Chapter 3

"By the side of a burn which flowed through a little grassy glen ... we saw two small round hive-like hillocks, not much higher than a man, joined together, and covered with grass and weeds. Out of the top of one of them a column of smoke slowly rose, and at its base there was a hole about three feet high and two feet wide, which seemed to lead into the interior of the hillock--its hollowness, and the possibility of its having a human creature within it being thus suggested. There was no one, however, actually within the _bo'h_, the three girls, when we came in sight, being seated on a knoll by the burn-side, but it was really in the inside of these two green hillocks that they slept, and cooked their food, and carried on their work, and--dwelt, in short."[58]

These two "green hillocks," and other structures of the same nature, are shown in the accompanying diagrams[59] (Plates I.-XVI.), which explain their formation better than any written description. It is enough here to state that they are built of rough stone, without any mortar. "Though the stone walls are very thick," says my authority (p. 62), "they are covered on the outside with turf, which soon becomes grassy like the land round about, and thus secures perfect wind and water tightness." Sometimes they occur in groups, as those shown in Plate III.; of which scene Captain Thomas justly remarks that "at first sight it may be taken for a picture of a Hottentot village rather than a hamlet in the British Isles."[60] Here there is little or no grassy covering outside, however; and consequently none of the hillock-like effect. But this is very well shown in Plates VI. and VIII. Of the "agglomeration of beehives" pictured in the latter, Sir Arthur Mitchell observes:--"It has several entrances, and would accommodate many families, who might be spoken of as living in one mound, rather than under one roof" (_op. cit._ pp. 64-5). Of another such dwelling, now ruined, he says that it could have accommodated "from forty to fifty people."

This last, however (Plates XI. and XII.), represents another variety of earth-house, the chambered mound or beehive, with an underground gallery leading to it. Of this kind two examples are here shown. And in Plates I. and XIII. will be seen specimens of wholly subterranean structures. It is difficult, and indeed hardly necessary, to distinguish between one variety and another of what is practically the same kind of building; but to this last class the term "earth-house" is most frequently accorded in Scotland. In the broader dialect it is "yird-house" or "eirde-house," which at once recalls the form "jord-hus" in the saga which tells of Leif's adventure underground in Ireland. The term _weem_ is also applied to these places in Scotland. This is merely a quickened pronunciation of the Gaelic _uam_ (or _uamh_), a cave; and it reminds one that, both in Gaelic and in English, the word "cave" is by no means restricted to a _natural_ cavity. Indeed, one of the two artificial structures under consideration is known as _Uamh Sgalabhad_, "the _cave_ of Sgalabhad." Another old Gaelic name for those underground galleries is "_tung_ or _tunga_";[61] while another name, by which they are known in Lewis is _tigh fo thalaimh_,[62] or "house beneath the ground."

"Martin, in his description of the Western Islands, printed in 1703, when their use would appear to have been still remembered, speaks of them [these underground structures] as 'little stone-houses, built under ground, called earth-houses, which served to hide a few people and their goods in time of war.'"[63] Dean Monro writes, "There is sundry coves and holes in the earth, coverit with hedder above, quhilk fosters many rebellis in the country of the North head of Ywst" [North Uist].[64] "From O'Flaherty's description of West Connaught, written in 1684, it appears," observes Captain Thomas,[65] but referring more strictly to the beehive-house, "that this style of dwelling had already become archaic." For, although that writer mentions certain "cloghans" as being still inhabited, holding forty men in some cases, yet he says they were "so ancient that nobody knows how long ago any of them were made." Of the underground galleries another writer says: "It has been doubted if these houses were ever really used as places of abode.... But as to this there can be no real doubt. The substances found in many of them have been the accumulated _débris_ of food used by man.... Ornaments of bronze have been found in a few of them, and beads of streaked glass. In some cases the articles found would indicate that the occupation of these houses had come down to comparatively recent times."[66]

In conclusion, these remarks of Captain Thomas, who made so thorough a study of the subject, may be quoted:--

"The Pict's house on the Holm of Papay [Orkney] would have held, besides the chiefs at each end, all the families in [the island of] Papay Westray when it was built. Maes howe[67] was for three families--grandees, no doubt; but the numbers it was intended to hold in the _beds_ may be learned by comparing them with the Amazon's House, St. Kilda."[68]

"I consider the relation between the _boths_ [beehive houses] and the Picts' houses of the Orkneys (and elsewhere) to be evident--the same method of forming the arch, the low and narrow doors and passages, the enormous thickness of the walls, when compared with the interior accommodation--exist in both. When a _both_ is covered with green turf it becomes a chambered tumulus, and when buried by drifting sand it is a subterranean Pict's house.... I regard the comparatively large Picts' houses of the Orkneys as the pastoral residence of the Pictish lord, fitted to contain his numerous family and dependents. Such an one exists on the Holm of Papa Westray, which, according to the Highland method of stowage, would certainly contain a whole clan. When writing the description of it, I had not made acquaintance with a people who would close the door to keep in the smoke, or that nested in holes in a wall like sand-martins....

"But the _both_ of the Long Island is only the lodging of the common man or 'Tuathanach,' and is consequently of small dimensions, and not remarkable for comfort. If the modern Highland proprietor or large farmer should ever be induced to lead a pastoral life, and adopt a Pictish architecture in his residence, we might again see a tumulus of twenty feet in height, with its long low passage leading into a large hall with beehive cells on both sides."[69]

But the point of all this is that these dwellings, whether above ground or below, are known as _Picts' Houses, Fairy Halls, Elf Hillocks_, "the hidden places of _Fians and Fairies_." Thus, the three titles which I have shown to be associated in other ways are all given to the alleged builders and occupiers of those very archaic and peculiar structures.

It is true that, in their most modern form, some of those dwellings are still inhabited for months at a time. And their inhabitants are neither Fians, Fairies nor Picts. But it is among those people that stories of Fians and Fairies are most rife, and many claim an actual descent from them. And although they are certainly not pigmies, yet they live in a district in which the _small_ type of this heterogeneous nation of ours is still quite discernible; and that part of the island of Lewis (Uig), which has longest retained those places as dwellings, is inhabited by a caste whom other Hebrideans describe as small, and regard as different from themselves.[70] Dr. Beddoe states that the tallest people in the United Kingdom are to be found in a certain village in Galloway, where a six-foot man is perfectly common, and many are above that height. It is quite certain that such men could not "nest like sand-martins" in the holes in the wall described by Captain Thomas. And, in proportion as such Galloway men are to the modern Hebridean mound-dwellers, so are these to the much more archaic race with whom the oldest structures are associated. For a study of the dimensions of these will show that they could not have been conceived, and would not have been built or inhabited by any but a race of actual dwarfs; as tradition says they were.

[Footnote 18: "_La légende des Pygmées et les nains de l'Afrique equatoriale_": _Rev. Hist._ t. 47, I. (Sept.-Oct. 1891), pp. 1-64.]

[Footnote 19: For some of these references see Dr. Hibbert's "Description of the Shetland Islands," Edinburgh, 1822, pp. 444-451. See also Mrs. J.E. Saxby's "Folk-Lore from Unst, Shetland" (in _Leisure Hour_ of 1880); Mr. W.G. Black's "Heligoland", 1888, chap. iv.; and "The Fians," London, 1891, pp. 2-3.]

[Footnote 20: Gwynn the son of Nudd: for whom see Lady C. Guest's "Mabinogion," pp. 223, 263-5, and 501-2.]

[Footnote 21: "The War of the Gaedhil with the Gaill," edited by J.H. Todd, D.D., London, 1867, pp. 114-115.]

[Footnote 22: I. cc. 4-6 (this reference and the passage is quoted from Du Chaillu's "Viking Age," vol. ii. p. 516).]

[Footnote 23: "_Fianaibh ag Sithcuiraibh_"]

[Footnote 24: "_Dan an Fhir Shicair"; Leabhar na Feinne_, pp. 94-95.]

[Footnote 25: _Folk-Lore Journal_, vol. vi. 1888, pp. 173-178.]

[Footnote 26: _The Fians_, 1891, p. 64.]

[Footnote 27: _Ibid._ p. 33.]

[Footnote 28: _The Fians_, p. 172. The Fairy Hill referred to is "a hillock, in which there is to be seen a small hollow called the armoury" (p. 174).]

[Footnote 29: _Ibid._ pp. 12-13, 166, &c.]

[Footnote 30: _Ibid._ pp. 3-4. Glenorchy is said to have teemed with Fenian traditions about the early part of this century (_Proceedings_ of Soc. of Antiq. of Scotland, vol. vii. pp. 237-240).]

[Footnote 31: See my _Testimony of Tradition_, London, 1890, pp. 146-8; and Pennant's "Second Tour in Scotland" (Pinkerton's _Voyages,_ London, 1809, vol. iii. p. 368).]

[Footnote 32: _Proceedings_ of Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, vol. vii. p. 294, _note_.]

[Footnote 33: See, for example, an article on "Scottish Customs and Folk lore," in _The Glasgow Herald_ of August 1, 1891.]

[Footnote 34: _The Fians_, pp. 78-80.]

[Footnote 35: _Scottish Celtic Review_, 1885, pp. 184-90: _The Fians_, pp. 175-184.]

[Footnote 36: _The Heimskringla_: Dr. Rasmus B. Anderson's 2nd ed. (1889) of Mr. Samuel Laing's translation from Snorre Sturlason: chap. lxxxiii., _Of Little Fin_.]

[Footnote 37: _Leabhar na Feinne_, p. 34.

[SUBSEQUENT NOTE.--To be very accurate, one ought to say that, in the pedigree referred to, Fin's grandfather (Trenmor) is stated to have married a Finland woman.]]

[Footnote 38: Mr. W.G. Black's _Heligoland_, 1888, chap. iv.]

[Footnote 39: With this Fin of Frisian tradition may be compared Fin, a North-Frisian chief of the fifth century, mentioned in _Beowulf_ and _The Gleeman's Tale_, and whose death is recorded in _The Fight at Finnsburk_.

[SUBSEQUENT NOTE.--A suitable companion to the dwarf Fin of Frisian tradition is mentioned in Harald Hardradi's Saga:--"Tuta, a Frisian, was with King Harald; he was sent to him for show, for he was short and stout, in every respect shaped like a dwarf."--Quoted by Mr. Du Chaillu at p. 357 of vol. ii. of "The Viking Age."]]

[Footnote 40: In this connection it is worth noting that Sir Walter Scott, in referring to the aboriginal or servile clans in 1745, whom he describes as "half naked, _stinted in growth_, and miserable in aspect," includes among them the McCouls, Fin's alleged descendants, who "were a sort of Gibeonites, or hereditary servants to the Stewarts of Appin." (Waverley, ch. xliv.)]

[Footnote 41: For example, the late Rev. J.G. Campbell, Tiree, says of "the Great Tuairisgeul" that he was "a giant of the kind called _Samhanaich_--that is, one who lived in a cave by the sea-shore, the strongest and coarsest of any" (_Scottish Celtic Review_, p. 62). That this term was one of contempt, given by Gaelic-speaking people to those "giants" (and apparently based upon their malodorous characteristics), will be seen from Mr. Campbell's further observation (_op. cit._ pp. 140-141):--"It is a common expression to say of any strong offensive smell, _mharbhadh e na Samhanaich_, it would kill the giants who dwell in caves by the sea. _Samk_ is a strong oppressive smell." McAlpine defines _Samk_ as a "bad smell arising from a sick person, or a dirty hot place"; and he further gives the definition "a savage" (quoting Mackenzie). The word _Samhanach_ itself is defined by McAlpine as "a savage," and he cites the Islay saying:--"_chuireadh tu cagal air na samhanaich_," "you would frighten the very savages." From these definitions it will be seen that a word translated "giant" by one is rendered "savage" by another (though neither of these terms expresses the literal meaning). Mr. J.G. Campbell also practically regards it as signifying "cave-dweller," or perhaps a certain special caste of cave-dwellers. With this may be compared McAlpine's "_uamh_, _n.f._, a cave, den; _n.m._, a chief of savages, terrible fellow ... '_cha'n'eil ann ach uamh dhuine_,' 'he is only a savage of a fellow.'" Islay has also another word to denote a Hebridean savage. This is _ciuthach_, "pr. _kewach_, described in the Long Island as naked wild men living in caves" (J.F. Campbell, Tales, iii. 55, _n._). One of these "kewachs" figures in the story of Diarmaid and Grainne, and one version says that he "came in from the western ocean in a coracle with two oars (_curachan_)" (_The Fians_, p. 54). (His name assumes various shapes--_e.g._, Ciofach Mac a Ghoill, Ciuthach Mac an Doill, Ceudach Mac Righ nan Collach.) These three terms--_samhanach, uamh dhuine_, and _ciuthach_--all seem to indicate one and the same race of people. And these are probably the people referred to by Pennant when he says, speaking of the civilised races of the Hebrides in the beginning of the seventeenth century:--"Each chieftain had his armour-bearer, who preceded his master in time of war, and, by my author's (Timothy Pont's MS., Advocates' Library, Edinburgh) account in time of peace; for they went armed even to church, in the manner the North Americans do at present [1772] in the frontier settlement, and for the same reason, the dread of savages." (Pinkerton's _Voyages_, vol. iii. p. 322.)]

[Footnote 42: Hibbert's "Description of the Shetland Islands," Edinburgh, 1822, pp. 444-451. With regard to the "Dwarfie Stone" of Hoy, the following references may be given:--"Jo. Ben," 1529, at p. 449 of Barry's "History of the Orkney Islands," 2nd ed., London, 1808; and other writers subsequent to 1529. These speak of this stone as the abode of a "giant." Sir Walter Scott (_The Pirate_, Note P.) and many others invariably say "a dwarf."

Note also J.F. Campbell (_W.H. Tales_, p. xcix): "The Highland giants were not so big, but that their conquerors wore their clothes." Also the dwarf in Ramsay's "Evergreen" who says that he was engendered "of giants' kind."]

[Footnote 43: _Dean of Lismore's Book_, p. lxxvi.; _Celt. Scot._, vol. i. p. 131; vol. iii. chap. iii.; &c.]

[Footnote 44: _Celt. Scot._ iii. 106-7.]

[Footnote 45: In this tale, the phonetic spelling _ben-ce_ shows the unusual aspirated form _bean-shithe_. She is elsewhere spoken of as the Lady of Innse Uaine, and her son is the hero of the tale _Gille nan Cochla-Craicinn_.]

[Footnote 46: According to a clergyman of the seventeenth century, the Hebrides and a part of the Western Highlands constituted "the country of the Fians," (_Testimony of Tradition_, p. 45.)]

[Footnote 47: Miss Dempster: "The Folk-Lore of Sutherlandshire," Folk-Lore Journal, vol. vi. 1888, p. 174.]

[Footnote 48: _Proc. of the Soc. of Antiq. of Scot._, vol. vii. p. 294.]

[Footnote 49: _Proc. Soc. Antiq. Scot._, vol. vii. pp. 165 and 192.]

[Footnote 50: "They are plainly no other than the Peihts, Picts, or Piks ... the Scandinavian writers generally call the Piks Peti, or Pets: one of them uses the term Petia, instead of Pictland (Saxo-Gram.); and, besides, the frith that divides Orkney from Caithness is usually denominated Petland Fiord in the Icelandic Sagas or histories." (Barry's _Orkney_, p. 115.)]

[Footnote 51: _Proc. of the Soc. of Antiq. of Scot._, vol. iii. p. 141: also vol. vii. p. 191. This quotation is made by the late Captain Thomas, R.N., a sound archæologist; but I have to add that in the document of 1443, as given in Barry's _Orkney_ (2nd ed., London, 1808, pp. 401-419), while I find the statement as to the two native races, I find nothing about the stature or habits of the Picts. Captain Thomas twice quotes his statement, and as at one place he refers, not to the Bishop of 1443, but (vol. iii. p. 141) to "the Earl of Orkney's chaplain, writing about 1460," it is possible he had two manuscripts of the fifteenth century in view.

[SUPPLEMENTARY NOTE.--The Bishop's words are as follows:--

"_Istas insulas primitus Peti et Pape inhabitabant. Horum alteri scilicet Peti parvo superantes pigmeos statura in structuris urbium vespere et mane mira operantes, meredie vero cunctis viribus prorsus destituti in subterraneis domunculis pre timore latuerunt._"--From his treatise _De Orcadibus Insulis_, reprinted in the "Bannatyne Miscellany," 1855, p. 33.]]

[Footnote 52: _Testimony of Tradition_, pp. 58-60, 65, 67-74, 79-80.]

[Footnote 53: Pennant's Second Tour in Scotland; Pinkerton's _Voyages_, London, 1809, p. 368.]

[Footnote 54: Linguæ Romanæ, Dictionarium, Luculentum Novum.]

[Footnote 55: Du Chaillu: _Land of the Midnight Sun_, vol. ii. pp. 421-2. This also is one of the articles of belief in Shetland, with regard to the _trows_, as the trolls are there called.]

[Footnote 56: _Proc. of Soc. of Antiq. of Scot_. (First Series), vol. iii. pp. 127-144; vol. vii. pp. 153-195.]

[Footnote 57: _The Past in the Present_, Edinburgh, 1880, pp. 58-72.]

[Footnote 58: _The Past in the Present_, p. 59.]

[Footnote 59: Reproduced by permission of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland.]

[Footnote 60: _Proc. Soc. Antiq. Scot._, vol. iii. p. 137.]

[Footnote 61: _Proc. Soc. Antiq. Scot._, vol. vii. p. 168 _n._ This appears to me to be a phonetic spelling of the _diongna_ mentioned in the passage relating to the plunderings of the Danes in the ninth century.]

[Footnote 62: _Ibid._ p. 171. On the same page, the form _Ugh talamkant_ is given.]

[Footnote 63: _Chambers's Encyclopædia_, new ed., s.v. Earth-house.]

[Footnote 64: Quoted in _Proc. Soc. Antiq. Scot._, vii. 172. The reference is "Ag. Rep. Heb. p. 782."]

[Footnote 65: _Op. cit._ vol. iii. p. 140.]

[Footnote 66: John Stuart, LL.D., _Proc. Soc. Antiq. Scot._, viii. pp. 23 _et seq._]

[Footnote 67: Plates XIV.-XVI. Compare also Plates XVII.-XIX.]

[Footnote 68: _Op. cit._, vii. 191.]

[Footnote 69: _Op. cit._, iii. 133.]

[Footnote 70: _Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland_, vol. iii. (First Series), p. 129. The district of Barvas is specially referred to by Captain Thomas.]

APPENDIX.

Most of the illustrations here given are reproductions of some of the plates accompanying Captain Thomas's papers in the _Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland_. In explanation of their details the following extracts may be made.

PLATE I. (Frontispiece).--_Uamh Sgalabhad, South Uist._

(From Plate XXXV. of Vol. VII. of _Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland_, First Series.)

Captain Thomas thus describes his descent into and exploration of this earth-house:--"An irregular hole was pointed out by the little lassie before alluded to, and some of my party quickly disappeared below ground. As they did not immediately return, I thought it was time to follow, and squeezing through the ruinated entrance (_a_), I entered the usual kind of gallery, which descended into the ground at a sharp angle. At the bottom, on the right-hand side, was the usual guard-cell (_b_); the sides of dry-stone masonry, but the end was the face of a rock _in situ_. Proceeding on, the roof rose and the gallery widened to what was the main chamber (_c_), which was 7 feet high under the apex of the dome, and 4 feet broad. Upon the west side of this chamber, and about 2 feet from the ground, is a recess, about 2 feet square and 4 feet long. At the further end, and in the same right line, the gallery (_d_) became low (2½ feet) and narrow (2 feet). Again the roof rose, and the gallery widened till stopt, in face, by a large transported rock (_f_); to the right of the rock a rectangular chamber (_e_), 2 feet broad, extended 4 feet, and ended against rock _in situ_. Round, and beyond the rock (_f_), the wall of the left side of the gallery was built, but the passage was so narrow (_g_) that I contented myself by looking through it. This incomprehensible narrowness is a feature in the buildings of this period. Some of Captain Otter's officers pushed through into the small chamber (_h_); beyond this the gallery was ruinated and impassable; the total length explored was 45 feet."[71]

[Footnote 71: _Proc. Soc. Antiq. Scot._, vol. vii. (First Series), pp. 167-8.]

PLATE II.--_Bee-Hive Houses at Uig, Lewis._

(From Plate XXXI. of Vol. VII. of _Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland_, First Series.)

_Fig. 8._ Captain Thomas selects this as "the most modern, and at the same time the last, in all probability, that will be constructed in this manner"--viz., "roofed by the horizontal or cyclopean arch, _i.e._, by a system of overlapping stones." "The woman who was living in it [about 1869] told us it was built for his shieling by Dr. Macaulay's grandfather, who was tacksman [leaseholder] of Linshader ... and I conclude that it was made about ninety years back."[72]

_Fig. 9._ Sir Arthur Mitchell says of this compound "bee-hive" house:--"The greatest height of the living room--in its centre, that is--was scarcely 6 feet. In no part of the dairy was it possible to stand erect. The door of communication between the two rooms was so small that we could get through it only by creeping. The great thickness of the walls, 6 to 8 feet, gave this door, or passage of communication, the look of a tunnel, and made the creeping through it very real. The creeping was only a little less real in getting through the equally tunnel-like, though somewhat wider and loftier passage, which led from the open air into the first or dwelling room."[73]

[Footnote 72: _Op. cit._, p. 161.]

[Footnote 73: _The Past in the Present_, p. 60.]

PLATE III.--_Bee-Hive Houses at Uig, inhabited in 1859._

(From Plate XII. of Vol. III. of _Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland_, First Series.)

See p. 47, _ante_.

PLATE IV.--_Bee-Hive Houses at Meabhag, Forest of Harris._