The archaeology and prehistoric annals of Scotland . ing the passage to the endmore easy ; and I found nearly the whole of the props covered with similarlyengraved lines. Here there is much to excite admiration at the regularity andbeauty of so extraordinary a place ; and on turning to a prop on the western side,the imagination is farther exercised to perceive the purpose or use of three circularholes, sunk into the face of the stone, each about six inches deep, and the samein diameter : they communicate with each other, and form a sort of trough withinthe stone. It is divided in front by two
The archaeology and prehistoric annals of Scotland . ing the passage to the endmore easy ; and I found nearly the whole of the props covered with similarlyengraved lines. Here there is much to excite admiration at the regularity andbeauty of so extraordinary a place ; and on turning to a prop on the western side,the imagination is farther exercised to perceive the purpose or use of three circularholes, sunk into the face of the stone, each about six inches deep, and the samein diameter : they communicate with each other, and form a sort of trough withinthe stone. It is divided in front by two raised parts resembling in form the handlesto a Other cromlechs in Brittany are similarly decorated ; and Mr. Lukisarrives at the conclusion that in some of them the stones must havebeen engraved prior to their erection, from the ornaments extendinground the sides which are now covered by adjoining stones. Thesculjjtured decorations at Newgrange are no less remarkable, and thesame observation has been made in regard to them, that the carvings. must have been executed before the stones upon which they appear had been placed in their present positions. We shall not probably err Journal of the Archaeological Association, vol. iii. p. 272. SEPULCHUES. 333 in assigning as contemporaneous works with these rare and most pri-mitive examples of sculptured sepulchral chambers, the rude cists oc-casionally found decorated with similar devices, though otherwiseentirely unhewn. The annexed view of one of these incised slabs isengraved from a drawing presented to the Royal Society of Edinburghby Colonel Hugh Montgomery of Shielmorly, in 1785, and subse-quently transferred to the Society of Antiquaries. It formed thecover of a cist, discovered in digging a gravel-pit at Coilsfield, inAyrshire, and underneath it was found an urn filled with incineratedbones. The dimensions of the stone were about five feet in lengthby two and a httlf feet in breadth. The original drawing includesthe repr
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1850, bookidarchaeologyp, bookyear1851
