CHAPTER IV.
WEAPONS, IMPLEMENTS, AND POTTERY.
The state of isolation, with all its attendant influences, must now be considered finally at a close. The effects of European civilisation rapidly modified the primitive native arts; and during this era, to which the name of Iron Period is applied, that strange mingling of races was chiefly effected which has resulted in our singular British nationality, in our peculiar virtues and our equally peculiar deficiencies. The Roman influence also failed not, even while indirectly operating, greatly to accelerate the development of the new era. Long before the invasion of Julius Cæsar, or the Roman working of lead and iron mines in England, the increasing demands for iron in the south of Europe could not fail to add somewhat also to the supplies of the north; nor is it improbable that the impetus communicated to the European workers in metals during the protracted struggles of the Punic wars, and the civil commotions which followed on the final supremacy of Rome, mainly contributed to furnish the native Britons with the arms by means of which they withstood both Julius Cæsar and Agricola.
Whatever effect the long occupation of England as a Roman province may have had on the native mythology and sepulchral rites, we have no reason to think that any change was produced on those of Scotland. Relics of the Roman period have been found in tumuli and cairns alongside of the rude British cinerary urn, the bronze spear, and even the stone celt; nor was it till the introduction of Christianity that the Scottish circumscribed cist was entirely abandoned for a sepulchre of ampler proportions. Sepulchral pottery is found alongside of relics of all periods, from the rudest primeval era to that of the general adoption of Christianity; but even where it is accompanied with Roman relics it betrays no indications of any familiarity with the artistic design or manufacturing processes of the Roman potter. The transition is at once from the primitive pottery apparently to that introduced by the Anglo-Saxons. On warlike implements, however, it is probable that the collision with the Roman legions exercised an important influence, though it is now difficult to ascertain its precise character or extent. The state of decomposition in which iron relics are usually found frequently renders it impossible to discriminate between those of Pagan and medieval eras. A few Scottish examples which have been noted from time to time, will, however, supply the means of forming some conclusions relative to the arts of this period.
Lieutenant-Colonel Miller in his "Inquiry respecting the Site of the Battle of Mons Grampius," thus describes some of the antiquities of the locality, which he conceives, with considerable probability, to be relics of native art contemporary with the Roman invasion of North Britain in the second century:—"At a point near Gateside a vast cairn stood until about forty-two years ago, and there the last stand of the Caledonians in a body seems to have been made. Upon removing this cairn many bones were found, and great quantities of iron. Many of the pieces were very small, so as to be called knives and forks by the workmen. Others again were very large; too much so, one might almost suppose, from the account I have had of them, even for the enormes gladios of the Caledonians. None of them have unfortunately been preserved, as they were probably completely oxidized, and reckoned of no value. Great numbers of beads were also found in the cairn, and distributed about the country at the time as curiosities. A few of these are still preserved, and serve to convey rather a favourable idea of the state of the arts at the time. Some of them were of a long elliptical form, and made of jet; others were made of a bluish glass, and shaded with spiral or circular lines; while others were white, enamelled with red and blue spots, the colours of which are as vivid as ever."[472] The same writer describes a great variety of stone and bronze relics found under a variety of circumstances throughout that district of Fifeshire. Many of these, however, must have belonged to very different periods, and most probably also to different races that succeeded each other in the occupation of the fertile region of country lying between the estuaries of the Forth and Tay, though all are pressed by him into the service, in order to add to the accumulated evidence by which he seeks to assign a precise site to the famed battle-field of Agricola and Galgacus. On the 22d November 1849, some farm-servants engaged in draining a field at East Langton, in the parish of Kirknewton, Mid-Lothian, found a skeleton about three and a half feet below the surface. The body lay south-west by north-east, imbedded in moss about three inches thick. Near the feet were found an iron knife, and a dagger with the remains of a wooden handle and a square gold plate and knob on the end of the haft, both greatly corroded and adhering together from the rust. There were also found in the same grave a wooden comb, broken and very much decayed, and a rude bodkin of bone measuring three and a quarter inches long, which had doubtless been employed in fastening the dress of the deceased. The knife is perforated with three holes, by which a handle must have been attached to it, but it is too much corroded to afford any correct idea of its original form. Near to these lay a wooden vessel and an earthen urn coated with green glaze, and rudely ornamented with a waved pattern; both of which were broken by the carelessness of the workmen. The accompanying woodcut represents the dagger and bone pin, the former of which measures with the handle thirteen and a quarter inches long. Nearly at the same time a quantity of billon pennies of James II., of the Edinburgh Mint,[473] were discovered in the field where this interesting sepulchral deposit was found. But it had been in cultivation upwards of fifty years, and there is no reason to think that any connexion was traceable between the two discoveries.
Iron Dagger and Pin, East Langton
The glazed pottery accompanying the iron weapons at East Langton is a characteristic feature of the sepulchral deposits of the last Pagan period in Scotland, and is perhaps one of the earliest indications of Anglo-Saxon influence. During the progress of the railway works for constructing a branch line of the North British Railway to North-Berwick, in 1848, two stone cists were discovered on the Abbey Farm, both of them measuring a little more than four feet in length, and each containing a human skeleton. In one of them was found an iron sword and dagger, both so much corroded as to break and crumble to pieces in the careless hands of the railway navies. At the side of the skeletons, in both cists, were urns of rough grey ware, ornamented externally with parallel grooves running round them, and internally covered with a green glaze. The woodcut represents one of these rescued in a partially dilapidated state from the railway excavators, and now in the possession of Andrew Richardson, Esq. It measures fully six inches in height, and it will be seen bears a singularly close resemblance to another urn of somewhat smaller dimensions, found in Aberdeenshire, and described below.