1852.] Northern Antiquities. 133 



When the circumstances in which this monument was found are 

 considered, there can remain no doubt of its very great antiquity, 

 From the time the Cathedral of St. Andrew's was destroyed at the 

 Reformation, the roof was, unless in so far as it supplied building 

 stones, suffered to remain where it fell till 1826, when it was cleared 

 away down to the floor. In 1833, a grave was dug deeper than the 

 foundations of the Cathedral itself, six or eight feet lower than the 

 floor, and here the stone coffin was found, in separate pieces, and not 

 as if remaining where it had been originally placed — the richness of 

 the sculpture clearly indicating that it was meant to be a Sarcophagus 

 for exhibition above ground. 



We are thus at once carried back to the Twelfth Century at latest, 

 an age to which it could not have belonged, Scotland from this time 

 back, so far as history extends, being in a state of the utmost barbarism, 

 Yet here we have a series of representations most obviously Oriental — 

 the elaborately curled wig and massy sword-sheath of Old Assyria — 

 the lion and the monkey of tropical climates ! How came they to be 

 represented on a Scottish monument at all ? 



On many of the Runic stones, again, there is the figure of a 

 strange flapping-eared, long- snouted animal, which I have no doubt 

 represents an elephant : it is not at all like the animal itself, it is true, 

 though it is like no other in creation, but it very closely resembles the 

 figures of it I find in the Bombay Bazar. 



You will find on the Aberlemno stone two winged figures, and two 

 others on the Essie stone, one of these being defaced so as not to show 

 the bird's head in the lithographs. If you will turn to my sketch-book 

 you will find a drawing, made about twenty-five years ago, when the 

 stone was more entire than when Mr. Chalmers saw it, in which one 

 of these is represented as with a human figure, with an eagle's wings, 

 head and beak — it might in fact pass for a rude copy of one of Mr. 

 Layard's Assyrian drawings, as might the other winged figures just 

 referred to, for some of his other drawings. Surely coincidences such 

 as these can neither be fanciful nor accidental. 



