It has now been shown that the intrusion of the Norwegian Paganism into the northern and western area of Scotland produced an extension into this country of types and phenomena which are purely indigenous to the Scandinavian area. But along with the types and phenomena that are purely Norwegian we also find, within the area of this intruded Paganism, a series of modified types—neither purely Celtic nor purely Scandinavian, but partaking to some extent of the distinctive characteristics of both. This has already been demonstrated in so far as the products of this commingling of distinctive styles and customs have been characterised by indications of Christianity;^[41] but there still remain to be discussed a group of phenomena and objects of this mixed character which either present no distinct indications of Christian associations or exhibit characteristics that are distinctive of Paganism.

I therefore proceed to describe a series of burials occurring within the same area in which the distinctive form of burial with arms, implements, and ornaments of purely Norwegian types also occur, but differing from these, inasmuch as though they present unequivocal indications of Paganism they do not so distinctly indicate their origin. As we examine their characteristics it will be seen that they form a group strictly local in its range, and possessing affinities which are rather Norwegian than Celtic.

In July 1869 the late Mr. George Petrie investigated the contents of a burial-mound, situated on the crown of a ridge overlooking the sea, at a place called Orem’s Fancy, in the island of Stronsay, Orkney. The burial-mound is a low, elongated accumulation of stones and earth, partly indistinguishable from the natural ridge, and apparently about fifty yards in length. Several burials had been discovered in it from time to time in the process of bringing it under cultivation. One of these (Fig. 51, No. 1), which was carefully examined by Mr. Petrie, was contained in a cist of rough slabs, the sides being 25½ inches and 22 inches in length, and the width and depth of the cavity about 23 inches. The bottom of the cist was formed of a rough slab, and the covering stone of a larger slab of the same character. The cist contained a large and somewhat irregularly-shaped urn of stone, hollowed evidently by a metal tool. The urn (Fig. 52) stood on the bottom slab of the cist (as shown in the foregoing section) and was covered by a thin slab of clay slate, rudely dressed Fig. 52.—Urn of Steatitic Stone from Cist No. 1, at Orem’s Fancy, Stronsay (17 inches high).
Fig. 52.—Urn of Steatitic Stone from Cist No. 1, at Orem’s Fancy, Stronsay (17 inches high). at the edges to a circular shape. The urn was filled to a depth of about 5 inches with burnt bones, largely mixed with vitrified matter, and run together in masses. No fragments of implements, weapons, ornaments, or other articles were present among the bones. The fragments of bone were greatly comminuted, but portions of the long bones, vertebral processes, and fragments of the skull were recognisable. The urn of stone was therefore the only remarkable feature of the interment. It is a rudely-formed vessel of irregularly-conical form, narrowing from the brim to the bottom. At the brim, which is oval in form, it measured 20¾ inches in its longer, and 18 inches in its shorter diameter. Its depth is 17 inches, and the greatest width across the bottom 15 inches. The rim is smooth and slightly rounded, and the marks of the tool by which the vessel was scooped out of the block of stone are distinctly visible. The stone is a soft and easily-worked steatite.

Adjoining this cist there was another 31 inches long, 21 inches wide, and 12 inches deep (Fig. 51, No. 2), which had been previously opened, and contained nothing but earth. Underneath it was a smaller cist, 13 inches long, 9½ inches wide, and 12½ inches deep (Fig. 51, No. 3). On the bottom stone of this under cist was a quantity of clay, in the centre of which there was a bowl-shaped cavity (i) nearly filled with burnt bones, and covered with a thin slab of clay slate, dressed to a circular form, over which was another layer of clay (k) about 2 inches thick, with a depression (h) in the middle, leaving a portion of the centre of the stone visible when the upper cover of the cist was lifted.

At a little distance another burial was discovered, placed simply in the mound without the protection of a cist The deposit of burned bones was contained in an urn of stone similar to the first, but slightly smaller, measuring across the mouth 19 inches in the longer and 15 inches in the shorter diameter, and 15 inches in depth. The urn had been simply set in the ground, the mouth covered with a flat stone, and a quantity of stones and earth heaped over it, so that its covering stone was scarcely more than 18 inches beneath the surface.

Another urn of the same character was found, also set in the ground about a foot below the surface. It had no covering stone. Two small cists containing burnt bones and ashes, but no urns, were also found in the mound separately. At a distance of seven yards from one of these there was a circular enclosure, formed of oblong beach stones, each about a foot long, and standing on end about a yard apart. Within this circle two other cists were discovered, each containing the usual indications of a burial after cremation—burnt bones, ashes, and charcoal—but no urns and no deposit of arms, implements, weapons, or ornaments.^[42]

In a large burial mound at Stennis, Orkney, excavated by Mr. Farrer^[43] in December 1854, another burial was found, accompanied by an urn of stone of this special character. The mound was 62 feet in diameter, and about 9 feet high, circular and flat on the top, the sides sloping at a considerable angle. Near the centre of the mound, and at a height of about 3 feet above the original level of the ground, there was a cist formed of massive side stones about 6 feet in length, and end stones about 2 feet in length, set in the middle of the space between the side stones, so that the cavity enclosed was only about 2½ feet long, 2 feet wide, and 2 feet deep. In the cist was an urn of steatitic stone (Fig. 53), 22½ inches Fig. 53.—Large Steatite Urn, found at Stennis, Orkney (20 inches high).
Fig. 53.—Large Steatite Urn, found at Stennis, Orkney (20 inches high). diameter across the mouth, and 20 inches high. It was filled to about one-third of its depth with calcined bones, largely mingled with vitrified matter. It differs from the Stronsay urn in having a triply incised border immediately underneath the rim. The burial-mound also differs from the Stronsay mound in being higher and more regularly-shaped. like the Stronsay mound, it contained more interments than one, although the excavation only revealed two.^[44] The second burial was a little beyond the centre of the mound, to the northward of the first, and at about the same height above the original surface of the ground. It was contained in a cist formed of rough flagstones placed on edge, which measured 33½ inches in length, and 19 inches in width. A small urn of baked clay, 5 inches diameter, and 5 inches deep, stood in the north-west corner of the cist. It contained fragments of calcined bones, and was unaccompanied by any other relics whatever. The urn fell to pieces, and has unfortunately not been preserved. In his account of it Mr. Petrie does not state whether it was plain or ornamented, and we are thus left with no more definite indication of its characteristics than that it was made of clay.

Quite recently a cluster of burial mounds at Corquoy, in the island of Rousay, Orkney, was examined by Mr. George M'Crie. The largest mound was about 50 feet in circumference, and 5½ feet high. It contained a cist in the centre, and on the level of the surrounding ground, composed of four side stones, a bottom stone, and a covering stone, the joints being coated with tempered clay. The cavity of the cist measured 2½ feet in length, by 2 feet in width, and 18 inches in depth. It was almost filled with clay, ashes, and fragments of bones. In the centre was an urn of steatite (Fig. 54), oval in shape, with a slightly bevelled rim. It measures 9¾ inches in its longer, and 8 inches in its shorter diameter, across the mouth, and stands 7 inches high.

The other mounds contained cists, but no urns or remains of any kind except comminuted fragments of bones.

There is in the Museum another urn of this material (Fig. 55) also from the island of Rousay, but unfortunately there is no record of the circumstances of its discovery. It is of steatite, oval in shape, the sides bulging from the bottom upwards. It measures 11 inches by 10 across the mouth, and stands 7½ inches high. It is rudely ornamented by incised lines cut round the outside immediately under the rim, and is still about one-third full of calcined human bones.

An urn of the same character (Fig. 56) was recently found in making a road through a sand hill about a mile north-east of Balfour Castle, in Shapinsay, Orkney. It was enclosed in a cist in a small tumulus, the cist being composed of four slabs for the sides and ends, and a slab for the bottom, with another flat stone for a cover. When found the urn was in fragments, but the fragments had been united by some kind of string, the fibrous texture of which was discernible in the holes which had been bored on either side of the fractures, and through which the cord had been passed to repair the breaks.

In 1874 a small burial mound, about 8 feet in diameter and 2½ feet high, was removed in the course of the construction of a road between the North and South Havens in Fair Isle, lying midway between Orkney and Shetland. In the mound there was found a large, oval-shaped, rudely-formed, and unornamented urn of baked clay. Although imperfect it measures upwards of 12 inches in height. Beside it there was a smaller urn of steatite (Fig. 57), also oval in shape, but Fig. 57.—Urn of Steatite, found in Fair Isle (4 inches high).
Fig. 57.—Urn of Steatite, found in Fair Isle (4 inches high). much more neatly formed. It measures 5½ inches in its longer diameter, and almost 5 inches in its shorter diameter across the mouth, and stands 4 inches high. Under the rim is a bevelled band, giving it something of an ornamental character. Close by this mound, in a flat space, there were found at intervals a number of flat stones, from 6 to 12 inches under the surface, and below each stone there was observed what is described as “a carefully-rounded hole, about 6 inches deep by 10 inches broad, very smooth in the inside, and lined with about an inch thick of a soft, black, adhesive substance, resembling a mixture of peat-moss and clay, and containing in the bottom a whitish substance resembling bone ash.” These phenomena thus imperfectly observed indicate in all probability a small cemetery of urns set in the ground, with stone covers, and having no mounds heaped over them.

In 1821 a mound in the island of Uyea, in Shetland, yielded a group of six interments, each consisting of an urn of this character filled with burnt human bones and ashes. Hibbert describes one of the urns as a well-shaped vessel, constructed of a soft magnesian stone, having the bottom made of a separate piece, and fitted into its place by a groove.^[45]

In the month of August 1863, when some excavations were being made on the summit of an eminence called the Meikle Heog, at Haroldswick, in the island of Unst, Shetland, for the purpose of planting a flag-staff as a fishing signal, the labourers broke into a place of sepulture formed of upright flagstones, and enclosing a number of skulls and bones. Further examination disclosed another cist similarly formed. Unfortunately there is no record of the dimensions of these cists. In the one last mentioned there were found a human skull, some bones of the ox, and six urns or vessels of chloritic schist or steatite.^[46] They were of different shapes and sizes, as follows:—

No. 1, a flat-bottomed vessel, with an unsymmetrical four-sided outline, the corners slightly rounded, and the sides bulging from the bottom upwards, about 7 inches high.

No. 2, a tolerably symmetrical four-sided vessel of similar form, but thinner and better made, measuring 5½ inches in length, 5¼ inches in width, and 3½ inches high.

No. 3, a rude thick-sided vessel of the same form, 6½ inches long, 4½ inches high, and 4½ inches wide.

No. 4, a rudely-made and unsymmetrical vessel, oval in outline, flat-bottomed, the sides bulging from the bottom upwards, and slightly contracting towards the rim, about 4 inches in length, 3¾ inches in width, and 4 inches high.

No. 5, a small cup-shaped vessel, oval in shape, 4½ inches long, 3 inches broad, and 2¾ inches high.

No. 6, a rather neatly-made oval vessel, 4½ inches long, and 4 inches wide at the brim, contracting to 2½ inches long, and 2 inches wide at the base. It is the only one in the group which bears any ornament, the ornament consisting of two incised lines scored round the upper part of the vessel, immediately under the rim.

These burials in the Meikle Heog differ from all the others that have been described, inasmuch as they are burials unburnt. The character of the vessels is also different, inasmuch as they are not cinerary urns placed in the grave for the purpose of containing the burned bones of the interment. But the general form of the vessels is similar to that of those which are found in Orkney and the Fair Isle, containing burnt bones, and the character of the ornament and the nature of the material of which they are made is identical.

Two vessels of stone, of the same irregularly oval shape, but slightly more ornate in character (Fig. 58), were turned up by the plough on the farm of Aucorn, in the parish of Wick, in Caithness, in 1853. The larger vessel is flat-bottomed, oval, and furnished with handles projecting from its ends. It measures 17 inches in its longest diameter, and 16 inches in its shortest diameter at the mouth, and stands 13 inches high. The smaller vessel is without handles, measures 10 inches in greatest, and 9 inches in its least diameter at the mouth, and stands 8 inches high. The ornamentation of both these vessels is similar in character to that of all the others, consisting of incised lines drawn round the outside, immediately below the rim. Unfortunately their contents were neither examined nor preserved, but Mr. Rhind states that it has been observed that the grain grows greener and richer on the spot where they were turned up than anywhere else in the field; and he infers from this, as well as from the character of the vessels themselves, that they were deposited with an interment or interments after cremation.

The largest vessel of this description which has been recorded is one which was presented to the museum in fragments in 1834. It was dug out of a mound called Wilkie’s Knowe, in the island of Westray, in Orkney, and an account of its discovery, which has not been preserved, was read to the Society in April 1835. The form of the vessel is oval, narrowing from the brim downwards. The circumference of the upper part is about 6 feet, and the thickness of the sides of the vessel 1½ inches. The material is the same chloritic or steatitic stone of which the others are formed.

These examples will suffice to show the general characteristics of this peculiar class of interments. They are interments of bodies usually burnt, but sometimes unburnt; usually placed in cisted mounds, sometimes singly, at other times in groups; and generally unaccompanied by any manufactured article except the urns. The character of the urns is peculiar. They are not of clay, but of stone. They are not circular, but oval or irregularly four-sided in shape. They vary extremely in size, the largest known being 6 feet in circumference, and the smallest less than 5 inches long and 3 inches high. They are characterised by extreme simplicity of form and decoration. When they are ornamented the decoration is confined to the scoring of two or more lines underneath the rim, and rudely parallel to it. Their range, so far as is at present known, is confined to Caithness, Orkney, and Shetland, the area proper of the old Norwegian Earldom of Orkney.

Urns of steatitic stone are of common occurrence in the burial mounds of the Viking time in Norway.^[47] But they are rarely placed in cists of stones, and they are usually accompanied by such deposits of arms, implements, and ornaments, as have been described in the previous Lecture. This form of burial, which is found in the area of the Norwegian colonisation of the north of Scotland, is not completely comparable to the common form in Norway. But it presents as its characteristic feature the single point in which Norwegian burials of that period differ from all others. Nowhere else in Europe are urns of steatite the characteristic feature of any class of burials. In this respect, therefore, these northern interments in Scotland link themselves with interments of the Viking time in Norway. But they are so far differentiated from the common Norwegian type as to constitute a distinct variety of that type peculiar to the area proper of the Norwegian colony which founded the earldom of Orkney in the time of the Scandinavian Paganism.

I now pass to the description of another series of objects, having no distinct connection with interments, but possessing associations and characteristics which also link them with the intrusion of the Norwegian element into the northern districts of Scotland.

In the month of March 1858 a boy, chasing a rabbit into a hole in the links of Skaill, in the parish of Sandwick, Orkney, found a few fragments of silver which had been unearthed by the rabbits at the mouth of their burrow. The news of this discovery soon spread in the neighbourhood, and a number of people having joined in the search, a large quantity of silver articles were found in the sand. Mr. George Petrie of Kirkwall (a zealous corresponding member of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland) was speedily upon the spot, and fortunately succeeded in securing the bulk of the articles, which had become dispersed in various hands, and they finally found their way through the Exchequer to the National Museum. The aggregate weight of silver thus recovered amounted to 16 lbs. avoirdupois.

The hoard, which had apparently been deposited in one spot, consisted of three classes of objects—personal ornaments, ingots of silver, and coins. The personal ornaments formed the bulk of the deposit. They were of three varieties—brooches, neck rings, and arm rings, all of silver.

The brooches are of great size, and unusually heavy and massive in their construction. The metal is brittle, and most of them are more or less broken. The largest of those that are entire (Fig. 59) consists of a plain penannular ring, formed of a solid cylindrical rod of silver, ¼ inch thick, the ring forming an incomplete circle 6¼ inches diameter, and terminating in bulbous knobs, which are furnished with expansions giving them a strong resemblance to thistle heads. These knobs are each 1¼ inches in diameter. They have been cast hollow, with a short cylindrical collar at either side, through which the ends of the ring of the brooch pass, to be riveted at their terminations. A similar knob with similar collars at either side fits loosely on the ring of the brooch. Its upper part terminates in the conventional thistle head, and its lower part is prolonged into a stout pin of great length. This pin, which is fitted by a socket at its upper end upon a projection of the bulbous head, is, like the ring of the brooch, a solid rod of hammered silver, cylindrical in the upper part, passing into a squarish section in the middle of its length, and tapering gradually to a bluntish point. The total length of the pin from head to point is 15 inches. The only parts of the brooch that are ornamented are the knobs and their collars, and the terminal expansions which give their suggestive resemblance to thistle heads. The spherical surfaces of the knobs are plain on one hemisphere, and the other is decorated with engraved designs of zoomorphic character (Figs. 71-73), to which I shall direct attention at a subsequent stage, for the purpose of determining the typical relationship of the style of ornament. The collars are decorated by a series of bands of engraved parallel lines, passing obliquely across the spaces they fill. The terminal expansions are decorated with triangular spaces, filled with parallel lines, and alternating with spaces that are plain.

Another brooch, the pin of which is gone, is a similar ring of hammered silver, ¼ inch thick, and 6¾ inches diameter, with bulbous knobs, which are plain, though the collars and terminal expansions are ornamented with a T-like fret, and with bands of triangles filled with parallel lines.

Among the other brooches there are three which present a different variety in the ornamentation of their bulbous extremities. The largest of these is formed of a solid cylindrical bar of silver, ⅜ of an inch in thickness, bent into an incomplete circle 8 inches in diameter, and terminating in bulbous expansions 1½ inches in diameter. The pin of this brooch is gone, but if it bore the same proportion to the diameter of the ring as is exhibited by that of the brooch first described, it could not have been much under 20 inches in length. The bulbous knobs of this brooch are differently ornamented on their opposite hemispheres. The surface of the one hemisphere is covered with a peculiar prickly ornamentation, which intensifies their suggestive resemblance to thistle heads. These prickles have been cut out of the solid. They are square at the base, cylindrical, and slightly tapering at the points. They stand somewhat over an eighth of an inch in height, and each has been separately finished in the upper part by a hollow drill. The opposite hemispheres of the bulbs are ornamented by engraved circular patterns of interlaced work (Fig. 68), and the collar of the expanded part is also ornamented with a running pattern of interlaced work (Fig. 70.)

The second of these three brooches (Fig. 60), is equally massive and handsome, though smaller. The ring is a solid cylindrical bar of silver, ¾ inch in thickness, bent into an incomplete oval 5½ inches in diameter. The bulbous ends of the penannular ring are decorated on the one hemisphere with the prickly ornament which has just been described, and on the other hemisphere by a T-shaped fret, enclosed in a circle placed in a lozenge-shaped space, bordered by incised lines, as shown in the woodcut under the figure of the brooch.

The third of these brooches consists of a penannular ring, formed of a solid cylindrical rod of silver ¼ inch thick, and 6½ inches diameter. It wants the pin, but the head, which is still on the ring, is furnished with a tapering projection, which fitted into a socket in the upper end of the pin. The bulbous extremities are not ornamented on one hemisphere with the prickly ornament, but have the one hemisphere plain and the other decorated with patterns of zoomorphic character (Figs. 75 and 76), while the bulbous head of the pin, which still remains on the ring of the brooch, has the remarkable anthropomorphic ornamentation shown in Fig. 77, and on the circular top of the pin-head is seen the interlaced ornament shown in Fig. 69.

Another brooch with bulbous extremities, which also wants the pin, has its bulbs plain. Along with these bulbous ring-brooches there are other three examples of the same type which present variations in the form of the extremities of the pin and the penannular ring.

The largest of these (Fig. 61) consists of a solid cylindrical rod of silver, ¼ inch in thickness, bent into an incomplete circle 5 inches in diameter. The pin, which wants the point, has a bulbous head of the same character as those previously described, but the prickly ornamentation is merely indicated by incised lines crossing each other diagonally. The other hemisphere of the bulbous head of the pin is decorated with a circle enclosing an equal-armed rectangular cross. The top of the pin presents a similar ornament, which might be described as a St. Andrew’s Cross; but there is nothing in the character of either of these figures which might not be present in a purely geometric ornament, and they need not therefore be supposed to possess a symbolic significance. The ends of the penannular ring of the brooch, instead of being furnished with bulbs, are slightly flattened and expanded, and their ornamentation consists of a simple dotted margin, with a triplet of larger dots placed in triangular form at the extremities of the expansions of the ring.

Other two brooches of this form are smaller, and their pins have no bulbous heads, but are simply looped on to the ring of the brooch. The smaller of the two is perfectly plain; the larger has the expanded ends of the ring ornamented with zoomorphic interlaced work, slightly engraved in the silver with a very fine point.

It is thus evident that the special peculiarity of these brooches is their excessive size, their massiveness and solidity of construction, the bulbous form of their terminal expansions, and their prickly and engraved ornamentation.

We pass now to the examination of the neck and arm rings found with them. The commonest form of the neck rings is a circlet of about 5 inches diameter, composed of a series of thicker and finer strands, twisted spirally together, and passing at the ends into flattened expansions, terminating in hooks. One, 5¼ inches diameter (Fig. 62), is composed of two thick strands, spirally intertwisted with two sets of finer wires, each set consisting of a plait of two very thin wires, bordered by a single fine wire on each side. These lie in the hollows of the twists between the thicker strands, and add greatly to the beauty of the necklet. The ends of all the strands are united together, forming terminal flattened expansions, which are provided with recurving hooks to fasten the ring when worn. There are ten examples of this type, differing only in the arrangements of thicker strands, with twisted wires of various degrees of fineness.

Another variety, an example of which is shown in Fig. 63, is formed of seven hammered rods of equal thickness, closely interplaited like the thong of a whip. The central portion of the ring is a solid knob, oval in shape, from which the strands decrease in thickness towards the extremities, where they are soldered together and drawn out into a cylindrical tapering rod, which is coiled into a spiral termination, and the two ends recurved so as to hook into each other when the ring was worn.

Another of these interplaited rings (Fig. 64) is formed of three plaits of two strands each, spirally twisted together, and intertwisted with double strands of very small wires, also plaited together, which lie in the interstices of the larger plaits. The thicker wires taper slightly towards the extremities, where they are soldered into solid flattened ends, one of which terminates in a hook, while the other is furnished with an eye to fasten the ring when worn. The flattened ends are ornamented with punched triangular depressions, having a raised dot in the centre.

There are two of the arm rings which are of the same construction as the neck rings. Both are closed rings, though both are treated with respect to their ornament as if they were penannular. One is formed of a series of thick strands and finer wires, spirally intertwisted. The other (Fig. 65) is of more elegant design. It is 3¼ inches in its inner diameter, and is formed of four sets of two strands of wire, each set being separately twisted, and the four double twists intertwisted spirally. The strands decrease in thickness from the middle of the armlet towards the ends, where they are soldered to a bar, formed into the semblance of two animal’s heads, grasping in their mouths the part which forms the junction between the penannular ends of the ring.

Besides these neck rings and armlets formed of intertwisted rods and wires, there were in the hoard twenty-five solid penannular rings of silver, bent to an elongated oval, and tapering slightly towards the extremities. They vary in size from 2½ to 3¼ inches in the long diameter, and are thus of a size sufficient to enclose the wrist. They are either quadrangular or circular in section, and, except in one instance, they bear no ornament whatever. The solitary exception (Fig. 66) is ornamented by a series of triangular markings impressed by a punch, having three dots in the field. Another armlet of a different form (Fig. 67) is a flat thin band of silver, wider in the middle than towards the ends, and terminating in a hook at one extremity, the other being broken. This example is the only one of its kind in the hoard. It is also ornamented with a double row of impressed triangles, having two dots in the field.

With these personal ornaments of various kinds, which constituted the bulk of the hoard, there was a small quantity of bullion, and a few coins.

The bullion consisted of a number of ingots of silver, some entire, others cut, and a quantity of fragments of brooches and arm-rings chopped up into small pieces, as if with an axe or chisel. The largest ingot is 3¼ inches in length, and weighs 1089 grains.

The coins were few—at least few were recovered—although from their small size and thinness they were more liable to be overlooked in the hasty and promiscuous grubbing of many treasure-seekers. One is a St. Peter’s penny struck at York, of tenth century date. Another is a penny of King Æthelstan (A.D. 925), struck at Leicester. All the others are Asiatic, of the time when the seat of the Mohammedan Caliphate was at Cufa or Bagdad. Three of these Cufic coins belong to the Abbaside Caliphs, and seven to the Samanian dynasty. They range in their dates between A.D. 887 and 945, and the places of mintage, still legible, are Al-shash, Bagdad, and Samarcand.

Let us now group the characteristics of this deposit. It is a hoard buried in the earth, but with no indication of its having been in any way connected with the rites of sepulture. It is a large hoard, altogether amounting to 16 lbs. in weight. It is entirely of silver, and consists of personal ornaments, ingots, and coins. The ornaments are brooches, neck rings, and arm rings. The brooches are of penannular form, but differ in their character from those we have learned to recognise as distinctively Celtic. The neck rings and arm rings present no features of a specially Celtic character. The coins are Cufic and Anglo-Saxon, dated mostly in the end of the ninth and the first half of the tenth centuries.

No similar hoard has been discovered in any other part of Scotland. But in its general composition the Skaill hoard resembles a considerable number of other hoards of similar articles which have been found in other countries. They are most abundant in the eastern parts of Sweden, less common in Norway, and of occasional occurrence in Denmark. In none of these countries has there been found a hoard consisting of such a large number of personal ornaments as that found at Skaill, but the forms and the character of the ornaments found in these hoards of silver, associated with mintages of the ninth and tenth centuries, are always the same. The specialty of these hoards so found in Scandinavia is that they are largely composed of Cufic and Anglo-Saxon coins.^[48] The personal ornaments associated with them consist for the most part of large rings for the neck, formed of intertwisted rods and wires; arm rings of similar character, or of solid bars, circular or quadrangular in section, bent into a penannular oval, and ornamented with the peculiar triangular patterns impressed by a punch, with dots in the field. The brooches, with long pins and bulbous ends like thistle heads, are less common, but occur occasionally in such hoards in all the three Scandinavian countries. In many of the hoards there are also ingots, and dismembered ornaments cut and hammered into lumps of mere bullion. “This fact,” says Hildebrand, “shows that they had no value with the people who possessed them, except the intrinsic value of the metal.” Weighing scales and weights are sometimes also found with them, and close examination reveals the fact that the ornaments and portions of ornaments have been often tested with a cutting instrument to try their purity. This again reveals the trafficker rather than the plundering Viking, who carries off his spoil without any such careful examination; and, according to this view, Mr. Hildebrand concludes that the silver ornaments and the Cufic coins must be considered as equally foreign to Scandinavia. “There can be no doubt,” he says, “that these ornaments, ingots, and lumps of silver were brought with the coins from Asia, where silver is more easily obtained than in the northern parts of Europe.” With reference to this conclusion it may be remarked that while the derivation of the Cufic coins needs no demonstration, and while it may be admitted that other products of the Arab civilisation of the time were brought by the same stream of commerce through Russia to the Scandinavian countries, and thence to Scotland, England, and Ireland, it still remains to be shown that these silver ornaments are Oriental in their origin. This can only be demonstrated by showing that they are allied by their forms and ornament to the Oriental types of that period; or, if this cannot be done, it must at least be shown that they differ so widely in form and ornament from the types of the western lands in which they are found as to forbid the supposition that they may be of western origin.

We have no knowledge of the types of personal ornaments in use in Asia at the time indicated by the dates of mintage of these Cufic coins. It is impossible, therefore, to establish the Oriental origin of these silver ornaments by demonstrating their identity of type with Oriental ornaments of that period. The question which remains for discussion, therefore, is, whether their forms and ornament present such relations to the forms and the ornament of any of the western countries in which they are found, as will correlate them with known types of native origin.

In 1840 a large hoard of silver ornaments, weighing upwards of a thousand ounces, along with a quantity of silver coins, from six to seven thousand in number, was discovered concealed in a leaden chest, and buried in the soil at Cuerdale, near Preston, in Lancashire. The coins consisted chiefly of Anglo-Saxon pennies, with a few of French and some Cufic mints, and the inference from the data they afford is that the deposit was probably made at some time subsequent to the commencement of the tenth century. The personal ornaments in the hoard consisted chiefly of rings of various sizes and of similar character to those that have been described as occurring in the deposit at Skaill. Some of the larger rings were composed of interplaited rods and twisted wires like those from Skaill, and the solid rings were also ornamented with patterns produced by impressions of a triangular punch, with dots in the field. There were also some fragments of the peculiarly-shaped brooches, with bulbous knobs and prickly ornamentation. One object in the hoard was distinctively Scandinavian—a small Thor’s hammer of silver, such as were commonly worn as amulets in the heathen time. Among the fragments described at the time as incapable of being determined, there are four which may now be said with certainty to be portions of penannular brooches of the distinctively Celtic form. This Celtic relationship was not perceived by Mr. Hawkins (who described them), except in one instance, which he recognises as “so much resembling the patterns on early crosses and architectural remains, that it is difficult to assign to it any other than a Northern origin.” But his general conclusion is that “it is scarcely consistent with sound reasoning upon all the facts of the case to assign any but an Oriental origin to these objects.” In this he is supported by Mr. Worsaae, who says that as these silver ornaments are not found in the west of Europe except in association with Cufic coins, and do not occur at all in the interior or southern parts of Europe, he regards it as without doubt that Mr. Hawkins has been perfectly right in giving an Oriental origin to at least a great part of the silver ornaments found at Cuerdale.

Setting aside these conclusions, in so far as they are merely conjectural, it appears established that the area over which these deposits of silver ornaments are found is limited to the three Scandinavian countries and the British Isles. It is certain that among the ornaments so found some are distinctively Scandinavian, and others distinctively Celtic, while the remainder, which constitutes the bulk of the deposits, is of unknown derivation, but has been conjecturally assigned to an Oriental origin, on account of its association with the Cufic coins. I therefore proceed to the examination of these objects which are of undetermined origin, with the view of ascertaining the special characteristics and relations of their form and ornament.

I have already remarked that the form of these bulbous brooches is that which is distinctive of the Celtic brooch—penannular, with expanded ends. Its special peculiarities are exaggerations of the specialties of form by which the Celtic type is distinguished from all others; and in this respect the form assumed by these bulbous brooches, though Celtic in type, is so strongly differentiated from the purely Celtic form, that it may be regarded as a distinct variety. No other form of brooch is so huge and massive, with such a length of pin. The Celtic brooch-maker was so much more of an artist than the mere silversmith that he flattened the ring of the brooch and broadened its terminal expansions in order to provide space for the elaborate surface decoration in which he delighted. The maker of these bulbous brooches, on the other hand, is so much more of the silversmith than of the artist that the bulk of his work is merely finished with the hammer—the ring and the pin are beaten into form, and the expansions made globular instead of flat. The form of these brooches, therefore, agrees with the Celtic form in its main features, its penannular character, and its length of pin, loosely looped on the ring of the brooch.

But if the form of these brooches be thus closely allied to the Celtic form, their ornament is no less closely allied to the Celtic system of ornamentation. The peculiar prickliness of the bulbs, which is the most marked feature of their character, is not distinctively Celtic, but a suggestion of it is occasionally found on Celtic silver-work, as, for instance, on the almost globular head of a Celtic brooch in the National Museum, and on a gold brooch found near Coleraine.^[49] But the reverse hemispheres of the bulbous terminations of the Skaill brooches, which present this prickly ornamentation on the obverse, are also decorated with engraved designs. These are of two varieties, simple interlaced ribbon patterns and zoomorphic patterns. The character of the interlaced work so closely resembles the Celtic style that it may be said to be more Celtic than Scandinavian. The character of the zoomorphic work, on the other hand, is more Scandinavian than Celtic, and is suggestive of the style and treatment of the designs on the Manx crosses, while it more closely resembles some of the more characteristic designs of the purely Scandinavian metal-work of the heathen time.

The interlaced work is present on the reverse hemispheres of the bulbs of one of the largest of the prickly brooches, in the form of a circular pattern (Fig. 68) which is common in Celtic work, and may be seen on several of the sculptured monuments of the east coast of Scotland. Another circular pattern of interlaced work (Fig. 69), differing in its construction, but possessing the Celtic peculiarity of the divided bands, is found on the head of the pin of another brooch. The collars of the first-mentioned example are also surrounded by bands of interlaced work in a running pattern (Fig. 70), which is common on Celtic stone and metal work.