The following is the report of Professor Rolleston, M.D., F.R.S., F.S.A., on the fauna of the crannog:—
"Among the bones submitted to me by Robert Munro, M.D., Kilmarnock, and reported as having been procured from a crannog at Lochlee, the following animals have their skeletons represented:—
"The Ox, Bos longifrons: no proof of the presence of the wild variety.
"The Pig, Sus scrofa, variety domestica. I am not clear that the wild variety is represented here any more than in the specimens of the preceding species. (One fragment might have belonged to a wild individual, the molar No. 3 in it having all the pinnacles and eminences which have given to the teeth of the Suidæ, as to the whole division of non-ruminant Artiodactyles, the name Bunodont, worn away, and having its grinding surface consequently reduced to one single, however sinuous, continent of dentine bounded by enamel.) As is well known,[28] the bones of an ill-tended and ill-fed self-providing, so-called domestic pig, come to be very like the bones of a thoroughly wild pig; whilst, on the other hand, it is also well known that very great variations exist as to size within the limits even of the wild varieties of Sus scrofa. But in the series now before me there is only one fragment, consisting of the part of the lower jaw which carries the last molar, and a part of the ascending ramus, and of that last molar itself, which could, I think, by any possibility be referred to the wild variety. And even here such a reference could only be justified on the ground of the great degradation which the cusps of the tooth have suffered, it being usually the case that domestic pigs are not allowed to live sufficiently long to get their teeth so worn down. I have however to say that, both from this country and from India, skulls of undoubtedly domestic animals of this species have come into my hands, in which the teeth are worn down far below the limits to which the molars of pigs are allowed to be worn down by modern model-farm managers.
"The texture of the bone furnishes us with no indications, its gloss and tenacity, if such it ever possessed, having been entirely removed by its long maceration in water.
"It is however worth mentioning that this fragment from a Scottish crannog exactly reproduces the contour of a fragment from the Starnberger See. (See Memoir on this "find" in the Archiv für Anthropologie, viii. 1875.) In both, the angle of the jaw has been knocked away, for the sake, doubtless, of the soft and succulent, and I may add sensitive, substances it protected during life, and in both the posterior molar has been left in situ, though much worn down. The posterior molar, however, of the foreign specimen has that superior development of its third molar, which, if Nathusius (Schweineschädel, p. 49) had not taught us better, might have been referred to domestication instead of to better food or sexual (male) character. I owe this specimen to the kindness of J. E. Lee, Esq., F.G.S., and though I hesitate in the case of the Scottish specimen, I have no hesitation in referring this one to the wild variety, as indeed it is referred under the title of Sus scrofa ferox on the label it carried when it came into my hands.
"The specimens of pigs' bones and of pigs' teeth are numerous, but none other either of the bones or of the teeth are of the size, strength, or proportions which would have enabled their owners to hold their own as wild animals in a country in which the wolf may still have existed.[29]
"The sheep, old dun-faced breed, Ovis aries, variety brachyura. One nearly perfect skull of a sheep of the variety which is known as brachyura,[30] from having a short tail, but which also has the horns of the goat, set on, it is true, with their long axis at a different angle from that which they have in the true goat, but still in themselves of very much the same shape. One lower jaw in this series has the concave posterior boundary, and the sinuosity anterior to its angle, which goats usually and sheep only sometimes, possess. It belonged, however, to an immature individual, the posterior molar not having been evolved, and it cannot be considered to positively prove the presence here of Capra hircus.
"The Red Deer (Cervus elaphus) is very abundantly represented in this series, especially by fragments of horns, some of which bear marks of having themselves been cut and sawn by other implements, whilst one or two may possibly have been used, as the tines of red deer so often were by the early British flint miners, as borers.
"The Roe Deer (Cervus capreolus) is only scantily, though unambiguously, represented in the collection from Lochlee.