Reference
Date 2001
Event ID 924540
Category Documentary Reference
Type Reference
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/924540
This symbol-stone (NMS X.IB 37) was presented to the National Museum of Antiquities of Scotland by Alexander Carmichael in 1870. It was found by him some years earlier below high-water level in the tidal channel that separates the islet of Sunamul from the N coast of Benbecula. He described the find-spot as lying 'about a mile or a mile and a half' (1.6km or 2.4km) E of structures then exposed in a large sand-dune in the area now occupied by Benbecula Airport. This suggests that it was in the channel to the S of Sunamul rather than to the W, but it cannot be more closely located. Carmichael noted an adjacent scatter of stones which appeared to be the remains of some artificial structure (i). A rock about 250m N of Sunamul is known as Crois an t-sleuchd ('cross of the prostration, or bowing'), and the traditional site of a cross occupies a knoll overlooking the strand at Gramsdale (NF 8265 5615), about 2.2km to the E (ii). A medieval church dedicated to St Columba is situated at Balivanich, about 2.5 km to the SW (iii).
The stone is a polygonal slab of gneiss, 0.96m high by 0.84m and 0.23m thick (iv). The carved face is level but weathering has exposed several prominent parallel veins of hard stone. At the centre there is an incised circle, 0.31m in diameter, enclosing three 0.13m circles which touch the perimeter (v) and are linked by curved lines to define a central three-armed figure. This motif has a small sinking at the centre and in each of its three terminals. Some 12mm above the circle there is a rectangle measuring 0.32m by 0.12m and divided by an axial line, with simple curvilinear ornament in the upper half.
A small number of disc symbols are known from NE Scotland, and three of them have three internal circles, but they are not linked to define a central motif as on this stone. In contrast, the ornamented rectangle is a neat but very simple form of the symbol (vi). The two symbols are not found in combination elsewhere.
Footnotes:
(i) A A Carmichael 1871, 282-4.
(ii) A Carmichael 1940, 262-3; RCAHMS 1928, No.358.
(iii) Ibid., No.339.
(iv) The slab, as displayed in the Museum of Scotland and described here, has been turned by 90? from its previous alignment
(v) One of the three small circles, which was affected by a hard vein, does not touch the perimeter and is only 0.12m in diameter.
(vi) Allen and Anderson 1903, 2, 58, 66.
(A A Carmichael 1871, 284-5; NMAS 1892, 262; Allen and Anderson 1903, 3, 110-11; RCAHMS 1928, No.356; A Mack 1997, 30).
I Fisher 2001, 108-9.
