Chapter III: Appendix: A.--Glens Columbkille and Malin 520 (2)

Neither Cæsar nor Tacitus, though describing the religious observances of our forefathers, make any mention of temples; nor, indeed, does any other classical author. Tacitus[23] tells us that the Germans worshipped only in groves; and though this is hardly to the point, his relations with Agricola were so intimate that had the Gauls and Britons had temples of stone, he could hardly have avoided alluding to them. The inference from Cæsar and all the other authors is the same, but there is no direct evidence either way.

There is no passage in any classical authors which connects the Druids, either directly or indirectly, with any stone temples or stones of any sort. Dracontia are wholly the creation of Dr. Stukeley's very fertile imagination.

So far, therefore, as negative evidence goes, it is complete in showing that our megalithic circles did not exist in the time of the Romans, and that they were not temples. Unfortunately, however, no amount of negative evidence is sufficient to prove an affirmative, though it may suffice to establish a strong presumption in favour of a particular view, and, at all events, clears the way for the production of any direct evidence which we may have. The direct written evidence that has been adduced is, however, of the most shadowy character. It amounts to little more than this:--that every allusion to these monuments in mediæval authors, every local tradition, every scrap of intelligence we have regarding them, points to a post-Roman origin. No writer, of any age or country, suggested their being prehistoric or even pre-Roman before the age of Stukeley,--say 1700.

There is, so far as I know, only one paragraph in any classical author which mentions a French or British temple; but it belonged to so exceptional a community that it would hardly be safe to base an argument upon it. A "hieron," Strabo tells us, existed at the mouth of the Loire, inhabited by a colony of women who lived apart from their husbands, but the roof or thatch of the roof of whose temple was renewed annually:[24] a fact that shows, in the first place, that it had a roof, and in the second, that it was not a very dignified or permanent structure.

It would add very much to the clearness of our conception on this subject if the early Christian writers had left us some descriptions of the temples of the Britons when the missionaries first came among them. Though not quite so silent on the subject as the classical authors, their direct evidence is far from being so complete as might be wished. One of the passages most distinctly bearing on this question is found in a letter which Pope Gregory the Great addressed to the Abbot Millitus, then on a mission to England. In this letter he instructs him by no means to destroy the temples of the idols belonging to the English, but only the idols which are found in them; and adds, "Let holy water be made, and sprinkled over them. Let altars be constructed, and relics placed on them; insomuch as if these temples are well constructed, it is necessary that they should be converted from the worship of dæmons to the service of the true God. So that the people, seeing their temples are not destroyed, may put away errors from their hearts, and, acknowledging the true God and adoring Him, may the more willingly assemble in the places where they were accustomed to meet."[25] A little further on he adds, in order that no apparent change may be made, "that on great festivals the people may erect huts of boughs around those churches which have been converted (commutatæ) from temples."

The fair inference from this paragraph seems to be that there was so little difference between the temples of the Pagans and the churches of the Christians that a little holy water and a few relics--as much esteemed in the West as in the East in those days--were all that was required to convert the one into the other.

We gather the same impression from another transaction which took place at Canterbury about the same time. After taking possession of the Cathedral, built of old by the Romans,[26] St. Augustine obtained from the recently converted King Ethelbert the cession of the temple in which he had been accustomed to worship his idols, and without more ado dedicated it to St. Pancras, and appropriated it as a burying place for himself and his successors from the circumstance of its being outside the walls.[27] We further learn from Gervaise[28] that it was so used till Cuthbert, the second archbishop, got permission to allow burials within the walls, and then erected the baptistry of St. John for this purpose, where apparently Becket's crown now stands. Afterwards the monastery of SS. Peter and Paul, now St. Augustine's, was erected "in fundo Templi"--whatever that may mean--but at that time St. Augustine seems to have accepted the Pagan temples as perfectly appropriate to Christian rites.

In like manner when King Redwald, after his conversion to Christianity was persuaded by his wife not rashly to forsake the faith of his forefathers, he set up two altars side by side in his temple (in fano), and dedicated the one to Christ, the other to the "victims of the dæmons."[29] The temple, apparently, was equally appropriate to either.

A still more instructive example is the description of the destruction of the church at Godmundingham by Coifi--the heathen priest--on his conversion to Christianity. He first desecrated it by throwing a spear into it--whether by the door or window we are not told--and then ordered his people to burn it to the ground with all its enclosures. These, therefore, must all have been in wood or some equally combustible material.[30]

All this is not much nor very distinct, but by these passages, and every hint we have on the subject, it would appear that the temples of the Pagans, between the departure of the Romans and the time of Alfred, were at least very similar to those of the Christians. Both were derived from the same model, which was the temple or basilica of the Romans, and both were apparently very rude, and generally, we may infer, constructed of wood. The word circular does not occur in any description of any Pagan temple yet brought to light, nor the word stone; nothing, in fact, that would in the remotest degree lead us to suppose that Bede, or any one else, was speaking or thinking of the megalithic monuments with which we are now concerned.

Although the classical authorities are silent regarding these rude stone monuments, and contemporary records help us very little in trying to understand the form of the temples in which our forefathers worshipped, till they were converted to Christianity, still the Decrees of the Councils render it quite certain that Rude Stone Monuments were objects of veneration--certainly in France, and, by implication, in England--down to the times of Charlemagne and Alfred, at least.

One often-quoted decree of a Council, held at Nantes, exhorts "Bishops and their servants to dig up, and remove, and hide in places where they cannot be found, those stones which in remote and woody places are still worshipped, and where vows are still made."[31] Unfortunately the date of this Council is not certain; but Richard places it in 658, which is probably at least nearly correct.[32] This, however, is of comparatively little consequence, as in 452 a Council at Arles decreed that "if, in any diocese, any infidel either lighted torches or worshipped Trees, Fountains, or Stones, or neglected to destroy them, he should be found guilty of sacrilege;"[33] and about a century later (567), a Council at Tours exhorts the clergy to excommunicate those who, at certain Stones or Trees or Fountains, perpetrate things contrary to the ordinances of the Church.[34]

Still another century further on (681), a Council held at Toledo admonishes those who worship Idols or venerate Stones, those who light torches or worship Fountains or Trees, that they are sacrificing to the devil, and subject themselves to various penalties, &c.[35] Another Council held in the same city, in the year 692, enumerates almost in the same words the various heresies which were condemned by the preceding Council.[36] A Council at Rouen, about the same time, denounces all who offer vows to Trees or Fountains or Stones as they would at altars, or offer candles or gifts, as if any divinity resided there capable of conferring good or evil.[37]

Lastly, a decree of Charlemagne, dated Aix-la-Chapelle in 789, utterly condemns and execrates before God Trees, Stones, and Fountains, which foolish people worship.[38]

Even as late as in the time of Canute the Great, there is a statute forbidding the barbarous adoration of the Sun and Moon, Fire, Fountains, Stones, and all kinds of Trees and Wood.[39]

The above which are taken from Keysler[40] are not all he quotes, nor certainly all that could be added, if it were worth while, from other sources; but they are sufficient to show that, from Toledo to Aix-la-Chapelle--and from the departure of the Romans till the tenth, or probably the eleventh century--the Christian priesthood waged a continuous but apparently ineffectual warfare against the worship of Stones, Trees, and Fountains. The priests do not condescend to tell us what the forms of the Stones were which these benighted people worshipped, whether simple menhirs or dolmens, or "grottes des fées," nor why they worshipped them; whether they considered them emblems of some unnamed and unknown God, or memorials of deceased ancestors, in whose honour they lighted candles, and whom they propitiated with offerings. Nor do they tell us what the form of that worship was; they did not care, and perhaps did not know. Nor do we; for, except an extreme veneration for their dead, and a consequent ancestral worship,[41] mixed with a strange adoration of Stones, Trees, and Fountains, we do not know now what the religion was of these rude people. The testimony of these edicts is, therefore, not quite so distinct as we might wish, and does not enable us to assert that the Rude Stone Monuments, whose age and uses we are trying to ascertain, were those alluded to in the preceding paragraphs. But what it does seem to prove is, that down to the 11th century the Christian Priesthood waged a continuous warfare against the veneration of some class of Rude Stone Monuments, to which the pagan population clung with remarkable tenacity, and many, if not most of which may consequently have been erected during that period. This is, at all events, infinitely more clear and positive than anything that has been brought forward in favour of their prehistoric antiquity. If, like the other branches of the written argument, this is not sufficient to prove, by itself, that the monuments were generally or even frequently erected after the Christian era, it certainly entitles that assertion to a fair _locus standi_ in the argument we are attempting to develop.

* * * * *

If, however, the pen has been reticent and hesitating in its testimony, the spade has been not only prolific but distinct. It is probably not an exaggeration to say that three-fourths of the megalithic monuments--including the dolmens, of course--have yielded sepulchral deposits to the explorer, and, including the tumuli, probably nine-tenths have been proved to be burial places. Still, at the present stage of the enquiry, it would be at least premature to assume that the remaining tenth of the whole, or the remaining fourth of the stone section, must necessarily be sepulchral. Some may have been cenotaphic, or simply monuments, such as we erect to our great men--not necessarily where the bodies are laid. Some stones and some tumuli may have been erected to commemorate events, and some mounds certainly were erected as "Motes" or "Things"--places of judgment or assembly. In like manner some circles may have been originally, or may afterwards have been used as places of assembly, or may have been what may more properly be called temples of the dead, than tombs. These, however, certainly are the exceptions. The ruling idea throughout is still of a sepulchre, with what exceptions, and at what age erected, is the thesis which we now propose to investigate.

At present these are mere assertions, and it is not pretended that they are more, and they are only brought forward in this place in order to enunciate the propositions it is hoped we may be able to prove as we advance in this enquiry. These are,--

First, that the Rude Stone Monuments with which we are concerned are generally sepulchral, or connected directly, or indirectly, with the rites of the dead.

Secondly, that they are not temples in any usual or appropriate sense of the term, and, Lastly,--that they were generally erected by partially civilized races after they had come in contact with the Romans, and most of them may be considered as belonging to the first ten centuries of the Christian Era.

In stating these three propositions so broadly, it must be borne in mind, that the evidence on which their proof or disproof rests is eminently cumulative in its character; not perhaps with regard to the use to which the monuments were applied, that probably will be admitted as settled, as so large a proportion of the tumuli can be shown to have a fair title to a sepulchral character, and most of the stone monuments can equally lay claim to being erected for the same purpose to which one-half of them have been certainly proved to have been dedicated. This is the more clear, as, on the other hand, in spite of every surmise or conjecture, no one monument of the class we are treating of can be proved to have been erected as a temple, or as intended for any civic or civil purpose.

With regard to their age, the case is not quite so easily settled. Except such monuments as those of Gorm and Thyra, and one or two others, to be mentioned hereafter, few can produce such proof of their age as would stand investigation in a court of law. But when all the traditions, all the analogies, and all the probabilities of the case are examined, they seem to make up such an accumulation of evidence as is irresistible; and the whole appears to present an unbroken and intelligible sequence which explains everything. The proof of all this, however, does not rest on the evidence of two or three, or even of a dozen, of instances, but is based upon the multiplication of a great number of coincidences derived from a large number of instances, which taken together in the cumulative form, make up a stronger body of proof than could be obtained from the direct testimony of one or two cases. To appreciate this, however, the whole must be taken together. To try to invalidate it by selecting one or two prominent cases, where the proof is manifestly insufficient when taken by itself, is to misunderstand and misrepresent the whole force of the argument.

One point, I fancy, there will be very little difficulty in proving, which is, that the whole form one continuous group, extending in an unbroken series, from the earliest to the latest. There is no hiatus or break anywhere; and if some can be proved to belong to the 10th century, it is only a question how far you can, by extenuating the thread, extend it backwards. It can hardly be much beyond the Christian era. It seems that such a date satisfies all the known conditions of the problem, in so far as the Stone Monuments at least are concerned. There is, so far as I know at present, absolutely no evidence on the other side, except what is derived from the Danish system of the three ages: if that is established as a rule of law, _cadit questio_, there is no more to be said on the subject. But this is exactly what does not appear to have yet been established on any sufficient or satisfactory basis. There need be no difficulty in granting that men used stone and bone for implements, before they were acquainted with the use of the metals. It may also be admitted, that they used bronze before they learned the art of extracting iron from its ores. But what is denied is, that they abandoned the use of these primitive implements on the introduction of the metals; and it is contended that they employed stone and bone simultaneously with bronze and iron, down to a very late period. The real fact of the case seems to be, that the people on the shores of the Baltic and the North Sea, were as remote from the centres of civilization on the Mediterranean and to the eastward of it in the earlier centuries of our era, and were as little influenced by them, as the inhabitants of the islands in the Pacific and Arctic America were by Europe in the last century. In the remote corners of the world, a stone and bone age exists at the present day, only modified by the use of such metal implements as they can obtain by barter or exchange: and this appears to have been the state of northern Europe, till, with their conversion to Christianity, the new civilization was domesticated among its inhabitants.

[Footnote 2: Those three treatises were afterwards republished in
one volume, small folio, with all the plates, &c., in London, 1725.
It is from this volume that the above is abstracted.]

[Footnote 3: Cæsar, 'De Bell. Gal.' vi 13-20.]

[Footnote 4: 'Hist. Nat.' xxix. 3.]

[Footnote 5: 'Historia,' v. 31.]

[Footnote 6: 'Geographica,' iv. 273.]

[Footnote 7: Tacitus, 'Ann.' xiv. 29.]

[Footnote 8: See controversy between M. Bertrand and M. Henri
Martin, in volume of 'Congrès préhistorique' (Paris, 1867), 193,
207, &c. See also 'Revue archéologique,' août, 1864, 144.]

[Footnote 9: For further information on the subject, the reader is
referred to 'Tree and Serpent Worship,' by the author, p. 26 _et
seq._, where the subject is treated of at length.]

[Footnote 10: 'Archæologia,' xxv. 188 _et seq._]

[Footnote 11: Mr. Ellis, 'Gent. Mag.' 4th series, ii. 317.]

[Footnote 12: 'Proceedings of the Archæological Institute,
Salisbury,' volume 113.]

[Footnote 13: Diodorus, ii. 47.]

[Footnote 14: Ibid. v. 21 _et seq._]

[Footnote 15: The volume containing the account of the proceedings
of the congress has not yet been published; so those who were not
present cannot feel sure to what extent these modifications were
carried or admitted. A short account of the Congress was published
by Gen. Lefroy, in the 'Journal of the Archæological Institute,'
Nov. 1869, p. 58 _et seq._]

[Footnote 16: "According to an analysis made by Sir John Lubbock,
of the contents of 250 tumuli described by Sir Richard Colt Hoare,
in the first volume of his 'Ancient Wiltshire,' 18 only had any
implements of stone, only 31 of bone, 67 of bronze, and 11 of iron,
while one-half of them contained nothing to indicate their age; but
whether those that contained nothing are earlier or more modern is
by no means clear."--_Prehistoric Times_, 2nd edit. p. 131.]

[Footnote 17: "Veterum Gothorum et Suevorum antiquissimus mos
est ut ubi acriores in campis seu montibus instituissent et
perfecissent pugnas, illic erectos lapides quasi Egyptiacas
pyramides collocare soliti sunt ... Habent itaque hæc saxa in
pluribus locis erecta longitudine x. vel xv. XX. aut xxx. et
amplius et latitudine iv. vel vi, pedum, mirabili situ sed
mirabiliori ordine et mirabilissimo charactere, ob plurimas
rationes collocata literato, rectoque et longo ordine videlicet
pugilarum certamina, quadrato, turmas bellantium, et spherico
familiarum designantia sepulturas ac cuneato equestrium et
pedestrium acies ibidem vel prope fortunatum triumphasse," &c.
&c.--_De Gentibus Septentrionalibus_, &c. p. 48.

Or again:--"Quos humi recondere placuit honorabiles statuas lapidum
excelsorum prout hodie cernuntur mira compagine in modum altissimæ
et latissimæ januæ, sursum transversumque viribus gigantum
erecta."--_Ibid._ 49.]

[Footnote 18: 'Danicorum Monumentorum,' libri sex, 22 _et seq._]

[Footnote 19: 'Memoirs of Hugh Falconer,' by Dr. Murchison, ii. p.
596.]

[Footnote 20: In 1797, Mr. John Frere found flint implements
identical with those at Abbeville, and published an account of
them, with engravings, in vol. xiii. of the 'Archæologia,' in 1800.]

[Footnote 21: In the first years of the last century a flint
implement, together with some bones of the _Elephas primigenus_,
were found in an excavation in Gray's Inn Lane. An engraving of
it was published in 1715, and the implement itself is now in the
British Museum.]

[Footnote 22: For the last, and one of the best, accounts of the
Hydahs, see 'Proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society,' vol.
xiii. No. V. p. 386 _et seq._, by Mr. Brown.]

[Footnote 23: 'Germania,' 9.]

[Footnote 24: Strabo, iv. p. 198.]

[Footnote 25: Bede, 'Hist. Eccles.' i. 30.]

[Footnote 26: "Inibi antiquo Romanorum fidelium opere factam,"
Bede, 'Hist. Eccles.' i. 32.]

[Footnote 27: Thorn, 'Dec. Script. Col.' 1760:--"Erat autem non
longe ab ipsa civitate ad orientem quasi medio itinere inter
ecclesiam Sti. Martini et muros civitatis Phanum sive ydolum situm
ubi rex Ethelbertus secundus ritum gentis suæ solebat orare et
cum nobilibus suis dæmoniis et non deo sacrificare. Quod Phanum
Augustinus ab iniquinamentis et sordibus gentilium purgavit et
simulacro quod in eo erat infracto, synagogam mutavit in ecclesiam,
et eam in nomine Sti. Pancratii martyris dedicavit."

Of this "Fane" we further learn from Godselinus ('Leland Collect.'
vol. iv. p. 8), that "extat adhuc condita ex longissimis et
latissimis lateribus more Britannico ut facile est videre in muris
Verolamiensibus," and may now be seen in this very church at
Canterbury. "Basilica Sti. Pancratii nunc est ubi olim Ethelbertus
idolum suum coluit. Opus exiguum structum tamen de more veterum
Britannorum."]

[Footnote 28: Gervaise, 'Acc. Pont. Cant.' p. 1640.]

[Footnote 29: Bede, 'Hist. Eccles.' ii. 15.]

[Footnote 30: "Succendere fanum cum omnibus septis suis," Bede,
'Hist. Eccles.' ii. 13.]

[Footnote 31: Summo decertare debent studio episcopi et eorum
ministri ut--_Lapides_ quoque, quos in ruinosis locis et
silvestribus, demonum ludificationibus decepti venerantur ubi et
vota vovent et deferunt, funditus effodiantur, atque in tali loco
projiciantur ubi nunquam a cultoribus suis inveniri possint et
omnibus annunciatur quantum scelus est idolatria.--Labbeum, t. ix.
474.]

[Footnote 32: Richard, 'Analyse des Conciles,' i. 646.]

[Footnote 33: Si in alicujus episcopi territorio infideles, aut
faculas accendunt, aut arbores, fontes vel _Saxa_ venerentur si hoc
eruere neglexerit, sacrilegii reum se esset cognoscat.--Labb., iv.
1013.]

[Footnote 34: Contestamur illam solicitudinem tam pastores quam
presbyteros, gerere ut quemcunque in hac fatuitate persistere
viderint, vel ad nescio quas _petras_ aut arbores vel fontes,
designata loca gentilium perpetrare, quæ ad ecclesiæ rationem non
pertinent eos ab ecclesia sancta auctoritate repellant.--Baluz, i.
518.]

[Footnote 35: Cultores idolorum, veneratores _Lapidum_, accensores
facularum excolentes sacra fontium vel arborum admonemus,
&c.--Baluz, vi. 1234.]

[Footnote 36: Illi diversis suadelis decepti cultores idolorum
efficiuntur, veneratores _Lapidum_, accensores facularum,
excolentes sacra fontium vel arborum, &c.--Baluz, vi. 1337.]

[Footnote 37: Si aliquis vota ad arbores, vel fontes, vel ad
_Lapides_ quosdam, quasi ad altaria, faciat aut ibi candelam, seu
quolibet munus deferet velut ibi quoddam Numen sit quod bonum aut
malum possit inferre.--Baluz, 1. 2, p. 210.]

[Footnote 38: Item de arboribus vel _Petris_ vel fontibus ubi
aliqui stulti luminaria vel aliquas observationes faciunt omnino
mandamus, ut iste pessimus usus et deo execrabilis ubicunque
invenitur tolletur et distruatur.--Baluz, t. i. p. 235.]

[Footnote 39: Barbara est autem adoratio, sive quas idola (puta
gentium divos), Solem, Lunam, Ignem, Profluentem, Fontes, _Saxa_,
cujusque generis arbores lignam coluerunt.--Keysler, 'Antiquitates
Septemtrion.' (Hanoveræ, 1720), p. 18. He quotes also a canon of
Edgar (967) to the same effect.]

[Footnote 40: 'Ant. Sept.' chap. ii.]

[Footnote 41: Laing in his wrath seems to have, by accident, very
nearly guessed the truth, when, refuting the authenticity of
Ossian, he accuses Macpherson of "having rendered the Highlanders a
race of unheard-of infidels, who believed in no Gods but the ghosts
of their fathers."]