Vestigia insulae manniae antiquiora, or, A dissertation on the armorial bearings of the Isle of Man : the regalities and prerogatives of its ancient kings, and the original usages, customs, privileges, laws, and constitutional government of the Manx people / by H.R. Oswald.

Oswald, H. R.

Date:: 1860

Credit: Vestigia insulae manniae antiquiora, or, A dissertation on the armorial bearings of the Isle of Man : the regalities and prerogatives of its ancient kings, and the original usages, customs, privileges, laws, and constitutional government of the Manx people / by H.R. Oswald. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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$TUMULT AND STONES OF BTUTTANY. Okus WormiuB mentions that the tomb of Wormius was ‘^collis spcctat<e magni- tudinis. Hence we may infer that the fashion of casting up ig a ° earth for individuals continued till the thirteenth centuiy.—Ed. Of the ancient monuments of different ages there is no lack in Brittany, and above all of Celtic remains. They are most numerous, however, on the storm-beaten pro^ montories and islands of the west coast, especially on the Morbihan, which inclu es the stony array of Carnac and the monstrous granite obelisks of Locmanaker.* * * § Car- nac is a remote village on the south coast of Brittany. The great mass of stones are arranged in eleven lines or rows, forming ten avenues, and a curved line of eighteen stones at one end, the extremities of which unite the two outside rows of the avenues.t These rude Celtic remains are of different kinds. Firstly,—Besides the Locmariaker, there is the Menhir,? (literally, long stone.) It is a monolith in the form of a rude obelisk, whose height much exceeds its breadth. There is one Menhir near Dol, which rises 30 feet, but the largest known is at Plouarzet, near Brest; it exceeds 42 feet iu height. Those at Locm.ariaker were more than 60 feet high, and thick in proportion, but they are now broken by violence. Secondly,—The Peulven, (pillar stone), an upright stone of inferior height to the Menhir,—the single stones at Carnac are of this kind. Thirdly,—The Dolmen§ or Cromlech, where one or two upright stones support a horizontal block. Some- times they nearly resemble a table, and the French call them “ pierres levees, or “pierres couvertesat others the supporting stones ai'e wide slabs, so arranged as to fit close to one another and so lofty as to allow a man to walk upright beneath their horizontal roof stone. Kit's Coity House in Kent is an instance of this kind but far inferior to those in Brittany, which are often 60 or 80 feet long. The French sometimes call them “ allees couvertes.’’ Fourthly, — The KistcaenH is similar to the Dolmen, inasmuch as it consists of two rows of upright stones supporting flat blocks, but the stones are smaller, and the whole structure is lower and longer ; it is more like the Hunnengraber\ of North Germany. The most remarkable is found on the island Gavre Tunis, near Locmariaker. Fifthly, Galgal, is a tumulus, cairn, or barrow. The largest known is the Butte de Tumiac, on the shores of the Morbihan Sea. Of the particular object of these * Locmariaker, i.e., place of the Virgin Mary. t The tradition of the country respecting their origin is, that “ St Comely [Cornelius] hard pressed by an army of Pagans, fled to the sea shore, hut finding no boat to further his escape, uttered a prayer which converted his pursuers into stones.” It is probably connected with some of those rites of initiation which formed part of the Druidical religion, and were derived from the same source as the Greek mysteries.—(See Welch’s Brittany.) t Menhir, literally long stone ; Fr-min-sul, long stone of the sun. § Dolmen, from taal, table, and mam, men; or mon-stone. II Kistcaeu and Kistvaen are the same word in Murray’s Guide. Hunuengriber, i.e., giant’s graves, mine is the German for giant, plural hunnen.$