252 PRINCIPAL SIR WILLIAM TURNER ON 



possibly that in use by the Anglo-Saxon people after their conversion to Christianity, 

 and the occasional presence of iron in long cists, to which I have previously referred, 

 is not adverse to this view. In making this statement I do not wish it to be thought 

 that the type was exclusively used by persons of Anglo-Saxon descent, but with the 

 spread and universal acceptance of the Christian faith in the Lowlands it would 

 doubtless, from its simple construction and symbolic significance, be adopted and 

 become for a long period of years the general habit of the people. 



I would recall that some fifty years ago I saw for the first time in progress an 

 archaeological excavation of long cists in the Catstane field at Kirkliston (p. 226). 

 Sir James Y. Simpson, whom I accompanied, published an elaborate memoir on that 

 ancient stone, a pagan memorial, the inscription on which could, he thought, be read 

 as "Vetta F(ilius) Victi"; Vetta being regarded as the grandfather of Hengist and 

 Horsa, the Jutish invaders of Kent. Should this reading be correct, it would point to 

 the presence of Saxons north of the wall of Hadrian before Hengist landed in the isle of 

 Thanet, which Sir James thought might have been owing to Saxon soldiers who had 

 constituted an element in the Eoman army during its occupation of Britain. Should 

 it be the case, however, as some historians have indicated, that a direct Jutish 

 or Frisian invasion of the south-east coast of Scotland took place, the stone may 

 have been inscribed by them prior to the departure of the Romans. 



The measurements made by Dr John Beddoe* of the heads of persons in the 

 border counties of Scotland gave the mean cephalic index 76 "4, equal to an index 74 # 4 

 for the cranium ; measurements of heads in Edinburgh and the Lothians yielded the 

 index 77 "4, equal to the cranial index 75. The dolichocephalic and mesodolicho- 

 cephalic proportions associated them with the Anglo-Saxon type. 



The Anglo-Saxons in their turn were attacked by people known to history as the 

 Danes. The invasion began in the tenth century along the east and south coasts of 

 England, and continued at intervals for nearly half a century, when Canute became 

 king and ruled the south of England, London, and the eastern counties. Northumbria 

 also came under his influence ; but it is doubtful if the Lothians and Scottish border 

 counties did to a material extent, except perhaps on the sea coast, as they had been 

 lost to Northumbria and annexed to Scotland before the Danish invasion, when the 

 present border line became established. Although called Danes, the invaders were 

 from at least two of the three Scandinavian countries, and Norway undoubtedly 

 provided a large Norse contingent. 



About the same time western France was invaded by the Norsemen, who 

 established the dukedom of Normandy. In the latter half of the eleventh century 

 Eugland was conquered by the Norman French, who founded a dynasty, and 

 inaugurated a political and social revolution. No material change in the physical 

 type of the English people was induced by this new invasion, and it exercised no 

 influence on that of Scotland. 



"Sur Pliistoire de Pindex cdphalique dans les Isles Britanniques," in L' Anthropologic, vol. v, 1894. 



