3 o ANCIENT FORTIFICATIONS in 



any rate, it is certain there were feveral Roman ftations in that 

 neighbourhood, as Tueffis, Varis and Ptorotone, which is fuffi- 

 cient for our purpofe. It is then evident, that, in the reign 

 of Antoninus Pius, and within a few years of A. D. 140, the 

 date of his vallum, the Romans had fixed praefidk. and built 

 caftella in the neighbourhood of Invernefs, from which part of 

 Scotland, there was an uninterrupted military road, as appears 

 by Richard's itinerary, to the Land's end in Cornwall. At this 

 period, therefore, the inhabitants of this region of Scotland 

 mud have been acquainted, from the practice of the Romans, 

 with the art of building with mortar. And, as the ftrucfture 

 of thofe hill-fortifications demonftrates the ignorance of the 

 builders of the ufe of that cement, the moft complete evidence 

 thence arifes, that they were reared prior to the time above 

 mentioned, that is, above fixteen centuries and a half ago. 



But how far beyond that period we are to fearch for the 

 date of thofe fingular fortifications, flill remains in doubt. 

 All that we can, with certainty, conclude, is, that they belong 

 to a period of extreme barbarifm. They muft have been con- 

 ftru&ed by a people fcarcely removed from the ftate of favages, 

 who lived under no impreflion of fixed or regulated property 

 in land, whofe only appropriated goods were their cattle, and 

 whofe fole fecurity, in a life of conftant depredation, was the 

 retreat to the fummits of thofe hills of difficult accefs, which 

 they had fortified in the beft manner they could. As the fpace 

 inclofed was incapable of containing a great number of men, 

 efpecially if occupied in part by cattle, it is prefumable, that 

 thefe retreats were formed chiefly for the fecurity of the wo- 

 men 



for the diftance in miles between Ptorotone, and the preceding ftation Tueffis, is left 

 blank in the itinerary, and the actual fituation of Tueffis is likewife uncertain, Hor.sl.ey 

 fixing it at Nairn, and Stukeley at Ruthven on the Spey. All that is certainly known 

 from Richard's itinerary, is, that Ptorotone was the third Roman ftation beyond the 



Grampian mountains. Since writingthe above, it was a fatisfa&ion to me to find, that 



General Roy, in his elegant map of Roman North Britain, has actually placed Ptoroton, 

 or Ptorotone, at the burgh-head of Moray. 



