The Phœnician origin of Britons, Scots & Anglo-Saxons : discovered by Phœnician & Sumerian inscriptions in Britain, by preroman Briton coins & a mass of new history : with over one hundred illustrations and maps

124 PHCENICIAN ORIGIN OF BRITONS & SCOTS

Cesar makes his remarkable statement that “ the inland non-agricultural people ’’ who were clad in skins and stained their skins blue (7.e., obviously the Picts) : “‘ by tens or twelves together have wives in common, and the offspring is credited to him who first had the mother as a virgin.” This is believed by some writers to be a misunderstanding by Cesar. And in view of the briefness of his visit, confined to only a few months’ strenuous campaigning in the south-east corner of England, in a foreign country, and dependent on interpreters, it seems probable that it is one of his several mistaken statements, * and that the Pictish custom in question was not polyandry, but matriarchy

The Serpent-worship of the Picts also, which was so universal, as seen everywhere on the prehistoric monuments in Pictlands, and figuring freely also on the early Christian monuments and “Celtic ’”’ crosses of the Picts, is now explained by the matriarchist Van or Fen origin of this race. We have seen the prominence of the Serpent-cult Witch’s Bowl or Cauldron amongst the Feins of prehistoric Ireland, and the - Serpent guardians there of the Tribe of the ‘‘ Fidga,”’ 7.e., the Picts, the Serpent-cult enmity against the Sun-worshipping heroes Diarmait and Conn of the Irish-Scots, and the widespread carving of the Serpent and its coiled symbols on the prehistoric stone monuments in Ireland, and how St Patrick the Scot in the fifth century a.p. traditionally banished the Serpent-cult from Ireland and demolished the chief Matriarchist idol. In Britain, the Serpent and its interlacing coils are freely sculptured on many of the prehistoric monuments and early Christian crosses. In Scotland, the last refuge of the Picts, where their early monuments have most largely escaped destruction, this symbolism is especially widespread and occurs on many of the several hundreds of prehistoric monuments and early Christian crosses figured by Dr. Stuart in his classic Sculptured Stones of Scotland, and it is well exemplified in the great prehistoric ‘‘ Serpent Stone,” which now stands alongside the Newton Stone.

1D.B.G., v, 5. Cf. H.A.B., 414, etc. ; = * E.s., His statement that the Pine and Beech do not grow in Britain,

D.B.G., v., 5-