[137] The following is the passage to which Sir Walter Scott refers:--"Visitur ibi hodiedum circulus concessus judicialis intra quem homines, Diis victima fieri jubebantur. Eminensque in isto circulo Saxum Thoris, in quo hominibus sacrificio destinatis terga confracta sunt, quodque sanguinem adhuc colorem conspiciendum præbet," &c. (Eyrbiggia Saga. G. J. Thorkelin, 1787. P. 27.) But a much more minute account is given in an earlier portion of the Saga, where Thorolf ascertains the destined site of the new temple by casting its wooden pillars into the sea, and accepting as the sacred spot a promontory to which they were borne by the tides. This is the description of the erection, which it will be seen is something different from a mere circle of stones:--"At Hofsvog he caused a temple to be erected, a house of vast magnitude, with doors in the side wall, somewhat near to either extremity. Within the doors were the pillars of the chief seat, secured with nails, and called sacred or divine. In the interior another chamber was constructed in the shape which the chancels of churches now have, in the middle of the pavement of which stood the pulvinar, as well as the altar," &c. _Vide_ Ibid. p. 11. [138] MS. Letter, John Stuart, Esq., Advocate, Aberdeen, 1888. Libr. Soc. Antiq. Scot. [139] The name Stennis, of Norwegian origin, was obviously the apposite description suggested to the first Scandinavian voyagers by the appearance of the singular tongue of land, crowned by its monolithic circle; but the death of Earl Havard, as mentioned in the Northern Sagas, conferred on it new associations and a corresponding name. Professor Munch, whose natural bias as a Norwegian might have inclined him to claim for his countrymen the erection of the Great Scottish Circle, remarks, in a recent letter to me:--"Stennis is the old Norn _Steinsnes_, that is, 'the promontory of the stones;' and that name it bore already when Havard fell, in the beginning of the island, being Scandinavian. This shows that the Scandinavian settlers found the stones already standing;--in other words, that the standing stones belonged to the population previous to the Scandinavian settlement." [140] Archæol. Scot. vol. iii. p. 211. [141] Archæologia, vol. xxii. p. 55; vol. xxv. p. 614, &c. [142] Hibbert on the Tings of Orkney and Shetland. Archæol. Scot. vol. iii. p. 141. [143] Regist. Episcop. Aberdon. vol. i. p. 79. [144] Regist. Episcop. Morav. p. 184. [145] Archæologia, vol. xvi. p. 353. [146] Logan's Scottish Gael, vol. ii. p. 322; Macculloch's Highlands and Isles, vol. iii. p. 232. [147] Primeval Antiquities of Denmark, p. 110. [148] Archæol. Index, p. 34. CHAPTER VI. WEAPONS AND IMPLEMENTS.