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I. An Account of some Extraordinary Structures on the Tops of Hills in the Highlands; with Remarks on the Progress of the Arts among the ancient Inhabitants of Scotland

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 January 2013

Alexander Fraser Tytler Esq.
Affiliation:
Professor of Civil History in the University of Edinburgh

Extract

In the year 1777, an account was published by Mr John Williams, mineral-engineer, of certain remains of ancient buildings on the summits of some of the hills in the Highlands of Scotland, which had hitherto escaped observation, and which to him afforded grounds for a very extraordinary supposition, That they had been cemented together by means of Fire. He mentioned several of those hills exhibiting remains of building, which he had visited and examined; particularly the hill of Knockfarril in Ross-shire, Craig-Phadrick near Inverness, Dun-Evan and Castle-Finlay in the county of Nairn, and the Castle-hill of Finhaven in the county of Angus. He described the vestiges of regular fortifications on the summits of those hills, of which the walls, remaining in some places of several feet in height, were evidently compacted together by the vitrification of the stones of which they were built; and he offered some ingenious conjectures with regard to the means employed in forming such extraordinary structures, and the purposes for which they might have been reared.

Type
Papers Read Before the Society
Copyright
Copyright © Royal Society of Edinburgh 1790

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References

page 19 note * La maniera riempiuta che si dice anco a cassa, facevano gli antichi, con tavole poste in coltello tanto spacio, quanto volevano che fosse grosso il muro, empiendolo di malta, e di pietre di qualunque forte mescolate insieme, e cosi andavano facendo di corso in corso. Si veggone muri di questa forte a Sirmion sopra il lago di Garda. Di questa maniera si possono anco dire le mura di Napoli, cioe le antiche, le quali hanno due muri di sasso quadrato, grossi quattro piedi, e distanti tra se piedi sei—e sono empiute di sassi e di terra. Pallad. Architect, lib. 1. cap. 9.

page 23 note * The picture given by Tacitus of the manner of life of the Germanic tribes, may probably be applied, with very little difference, to all the contemporary barbarous nations of Europe: “Nullas Germanorum populis urbes habitari satis notum est, ne pati “quidem inter se junctas sedes. Colunt discreti ac diversi, ut sons, ut campus, ut ne-“mus placuit. Vicos locant non in nostrum morem, connexis et cohærentibus ædificiis: “suam quisque domum spatio circumdat, five adversus casus ignis remedium, five inscitia ædificandi. Ne cæmentorum quidem apud illos, aut tegulorum usus.” Tacit. de. Mor. Germ. cap. 16.

page 23 note † Πολεις δε αυτων εισιν ὸι δςυμοι. πεςιφραξαντες γαρ δενδεσι ϰαταβεβλημειοις ενϱυχωϱη ϰυϰλον, ϰαι αυτοι ενταυϑα ϰαλυζοποιϨνται, ϰαι τα βοσϰηματα ϰαταςαЅαευοισιν, ἔ πϱος πολυν χϱονον. Strabo Geog. l. 4.

page 24 note * Horseley's Britannia Romana, p. 19, 20.Google Scholar; and Tacitus mentions both the fact and its cause. “Mox bella civilia et in rempublicam versa principum arma ac longa “oblivio Britanniæ etiam in pace.” Vit. Agric. cop. 13.

page 25 note * See an accurate account of the commencement of the commerce of Britain in Whitaker's History of Manchester, book 1. chap. 11.

page 25 note † About fifty coins of Cunobeline have come down to the present times. They are of gold, of silver and of brass; and some of them are elegant in their fabric and device.

page 26 note * Ad septuaginta millia civium et sociorum iis quæ memoravi locis, cecidisse constitit. Tacit. Annal. lib. 14. cap. 33.

page 26 note † Ubi fatis terruerat parcendo rurfus irritamenta pacis ostentare. Jul. Agric. Vit. cap. 20.

page 26 note ‡ Sequens hiems saluberrimis confiliis absumpta. Namque ut homines dispersi ac rudes, eoque bello faciles, quieti et otio per voluptates assuescerent, hortari privatim, adjuvare publice, ut templa, fora, domos extruerent, laudando promptos, aut castigando segnes—paullatimque discessum ad delinimenta vitiorum, porticus et balnea et conviviorum elegantiam. Jul. Agric. Vit. cap. 21.

page 27 note * Whitaker's Manchester, book I. chap. 7.

page 27 note † Or 84; for the year is not certain. See Horsley, p. 48Google Scholar.

page 28 note * Vit. Agric. cap. 22.

page 29 note * Julius Capitolinus, in his life of Antoninus Pius, mentions, that this Emperor excluded the barbarians from the Province, “alio muro cespitio,” which proves that the former, viz. that of Adrian, was of the same materials.

page 29 note † Whitaker's History of Manchester, book I. chap. 3. § 1.

page 29 note ‡ Its shape corresponds entirely to the name of an encampment with wings. Such is the actual form of the promontory; and although both Stukeley and Horsley place the station of Ptorotone at Inverness itself, it will be observed, this is nothing more than conjecture. The itinerary of Richard gives no authority for that precise situation; for the distance in miles between Ptorotone, and the preceding station Tuessis, is left blank in the itinerary, and the actual situation of Tuessis is likewise uncertain, Horsley 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 station beyond the Grampian mountains.—Since writing the above, it was a satisfaction 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.

page 31 note * This idea is not contradicted by the fact, of which we are assured by Cæsar, viz. That the Druids of Gaul were sent over for instruction to Britain. This fact proves only, that the British Druids, in the solitude of the distant island of Mona, had made farther advances in the sciences at that time, than their brethren on the continent. Cæsar indeed thence conjectures, that the Druidical system had been invented in Britain but this conjecture has no other bafis than the fact above mentioned.