As this is the last of the great groups containing first-class circles, which we shall have to deal with in the following pages, it may be well to try and sum up, in as few words as possible, the points of the evidence from which we arrive at the conclusion that it may be of the date above assigned to it:—
1. History is absolutely silent either for or against this theory. In so far as the litera scripta is concerned, it may either have been erected by the Phœnicians or in the time of the Stuarts.
2. The Danish theory is of no avail. No flint, bone, or bronze or iron implements have been found in a position to throw any light on its age.
3. There are in the islands some thousands of small mole-hill barrows—insignificant, stoneless, unadorned.
4. All parts of the Stennis group show design and power, and produce an effect of magnificence.
5. It seems evident that the circles and the barrows belong to two different peoples.
6. If so, the barrows belong to the Peti and Pape; the large howes and the stone monuments to the Northmen.
7. If this is so, the latter belong to the two centuries comprised between 800 and 1000 A.D.
8. Maes-Howe, being unique, must have belonged to the shortest, but most magnificent dynasty in the Island.
9. With regard to Havard. He was killed on, or close to the spot where Maes-Howe now stands.