The Clyde Mystery Part 2

These were found at intervals, and were held in position by stones and smaller jammers.'

The outer woodwork formed the foundation of another stone structure, of a horseshoe shape, having the open side to the north or landside of the tower, which doubtless was intended as a breakwater. By means of the ladder placed slantingly against the wall of the central stone building access could be got to the top in all states of the tides.

The people who occupied this watch-tower ground their own corn, and fared abundantly on beef, mutton, pork, venison, and sh.e.l.l-fish. The food refuse and other debris were thrown into the s.p.a.ce between the central structure and the breakwater, forming in the course of time a veritable kitchen-midden.

Besides the causeway on the north side, Mr. Bruce describes 'a belt of stones, forming a pavement about six feet wide and just awash with the mud,' extending westwards about twenty yards from the central cavity, till it intersected the breakwater. {31} These so-called pavements and causeways were probably formed during the construction of the tower with its central pole, or perhaps at the time of its demolition, as it would be manifestly inconvenient to transport stones to or from such a place, in the midst of so much slush, without first making some kind of firm pathway. Their present superficial position alone demonstrates the absurdity of a.s.signing the Dumbuck structures to Neolithic times, as if the only change effected in the bed of the Clyde since then would be the deposition of a few inches of mud. At a little distance to the west of these wooden structures there is the terminal end of a modern ditch ('the burn' of Mr. Alston), extending towards the sh.o.r.e, and having on its eastern bank a row of stepping- stones; a fact which, in my opinion, partly accounts for the demolition of the stonework, which formerly stood over them. So far, the facts disclosed by the excavations of the structures at Dumbuck, though highly interesting as evidence of the hand of man in the early navigation of the Clyde basin, present nothing very remarkable or improbable. It is when we come to examine the strange relics which the occupants of this habitation have left behind them that the real difficulties begin."

Dr. Munro next describes the disputed things found at Dumbuck. They were a.n.a.logous to those alleged to have been unearthed at Dunbuie. They were

"A number of strange objects like spear-heads or daggers, showing more or less workmanship, and variously ornamented. One great spear-head (figure 1), like an arrow-point, is 11 inches long and 4.75 inches wide at the barbs. The stem is perforated with two holes, in one of which there was a portion of an oak pin. It has a flat body and rounded edges, and is carefully finished by rubbing and grinding. One surface is ornamented with three cup-marks from which lines radiate like stars or suns, and the other has only small cups and a few transverse lines. There are some shaped stones, sometimes perforated for suspension, made of the same material; while another group of similar objects is made of cannel coal. All these are highly ornamented by a fantastic combination of circles, dots, lines, cup-and- rings with or without gutters, and perforations. A small pebble (plate XV. no. 10) shows, on one side, a boat with three men plying their oars, and on the other an incised outline of a left hand having a small cup-and-ring in the palm. The most sensational objects in the collection are, however, four rude figures, cut out of shale (figs. 50- 53), representing portions of the human face and person. One, evidently a female (figure 2), we are informed was found at the bottom of the kitchen midden, a strange resting-place for a G.o.ddess; the other three are grotesque efforts to represent a human face. There are also several oyster-sh.e.l.ls, ornamented like some of the shale ornaments, and very similar to the oyster-sh.e.l.l ornaments of Dunbuie.

A splinter of a hard stone is inserted into the tine of a deer-horn as a handle (plate xiii. no. 5); and another small blunt implement (no.

1) has a bone handle. A few larger stones with cup-marks and some portions of partially worked pieces of shale complete the art gallery of Dumbuck."

It seemed as if some curse were on Mr. Donnelly! Whether he discovered an unique old site of human existence in the water or on the land, some viewless fiend kept sowing the soil with _bizarre_ objects unfamiliar to Dr. Munro, and by him deemed incongruous with the normal and known features of human life on such sites.

VII--LANGBANK

The Curse, (that is, the forger,) unwearied and relentless, next smote Mr. John Bruce, F.S.A.Scot., merely, as it seems, because he and Mr.

Donnelly were partners in the perfectly legitimate pastime of archaeological exploration. Mr. Bruce's share of the trouble began at Dumbuck. The canoe was found, the genuine canoe. "It was at once cleared out by myself," writes Mr. Bruce. In the bottom of the canoe he found "a spear-shaped slate object," and "an ornamented oyster sh.e.l.l, which has since mouldered away," and "a stone pendant object, and an implement of bone." {34}

Such objects have no business to be found in a canoe just discovered under the mud of Clyde, and cleared out by Mr. Bruce himself, a man or affairs, and of undisputed probity. In this case the precise site of the dubious relics is given, by a man of honour, at first hand. I confess that my knowledge of human nature does not enable me to contest Mr.

Bruce's written attestation, while I marvel at the astuteness of the forger. As a finder, on this occasion, Mr. Bruce was in precisely the same position as Dr. Munro at Elie when, as he says, "as the second piece of pottery was disinterred by myself, I was able to locate its precise position at six inches below the surface of the relic bed." {35} Mr.

Bruce was able to locate _his_ finds at the bottom of the canoe.

If I understand Mr. Bruce's narrative, a canoe was found under the mud, and was "cleared out inside," by Mr. Bruce himself. Had the forger already found the canoe, kept the discovery dark, inserted fraudulent objects, and waited for others to rediscover the canoe? Or was he present at the first discovery, and did he subtly introduce, unnoted by any one, four objects of sh.e.l.l, stone, and bone, which he had up his sleeve, ready for an opportunity? One or other alternative must be correct, and either hypothesis has its difficulties.

Meanwhile Sir Arthur Mitch.e.l.l, not a credulous savant, says: "The evidence of authenticity in regard to these doubted objects from Dumbuck is the usual evidence in such circ.u.mstances . . . it is precisely the same evidence of authenticity which is furnished in regard to all the cla.s.ses of objects found in the Dumbuck exploration--that is, in regard to the canoe, the quern, the bones etc.--about the authenticity of which no doubts have been expressed, as in regard to objects about which doubts have been expressed." {36a}

Of another object found by a workman at Dumbuck Dr. Munro writes "is it not very remarkable that a workman, groping with his hand in the mud, should accidentally stumble on this relic--the only one found in this part of the site? Is it possible that he was an unconscious thought-reader, and was thus guided to make the discovery" of a thing which "could as readily have been inserted there half-an-hour before?"

{36b}

This pa.s.sage is "rote sarcustic." But surely Dr. Munro will not, he cannot, argue that Mr. Bruce was "an unconscious thought-reader" when _he_ "cleared out" the interior of the canoe, and found three disputed objects "in the bottom."

If we are to be "psychical," there seems less evidence for "unconscious thought-reading," than for the presence of what are technically styled _apports_,--things introduced by an agency of supra-normal character, vulgarly called a "spirit."

Undeterred by an event which might have struck fear _in constantem virum_, Mr. Bruce, in the summer of 1901, was so reckless as to discover a fresh "submarine wooden structure" at Langbank, on the left, or south bank of the Clyde Estuary opposite Dumbarton Castle. The dangerous object was cautiously excavated under the superintendence of Mr. Bruce, and a committee of the Glasgow Archaeological Society. To be brief, the larger features were akin to those of Dumbuck, without the central "well," or hole, supposed by Dr. Munro to have held the pole of a beacon- cairn. The wooden piles, as at Dumbuck, had been fashioned by "sharp metal tools." {37} This is Mr. Bruce's own opinion. This evidence of the use of metal tools is a great point of Dr. Munro, against such speculative minds as deem Dumbuck and Langbank "neolithic," that is, of a date long before the Christian era. _They_ urged that stone tools could have fashioned the piles, but I know not that partisans of either opinion have made experiments in hewing trees with stone-headed axes, like the ingenious Monsieur Hippolyte Muller in France. {38a} I am, at present, of opinion that all the sites are of an age in which iron was well known to the natives, and bronze was certainly known.

The relics at Langbank were (1) of a familiar, and (2) of an unfamiliar kind. There was (1) a small bone comb with a "Late Celtic" (200 B.C.-?

A.D.) design of circles and segments of circles; there was a very small penannular brooch of bra.s.s or bronze; there were a few cut fragments of deer horn, pointed bones, stone polishers, and so forth, all familiar to science and acceptable. {38b}

On the other hand, the Curse fell on Mr. Bruce in the shape of two perforated shale objects: on one was cut a grotesque face, on the other two incomplete concentric circles, "a stem line with little nicks," and two vague incised marks, which may, or may not, represent "fragments of deer horn." {38c}

We learn from Mr. Bruce that he first observed the Langbank circle of stones from the window of a pa.s.sing train, and that he made a few slight excavations, apparently at the end of September, 1901. More formal research was made in October; and again, under the superintendence of members of the Glasgow Archaeological Society, in September, October, 1902. No members of the Glasgow Committee were present when either the undisputed Late Celtic comb, or the inscribed, perforated, and disputed pieces of cannel coal were discovered. Ill.u.s.trations of these objects and of the bronze penannular ring are here given, (figures 1, 2, 3, 4), (two shale objects are omitted,) by the kindness of the Glasgow Archaeological Society (_Transactions_, vol. v. p. 1).

The brooch (allowed to be genuine) "might date from Romano-British times, say 100-400 A.D. to any date up to late mediaeval times." {39} Good evidence to date, in a wide sense, would be the "osseous remains," the bones left in the refuse at Langbank and Dumbuck. Of the bones, I only gather as peculiarly interesting, that Dr. Bryce has found those of _Bos Longifrons_. Of _Bos Longifrons_ as a proof of date, I know little. Mr.

Ridgeway, Disney Professor of Archaeology in the University of Cambridge, is not "a merely literary man." In his work _The Early Age of Greece_, vol. i., pp. 334, 335 (Cambridge University Press, 1901), Mr. Ridgeway speaks of _Bos_ as the Celtic ox, co-eval with the Swiss Lake Dwellings, and known as _Bos brachyceros_--"short horn"--so styled by Rutimeyer. If he is "Celtic" I cannot say how early _Bos_ may have existed among the Celts of Britain, but the Romans are thought by some persons to have brought the Celtic ox to the Celts of our island. If this be so, the Clyde sites are not earlier (or _Bos_ in these sites is not earlier) than the Roman invasion. He lasted into the seventh or eighth centuries A.D.

at least, and is found on a site discovered by Dr. Munro at Elie. {40a} Meanwhile archaeology is so lazy, that, after seven years, Dr. Bryce's "reports on the osseous remains" of Langbank and Dumbuck is but lately published. {40b}

{ Figs. 1, 2: p40a.jpg}

Dr. Bryce, in his report to the Glasgow Archaeological Society, says that "_Bos Longifrons_ has a wide range in time, from Neolithic down to perhaps even medieval times. It was the domestic ox in Scotland for an unknown period, before, during, and for an unknown time after the Roman invasion. . . . The occurrence of extinct, probably long extinct, breeds, and these only, make the phenomena in this respect at Langbank exactly comparable with those observed at sites of pile buildings in Scotland generally, and thus it becomes indirect evidence against the thesis that the structure belongs to some different category, and to quite recent times." {40c}

{ Fig. 3: p40b.jpg}

The evidence of the bones, then, denotes any date except a relatively recent date, of 1556-1758; contrary to an hypothesis to be touched on later. It follows, from the presence of _Bos_ at Elie (700 A.D.) that the occupants of the Clyde sites at Langbank may have lived there as late as, say, 750 A.D. But when they _began_ to occupy the sites is another question.

{ Fig. 4: p40c.jpg}

If Roman objects are found, as they are, in brochs which show many relics of bronze, it does not follow that the brochs had not existed for centuries before the inhabitants acquired the waifs and strays of Roman civilisation. In the Nine Caithness Brochs described by Dr. Joseph Anderson, {41} there was a crucible . . . with a portion of melted bronze, a bronze ring, moulds for ingots, an ingot of bronze, bits of Roman "Samian ware," but no iron. We can be sure that the broch folk were at some time in touch of Roman goods, brought by traffickers perhaps, but how can we be sure that there were no brochs before the arrival of the Romans?

We shall return to the question of the disputable relics of the Clyde, after discussing what science has to say about the probable date and original purpose of the wooden structures in the Clyde estuary. n.o.body, it is admitted, forged _them_, but on the other hand Dr. Munro, the one most learned authority on "Lake Dwellings," or "Crannogs," does not think that the sites were ever occupied by regular "crannogs," or lacustrine settlements, Lake Dwellings.

VIII--THE ORIGINAL DATE AND PURPOSE OF DUMBUCK AND LANGBANK

The actual structures of Langbank and Dumbuck, then, are confessedly ancient remains; they are _not_ of the nineteenth century; they are "unique" in our knowledge, and we ask, what was the purpose of their constructors, and what is their approximate date?

Dr. Munro quotes and discusses {43} a theory, or a tentative guess of Dr.

David Murray. That scholar writes "River cairns are commonly built on piled platforms, _and my doubt is_ whether this is not the nature of the structure in question" (Dumbuck). A river cairn is a solid pile of stonework, with, perhaps, a pole in the centre. At Dumbuck there is the central "well" of six feet in diameter. Dr. Murray says that a pole "carried down to the bottom would probably be sunk in the clay, which would produce a hole, or well-like cavity similar to that of the Dumbuck structure." {44}

It is not stated that the poles of river cairns usually demand accommodation to the extent of six feet of diameter, in the centre of the solid ma.s.s of stones, and, as the Langbank site has no central well, the tentative conjecture that it was a river cairn is not put forward. Dr.

Murray suggests that the Dumbuck cairn "may have been one of the works of 1556 or 1612," that is, of the modern age of Queen Mary and James VI. The object of such Corporation cairns "was no doubt to mark the limit of their jurisdiction, and also to serve as a beacon to vessels coming up the river."

Now the Corporation, with its jurisdiction and beacons, is purely modern.

In 1758 the Corporation had a "lower cairn, if it did not occupy this very spot" (Dumbuck) "it stood upon the same line and close to it. There are, however, no remains of such cairn," says Dr. Murray. He cites no evidence for the date and expenses of the demolition of the cairn from any munic.i.p.al book of accounts.

Now we have to ask (1) Is there any evidence that men in 1556-1758 lived on the tops of such modern cairns, dating from the reign of Mary Stuart?

(2) If men then lived on the top of a cairn till their food refuse became "a veritable kitchen midden," as Dr. Munro says, {45} would that refuse exhibit bones of _Bos Longifrons_; and over ninety bone implements, sharpened antlers of deer, stone polishers, hammer stones, "a saddle stone" for corn grinding, and the usual _debris_ of sites of the fifth to the twelfth centuries? (3) Would such a modern site exhibit these archaic relics, plus a "Late Celtic" comb and "penannular brooch," and exhibit not one modern article of metal, or one trace of old clay tobacco pipes, crockery, or gla.s.s?

The answers to these questions are obvious. It is not shown that any men ever lived on the tops of cairns, and, even if they did so in modern times (1556-1758) they could not leave abundant relics of the broch and crannog age (said to be of 400-1100 A.D.), and leave no relics of modern date. This theory, or suggestion, is therefore demonstrably untenable and unimaginable.

Dr. Munro, however, "sees nothing against the supposition" that "Dr.

Murray is right," but Dr. Munro's remarks about the hypothesis of modern cairns, as a theory "against which he sees nothing," have the air of being an inadvertent _obiter dictum_. For, in his conclusion and summing up he writes, "We claim to have established that the structures of Dunbuie, Dumbuck, and Langbank are remains of inhabited sites of the early-Iron Age, dating to some time between the fifth and twelfth centuries." {46a} I accept this conclusion, and will say as little as may be about the theory of a modern _origin_ of the sites, finally discarded by Dr. Munro. I say "discarded," for his theory is that the modern corporation utilised an earlier structure as a cairn or beacon, or boundary mark, which is perfectly possible. But, if this occurred, it does not affect the question, for this use of the structure has left no traces of any kind. There are no relics, except relics of the fifth (?) to twelfth (?) centuries.

In an earlier work by Dr. Munro, _Prehistoric Scotland_ (p. 439), published in 1899, he observes that we have no evidence as to the when, or how of the removal of the stones of the hypothetical "Corporation cairn," or "round tower with very thick walls," {46b} or "watch tower,"

which is supposed to have been erected above the wooden sub-structure at Dumbuck. He tentatively suggests that the stones may have been used, perhaps, for the stone causeway now laid along the bank of the recently made ca.n.a.l, from a point close to the crannog to the railway. No record is cited. He now offers guesses as to the stones "in the so-called pavements and causeways." First, the causeways may have probably been made "during the construction of the tower with its central pole," (here the cairn is a habitable beacon, habitable on all hypotheses,) or, again, "perhaps at the time of its demolition" about which demolition we know nothing, {47a} except that the most of the stones are not now _in situ._

Several authentic stone crannogs in Scotland, as to which we have information, possessed no central pole, but had a stone causeway, still extant, leading, _e.g._ from the crannog to the sh.o.r.e of the Ashgrove loch, "a causeway of rough blocks of sandstone slabs." {47b} If one stone crannog had a stone causeway, why should this ancient inhabited cairn or round tower not possess a stone causeway? Though useless at high water, at low water it would afford better going. In a note to _Ivanhoe_, and in his Northern tour of 1814, Scott describes a stone causeway to a broch on an artificial island in Loch Cleik-him-in, near Lerwick. Now this loch, says Scott, was, at the time when the broch was inhabited, open to the flow of tide water.

As people certainly did live on these structures of Langbank and Dunbuie during the broch and crannog age (centuries 5-12) it really matters not to our purpose _why_ they did so, or _how_ they did so. Let us suppose that the circular wall of the stone superstructure slanted inwards, as is not unusual. In that case the habitable area at the top may be reduced to any extent that is thought probable, with this limitation:--the habitable s.p.a.ce must not be too small for the accommodation of the persons who filled up the eastern third of an area of from twelve to fourteen feet in breadth, and in some places a foot in thickness, with a veritable kitchen-midden, of "broken and partially burned bones of various animals, sh.e.l.ls of edible molluscs, and a quant.i.ty of ashes and charcoal . . . ." {48}

But Dr. Munro a.s.sures me that the remains discovered could be deposited in a few years of regular occupancy by two or three persons.