My suggestion is that, if the Clyde objects are forged, the forger knew a good deal of archaeology—knew that perforated inscribed plaques of soft mineral occurred in many countries—but he did not slavishly imitate the patterns.
By a pleasant coincidence, at the moment of writing, comes to me the Annual Archaeological Report, 1904, of the Canadian Bureau of Education, kindly sent by Mr. David Boyle. He remarks, as to stone pendants found in Canadian soil, “The forms of what we call pendants varied greatly, and were probably made to adapt themselves to the natural shapes of water-worn stones. . . .” This is exactly what Dr. Munro says
about the small stone objects from the three Clyde stations. “The pendants, amulets, and idols appear to have been water-worn pieces of shale or slate, before they were perforated, decorated, and polished” (Munro, p. 254). The forger may have been guided by the ancient Canadian pendants; that man knows everything!
Mr. Boyle goes on, speaking of the superstitious still surviving instinct of treasuring such stones, “For some unknown reason, many of us exhibit a desire to pick up pebbles so marked, and examples of the kind are often carried as pocket pieces,” obviously “for luck.” He gives one case of such a stone being worn for fifty years as a “watch pendant.” Perforated stones have always had a “fetishness” attached to them, adds Mr. Boyle. He then publishes several figures of such stones. Two of these, with archaic markings like many in Portugal, and one with an undisputed analogue from a Scottish site, are reproduced (figs. 12, 13).
It is vain to tell us that the uses of such fetishistic stones are out of harmony with any civilisation. The civilisation of the dwellers in the Clyde sites was not so highly advanced as to reject a superstition which still survives. Nor is there any reason why these people should not have scratched archaic markings on the pebbles
as they certainly cut them on stones in a Scottish crannog of the Iron age.
Dr. Munro agrees with me that rude scribings on shale or slate are found, of a post-Christian date, at St. Blane’s, in Bute. [107] The art, if art it can be called, is totally different, of course, from the archaic types of decoration, but all the things have this in common, that they are rudely incised on shale or slate.
XXVIII—QUESTION AS TO THE OBJECTS AS ORNAMENTS OF THE PERSON
Dr. Munro now objects that among the objects reckoned by me as analogous to churinga is a perforated stone with an incised line, and smaller slanting side lines, said to have been found at Dumbuck; “9 inches long, 3½ inches broad, and ½ an inch thick.” [108] I wish that he gave us the weight. He says, “that no human being would wear this as an ornament.”
No human being wears any churinga “as an ornament!” Nobody says that they do.