RRE-HISTORIC DWELLINGS. 
363 
circles, and cairns, we need not touch upon, our business 
being with the homes of the cromlech-rearers and cairn- 
builders. In this country very little has been done in in- 
vestigating the very many hut-circles and other evidences of 
dwelling-spots which exist, chiefly in the North of England 
and Scotland. Had a tenth part of the labour been bestowed 
upon them which Continental archgeologists have given to the 
examination of the Swiss and German lake -dwellings, some of 
which habitations are probably contemporaneous with them in 
time, a remarkable series of evidences might have been obtained. 
Enough, however, has been done to indicate the relationship 
between the pre-Celtic dwellers in North Britain and those of 
the Continent, and to exhibit the identity of their modes of 
life. The buildings which we refer to tribes of this age 
throughout Europe, are of three several, though closely 
related, kinds — viz,, hut- circles, crannoges, and pfahlbauten, 
or lake- dwellings. Remains of the first class are to be sought 
for on dry moorlands. They have been met with on Clava 
Heath near Culloden, in Helmsdale in Sutherlandshire, on 
Yevering Bell in the Beamish Yalley, and other localities near 
the Cheviots, by Mr. George Tate, and at Keilder (Northum- 
berland) by the Rev. G. R. Hall ; but in all these examples 
from the Border country, the hut-circles were grouped closely 
together, and surrounded with a defensive line of earthworks. 
It is also probable that they were of younger age than the 
Helmsdale circles ; indeed, although their existing remains 
resemble those of the elder time, they have been described by 
Mr. Hall as being comparable in their inhabited condition 
with the wattle- work, huts of the Britons of the seventh 
century. These were all undoubtedly land- dwellings. Perhaps 
the Hottentot kraal is their nearest modern analogue. The 
examples which I figure as typical of the class are from Helms- 
dale, and to them I shall hereafter refer. 
The present appearance of these and other hut-circles 
which may be attributed to a pre- Celtic people is simple 
enough. A ring of stones gathered from the moor marks out 
the limits of the primitive house, and a broad flat slab in the 
centre points to the hearthstone of the family circle. It can 
scarcely be supposed that this simple home was entirely naked 
of covering, but as yet we have but the slightest reason 
for believing that a circle of erected logs supported a rude 
roof of wattle or timber, or entwined heather. Sufficient 
time, however, has passed since the circles were tenanted to 
account for the absence of every fragment of a sheltering roof, 
and the conservating element of water is absent, into which 
the erection, when it fell, might have sunk, as did the timbers 
of the lake- dwelling, and been preserved. The “ kitchen 
