Diggers

When the Romans occupied Britain, one of their big problems was the wild, tattooed Picts, who kept the northern end of the island in continual uproar. Fenced off at last by the famed Roman walls, the Picts remained as a troublesome relic of barbarism on the edge of the Roman empire. In Archaeology, J.R.C. Hamilton, assistant inspector of ancient monuments for Scotland, tells about excavations that reveal how the wild Picts lived.

Near Jarlshof in the Shetlands, off the northern coast of Scotland, is a great mound of wind-blown beach sand stuffed with stone ruins. For more than 50 years archeologists have poked at the mound, but the job of excavating it was not undertaken until a few years ago. Near the top of the sand were remains of houses built by the Vikings, who conquered the Shetlands in the Dark Ages. Farther down were strange windowless stone buildings that must have looked in their prime like a cross between a medieval castle and a huddle of Eskimo igloos.

Wheelhouse. Oldest part of the grim little hamlet was a "broch tower": a crude donjon keep. Beside it was a walled courtyard. For shelter against the rough climate, they had a "roundhouse" that was roofed along its circular outer walls, leaving an open space for a fire in the middle.

As the Picts grew slightly more sophisticated, they developed a better dwelling: a "wheelhouse" with radial, spokelike partitions supporting a massive roof of stone and turf. When the village was fully developed, the courtyard was crammed with five of these stone igloos.

During the growth of the Pictish village, the blowing beach sand heaped up around its walls, and some of the people took to living in underground houses sunk into the sand. The British diggers found remains of their pottery, tools and weapons of stone, bone and iron, and many mysterious pebbles painted with crude designs. The pebbles are believed to be connected in some way with their custom of tattooing their bodies.

Day Fearers. Except for such bizarre details, the Pictish way of life foreshadowed that of the Shetlanders today. They raised grain, caught fish and seals and gathered seabirds and their eggs. But they must have had some odd ideas, perhaps a part of their religion. A medieval chronicler, says Digger Hamilton, describes them as "Picts who did marvels in the morning and the evening, in building walled towns, but at midday they entirely lost their strength and lurked, through, fear, in little underground houses."

Gradually the sand piled over the village of the day-fearing Picts. Their poor arts and crafts grew even poorer. At last came the invading Vikings, who did not kill all the Picts. A few survived for a while, to live as trembling serfs on the outskirts of the Viking settlement.

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