An Attempt to Explain the Origin and Meaning of the Early Interlaced Ornamentation Found on the Sculptured Stones of Scotland, Ireland, and the Isle of Man

AN ATTEMPT TO EXPLAIN THE ORIGIN AND MEANING OF THE EARLY INTERLACED ORNAMENTATION FOUND ON THE Ancient Sculptured Stones OF SCOTLAND, IRELAND, AND THE ISLE OF MAN.
BY GILBERT J. FRENCH, OF BOLTON.
PRINTED FOR PRESENTATION ONLY.
MANCHESTER: PRINTED BY CHARLES SIMMS AND CO. 1858.


Any reasonable and honest attempt to explain the origin of the singularly elegant interlaced ornamentation, familiar to archæologists as the very earliest style of artistic decoration known in the British islands, must be entitled to, and I feel assured will receive, favourable consideration. Even should the attempted explanation fail to obtain entire sanction, it will at least lead to attentive and accurate observations upon an interesting subject, which may at some future time refute or establish the theory which I venture to propound.
My remarks are confined to sculptured stones only, though the subject would be greatly elucidated and my argument enforced by references to manuscripts and metal ornamentation. This ground, however, is so well occupied by gentlemen who have made palæography and metallic art their peculiar study that I decline intruding upon it, even had it been possible to treat it satisfactorily within the limits of this paper.
The aborigines of this or any other country of corresponding climate, after discovering some natural cave, or making for themselves a rude hut, would probably take their next step in constructive art by attempting to form such utensils as might contain, and enable them to preserve, the fruits and seeds necessary for food. Assuming that they were then unprovided with even the rudest tools,—for we refer to a time before our far-off ancestors knew the use of bronze or iron,—they would form these utensils by twisting together the long, pliant osiers with which the land abounded, and of which, by the unaided action of the fingers, they could form baskets excellently adapted for the required purpose.
No other branch of art is even now so independent of tools, and none has been so universally diffused or so long and uninterruptedly practised as basket making. It is the humble parent of all textile art, the most elaborate tissues produced by the loom or the needle being but progressive developements proceeding from the rude wattle-work of unclothed savages. Basket making is the first natural step in the path of civilization. To this day the earliest effort of infantile ingenuity among the rural population is directed to making (as it were by intuitive instinct) personal ornaments of plaited rushes, and that, too, in patterns, some of which are identical with the devices engraved by our pre-historic ancestors on their old sculptured stones.