In England, Scotland, Wales, and the island Anglesey, there are numbers of monuments erected by the ancients; but the most remarkable are generally found in the two latter, whither the old Britons retreated from their Roman and Saxon conquerors; and Anglesey, the ancient Mona, is supposed to have been the chief seat of the Druids. The remains of most consequence are the cromlechs, the tumuli, and the cumuli or carrnedds. Cromlech, if the word is derived from the British roots krom laech, signifies a bending stone.[52] This is the common opinion, as Rowland observes.[53] If we trace the origin to the Hebrew, the root of the old British,[54] we shall find it not less significativ; for cærem luach signify devoted stone, or altar. These cromlechs consist of large stones, pitched on end in the earth, as supporters, upon which is laid a broad stone of a vast size. The supporters stand in a bending posture, and are from three to seven feet high. The top stone is often found to be of twenty or thirty tons weight, and remains to this day on the pillars. Numbers of these are found in Wales and Anglesey; but none is more remarkable than that in Wiltshire, called stone henge, for a full description of which I must beg leave to refer you to Camden's Britannia, vol. I, page 119. These cromlechs are doubtless works of great antiquity; but for what purpose they were erected, at such an immense expense of time and labor as would be necessary to convey stones of thirty tons weight a considerable distance, and raise them several feet, is not easily determined. The probability is that they were altars for sacrifice, as pieces of burnt bones and ashes are found near them. They might also be used in other ceremonies, under the druidical system, as the ratification of covenants, &c. As this kind of monuments is not found in America, I will wave a further consideration of it; observing only, that it was an ancient practice among the eastern nations, to raise heaps of stones, as witnesses of agreements, and sacrifice upon them, as a solemn ratification of the act of the parties. Many instances of this ceremony are mentioned in the old testament. The covenant between Jacob and Laban was witnessed by a heap of stones, which served also as a boundary between their respectiv claims. "And Jacob offered sacrifice upon the mount, that is, the heap, and called his brethren to eat bread." Gen. xxxi, 54. A similar custom seems to have prevailed among the primitiv Britons.
But the tumuli, barrows or mounts of earth, which remain in multitudes in England and Wales, are constructed exactly in the manner of the barrows, described by Mr. Jefferson and Mr. Heart. One of these in Wiltshire, Camden thus describes.[55] "Here Selbury, a round hill, rises to a considerable height, and seems by the fashion of it, and the sliding down of the earth about it, to have been cast up by mens hands. Of this fort there are many in this country, round and copped, which are called burrows or barrows; perhaps raised in memory of the soldiers slain there. For bones are found in them, and I have read, it was a custom among the northern people, that every soldier who survived a battle, should bring a helmet full of earth towards the raising of monuments for their slain fellows."
This is said to be the largest and most uniform barrow in the country, and perhaps in England; and I regret that the height and circumference are not mentioned. I am however informed verbally by a gentleman who has visited England, that some of these tumuli appear to have been nearly one hundred feet high.[56] There are also in the same country several kinds of barrows of different sizes; some surrounded with trenches; others not; some with stones set round them, others without any; the general figure of them is nearly circular, but a little oval.
In Penbrokeshire, in Wales, Camden informs us[57] "there are divers ancient tumuli, or artificial mounts for urn burial, whereof the most notable I have seen, are those four, called krigeu kemaes, or the burrows of kemeas. One of these a gentlemen of the neighborhood, out of curiosity, and for the satisfaction of some friends, caused lately to be dug; and discovered therein five urns, which contained a considerable quantity of burnt bones and ashes." If there is any difference between these barrows, and those at Muskingum, it is this, that in Wales the bones were lodged in urns; probably this was the fate of the bodies of eminent men only, or it proves a greater degree of improvement in Britain than appears among the American savages.
In Caermardhinshire, there is a barrow of a singular kind. It is called, krig y dyrn (probably the king's barrow.[58]) The circumference at bottom is sixty paces, and its height about six yards. It rises by an easy ascent to the top, which is hollow. This is a heap of earth, raised over a carrnedd or pile of stones. In the center of the cavity on the top, there is a large flat stone, about nine feet by five; beneath this was found a kist vaen, a kind of stone chest, four feet and a half by three, and made up of stones, and within and about it were found a few pieces of brick and stones. This might have been the tomb of a druid, or prince.
The cumuli of stones or caernedds, as they are called by the Welsh, from keren nedh, a coped heap, are scattered over the west of England and Wales, and appear to have been raised in the manner of our Indian heaps, and for the same purpose, viz. to preserve the memory of the dead. Every Indian in this country that passes one of these heaps, throws a stone upon it. Rowland remarks that the same custom exists among the vulgar Welch to this day; and if I mistake not, Camden takes notice of the same practice. Rowland says, "in these coel ceithic, (certain festivals) people use, even to this day, to throw and offer each one his stone, tho they know not the reason. The common tradition is, that these heaps cover the graves of men, signal either for eminent virtues, or notorious villanies, on which every person looked on himself obliged as he passed by, to bestow a stone, in veneration of his good life, or in detestation of his vileness." This practice now prevails in Wales and Anglesey, merely as a mark of contempt.
The carrnedds in America answer exactly the description of those in Wales, and the practice of throwing upon the heap each man his stone as he passes by, exists among the Indians, in its purity; that is, as a mark of respect.
It is said by authors that mounts and piles of stones, are found likewise in Denmark and Sweden; but in construction they differ from those found in Britain. Yet from the foregoing descriptions, taken from authentic testimony, it appears, that between the barrows in England and America, the manner of constructing them in both, and the purposes to which they were applied, there is an analogy, rarely to be traced in works of such consequence, among nations whose intercourse ceased at Babel; an analogy that we could hardly suppose would exist among nations descended from different stocks. This analogy however, without better evidence, will not demonstrate the direct descent of the Indians from the ancient Celts or Britons. But as all the primitiv inhabitants of the west of Europe were evidently of the same stock, it is natural to suppose they might pass from Norway to Iceland, from Iceland to Greenland, and from thence to Labrador; and thus the North American savages may claim a common origin with the primitiv Britons and Celts. This supposition has some foundation, and is by no means obviated by Cook's late discoveries in the Pacific ocean.[59]
These are however but conjectures. Future discoveries may throw more light upon these subjects. At present, a few facts only can be collected to amuse a contemplativ mind, and perhaps lead to inquiries which will result in a satisfactory account of the first peopling of America, and of the few remains of antiquity which it affords.