Dr. Munro classifies the disputed objects as _Weapons_, _Implements_,
"_Amulets_" _or Pendants_, _Cup-and-Ring Stones_, "_Human Figurines or
Idols_."
For reasons of convenience, and because what I heard about group 3, the
"amulets or pendants" first led me into this discussion, I shall here
first examine them. Dr. Munro reproduces some of them in one plate (xv.
p. 228). He does not say by what process they are reproduced; merely
naming them . . . "objects of slate and stone from Dumbuck."
Dr. Munro describes the "amulets" or "pendants" thus:
"The largest group of objects (plate XV.) consists of the so-called
amulets or pendants of stone, shale, and shell, some fifteen to twenty
specimens of which have been preserved and recorded as having been
found on the different stations, viz., three from Dunbuie (exclusive
of a few perforated oyster shells), eleven from Dumbuck, and one from
Langbank. Their ornamentation is chiefly of the cup-and-ring order,
only a few having patterns composed of straight lines. Some of them
are so large as to be unfit to be used as amulets or pendants, such,
for example, as that represented by no. 14, which is 9 inches long,
3.5 inches broad, and 0.5 inch thick. The ornamentation consists of a
strongly incised line running downwards from the perforation with
small branch lines directed alternately right and left. Any human
being, who would wear this object, either as an ornament or religious
emblem, would be endowed with the most archaic ideas of decorative art
known in the history of human civilisation. Yet we can have no doubt
that the individual who manufactured it, if he were an inhabitant of
any of the Clyde sites, was at the same time living in a period not
devoid of culture, and was in possession of excellent cutting
implements, most likely of iron, with which he manipulated wood, deer-
horn, and other substances. These objects are nearly all perforated,
as if intended for suspension, but sometimes, in addition to this,
there is a large central hole around which there is always an
ornamentation, generally consisting of incised circles or semicircles,
with divergent lines leading into small hollow points, the so-called
cup-marks."
I shall return to the theory that the stones were "ornaments"; meanwhile
I proceed to the consideration of "cup-marks" on stones, large or small.