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Updated: June 27, 2025
It is only certain that the pebbles of the Caithness brochs are as absolutely unfamiliar as the inscribed stones of Dumbuck. But nobody says that the Caithness painted pebbles are forgeries or modern fabrications. The use of painted pebbles and of inscribed stones, may have been merely local.
Moreover, the appearance of an unique and previously unheard-of set of inscribed stones, in a site of the usual broch and crannog period, is not invariably ascribed to forgery, even by the most orthodox archaeologists. Thus Sir Francis Terry found unheard-of things, not to mention "a number of thin flat circular discs of various sizes" in his Caithness brochs.
For Gaelic was ever a trustworthy vehicle of the original Norse. The Norse place-names too are found in the same spots on which the remains of brochs exist, that is, on the best land at the lowest levels which the Picts had already cultivated, and which the Norse invaders seized. Such names are also found on the eastern coast as far south as Dingwall, both in Ross and Cromarty.
They then, as we know from the localities which bear their place-names, cleared out the Pict from most of his brochs and from the best land in Cat, shown on the map by dark green colour, that is, from all cultivated land below the 500 feet level save the upper parts of the valleys; or they slew or enslaved the Pict who remained.
Through this wall there was one entrance passage on a level with its base, 3 feet 2 inches in width, protected by two guard chambers, one on each side, analogous to those so frequently met with in the Brochs. The height of the remaining part of the wall varied from 18 inches to 3 feet 6 inches. The interior contained no dividing walls nor any indications of secondary occupation." Thus writes Dr.
That the Norsemen used many of the Pictish brochs as dwelling-places is more than probable, and is proved by the Sagas in certain instances. At the same time few articles used distinctively by Norsemen have been found in them. No stately church like the Cathedral of St.
What concerns dwellers in the extreme north is that although the Romans went into Perthshire and may have temporarily penetrated even into Moray, they certainly never occupied any part of Sutherland or Caithness, though their tablets of brass, probably as part of the currency used in trade, have been found in a Sutherland Pictish tower or broch, a fact which goes far to prove that the brochs, with which we shall deal later on, existed in Roman times.
The unique arrangement of the wooden substructures suggests that the central building was in the form of a round tower with very thick walls, like the brochs and other forts of North Britain.
Built invariably solely of stone and without mortar, in form the brochs were circular, and have been described as truncated cones with the apex cut off, and their general plan and elevation were everywhere almost uniform. The ground floor was solid masonry, but contained small chambers in its thickness of about 15 feet.
Notwithstanding agricultural operations, foundations of 145 brochs can still be traced in Ness and 67 in Strathnavern and Sudrland, but they were not all in use at the same time, and they are mostly on sites taken over later on by the Norse, because they were already cultivated and agriculturally the best. A well-known authority on such subjects, the late Dr.
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