104 Proceedings of the Royal Physical Society, 



of exactly similar remains, in such frequently occurring relations 

 to one another, as leaves little doubt of many of them having been 

 contemporaneous in their use ; metallic substances being of course 

 rarer and more valuable in those early days, as well as more perish- 

 able, and necessitating in most localities at the same time, the 

 frequent use of the more common articles of stone and bone. The 

 piled sites in this country appear, however, to have been in use 

 down even to a comparatively very recent period, and our Vice- 

 President, Mr Joseph Eobertson, considers, as the result of his 

 inquiries, that some of them had been occupied even in mediaeval 

 times. 



"We are told that habitations of a similar character still exist in 

 some parts of the world, as among the Papoos of New Guinea ; and 

 historical record tells us of their existence at least as far back as 

 the fifth century before Christ. Herodotus, in chap. 16 and lib. v. 

 of his Life, 1 states that when at the port of Eion on the river 

 Strymon, in Thrace (b.c. 459), he paid a visit to a people who lived 

 in houses built on piled platforms in the lake of Praseas — the 

 Sfcrymonic Lake — according to Colonel Leake the Takhimos of the 

 present day. This site has, it seems, been lately rediscovered by 

 M. Delville, 2 and antiquaries, I am sure, will wait with much 

 interest for a careful examination of these ancient lake dwellings 

 with their buried remains, for comparison with those of the Swiss 

 lakes; we would then be better able to judge whether, or how 

 much, it might be necessary to add to an antiquity like this, of 

 nearly 500 years before Christ, when attempting to calculate the 

 age of the corresponding remains that have been found in Western 

 Europe. 



Chemical Analysis of the Bronze Implement found at Kinleiih. — ■ 

 Being anxious to add another analysis of an ancient bronze to 

 those already given in our Proceedings, 3 I placed the bronze 

 implement, found at Kinleith, in the hands of our well-known 

 practical chemist and lecturer on chemistry, Dr Stevenson Mac- 

 adam, asking him, at the same time, if he could give me any 

 information of the cause of the different appearance and colour of 

 the serugo or patina which was shown on bronzes of different ages ; 

 whether the particular appearance of the patina might give any 

 information as to differences in their composition, and perhaps, 



1 Life and Travels of Herodotus by J. T. Wheeler, vol. i. p. 359, 1855 ; and 

 Eawlinson's Herodotus, vol. iii. p. 227, 1859. 



2 Nat. Hist. Eeview, vol. ii. p. 486, 1862. 



3 Proc. Aut. Scot., vol. iv. p. GOO. 



