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Introduction

DH Lawrence stated: “Every people is polarised in some particular locality, which is home, the homeland. Different places on the face of the earth have different vital effluence, different vibration, different chemical exhalation, different polarity with different stars: call it what you like, but the spirit of place is a great reality.”
According to Lester Borley, Director of the National Trust of Scotland and an authority on world tourism, “perhaps the most powerful of all world tourism motives is the desire to visit special places which have a spiritual quality.” Some have gone so far as to distinguish these people from “the tourist” and have labelled them “pilgrims”, as they use the tourist industry to reach places which for them are of special significance.
Is it possible that a part of Scotland, in particular the Lothians and the Borders, was once considered by its inhabitants to be a “sacred land”, a land favoured by the Gods? This concept might seem outrageous to propose at the beginning of the 21st century. But only half a century ago, the Jews claimed the land of Israel because they believed that that land had been given to them by Yahweh 3,000 years earlier. In our 21st century, 400 years after being colonised by Europeans and nearly 250 after the Declaration of Independence the United States of America still feels it is specifically favoured by “God”. More than any other political leader, its presidents use the name of “God” in their speeches, obviously indicating how they think their decision is favoured by him, or in his interest, and how he will bless and help the American nation. The United States are not alone; various other countries believe the same. And originally, it seems various cultures believed this: from Easter Island, to Egypt, to Sumer, etc. In all these cases, past and present, the belief in a special relationship between God or the Gods and the people, and hence the nation, married the people to the land they lived.
So, to some extent, the answer to the question of this special relationship that might have applied to the Lothians and the Borders should be a rather uncontroversial “yes”. But, whereas we have written records of the claims of the Jews and the Egyptians about their relationship with God, who apparently gave them their country, such evidence seems to be lacking from the Lothians. So did it happen, or didn’t it? To ask the well-tried question: “is absence of evidence, evidence of absence?” Or is there another reason for this absence?

The evidence is, in fact, lacking throughout the length and breadth of Britain –– at least it is when we try to find it around 2000 BC. The Lothians do not form the exception; they are the norm. But to the West, in Ireland, there is evidence. Ireland, scholars affirm, has the best preserved and richest store of mythological traditions of any country north of the Alps. Why? The most likely reason is that Ireland had no exposure to the Roman invasion that changed Britain forever. The transition in Ireland went from the Celtic religion to the Christian religion. It is well known that Christian missionaries had specific orders to make sure that religious places were the prime targets for conversion; the pagan sanctuaries were often occupied literally by the Christian missionary – hence the name “Christianisation”.
On mainland Britain, the situation was different. With the Romans, the prime locations for occupation would be the forts or areas where the local people did battle with them. The Romans occupied Britain and often erected new towns to suit their needs. Bath became a prosperous Roman town because the Romans used it as a spa. At the same time, the Romans brought with them their own religion. Hence, it is often unclear whether certain locations were “Romanised” Celtic sanctuaries, or whether the Christians merely “Christianised” Roman temples in locations where there had been nothing before the arrival of the Romans. In London, Westminster Abbey and St Paul’s Cathedral are thought to have been built on Roman Temples – but whether or not those temples were built on Celtic religious sites, is completely unknown.
Contrary to the Romans, the Christian missionaries also ensured that they left written records of their conversions: the accounts of the early saints show evidence of how their work converted a people from worshipping “the devil” to the worship of God. The missionaries felt it was important to show the process of Christianisation, to underline the evil of what was there before. Throughout Christianity, the contrast between the pagan, evil ways and the “good way” would continue to be underlined – often with painful and lethal illustrations along the “good path”. The Romans simply did not bother; their records were administrative: on their way to conquer this and that, they came across these people, who they fought there, etc. Often, the accounts were written after the events, and often written by those not witnessing the events.
This difference in approach is one of the primary reasons why the mythology of Ireland has been well documented and to a large extent remains active to this day, though often under a layer of veneer, painted and frequently restored by Christianity. But the underlying imagery remained visible. In Ireland, the pilgrimage at the end of July to Croagh Patrick clearly reveals its pagan roots. The hill was sacred in pre-Christian times and the annual pilgrimage is literally identical to the pagan festival; the only difference is that, as it is performed by Christians, the pilgrimage now marks the victory over the pagan ways. The ancient rituals were literally Christianised – but to any neutral observer watching the progression, little or no difference would be visible.

In contrast to Ireland the imagery in mainland Britain is more dispersed – but nevertheless it is still traceable. However, there is only so much that archaeology can uncover. The best way of ensuring the survival of things that archaeology cannot deal with – language, belief, social organisation and so on – would be in the local folklore. But in nearly all areas it is clear that Britain, and specifically Scotland, has suffered more than Ireland. Therefore, where native evidence has gone missing, analogies will have to be used. However, it is important to make sure that the analogies used are topical and close to home.
All too often, both archaeologists and non-scientific authors, draw comparisons from outside of the framework. Comparisons between the Old World and the New World, e.g. Egypt and the Maya civilisation of Mexico and surrounding countries, comes to mind. Several millennia separate both civilisations, as well as the Atlantic Ocean. The fact that both civilisations built pyramids following the same general pattern is intriguing, but straightforward comparisons cannot be made. Arguing, as some have done, that the similarity, small though it is, of more than one civilisation building pyramids (which are structurally completely different in each civilisation) is proof for the existence of a “lost civilisation” is therefore only allowable if extra-ordinary evidence can be produced to substantiate the claim.

However, for some unknown reason, during the period 3000 BC to 500 AD, from the era of the megalithic civilisation to the departure of the Romans, the role of the Lothians and the Borders has remained largely unexplored. Here enters a second problem: the division between England and Scotland, with the Lothians and Borders belonging to the latter, though often sandwiched between both. North of the border, allegations that English historians have always minimised the importance of Scottish history have never stopped; but they are nevertheless true. Even when it comes to megalithic monuments, the main focus is on Stonehenge and Avebury – England. That Scotland has megalithic monuments might be unknown to a large percentage of the British population. That monuments rivalling Stonehenge and Avebury are present in the Orkneys and the Isle of Lewis, is also little appreciated.
There is, therefore, less knowledge of Scottish megalithic monuments than there is of those located in England. Knowledge of Lothian and border megalithic monuments is even less. This is very strange, as the area is littered with megalithic monuments – some of them extreme importance. The Romans discovered a Celtic tribe living in the area which, uniquely, they did not subjugate, but instead they entered in partnership with them. The question of “why” the Votadini received this special treatment is hardly ever asked. When the megaliths of the Lothians are occasionally looked into, those who are studying them never release them from their territorial isolation and place them within the framework of the British Megalithic Era as a whole.
In 1947, Cairnpapple, the most important megalithic site of the Lothians, was researched by archaeologist Stuart Piggott. He had also done research at Stonehenge, thus linking the two sites. Furthermore, both sites belonged to the same category of monument: a henge. But despite all of this, neither Piggott nor anyone else has placed Cairnpapple within the “Henge tradition” – or Hengeworld as one archaeologist has recently labelled it. These researchers have pointed out how the henge phenomenon was typically British, that it was found in Northern Scotland, and in Wiltshire. Anyone drawing a line from both locations will end in the Lothians – it is very hard to miss the Lothians and the Border region when travelling North to South or vice versa in Britain – as the Romans realised. In the middle, between the Orkneys and the Wiltshire henge, sits Cairnpapple. But is it ever incorporated into the concept of how the henge phenomenon spread southward from the Orkneys? The answer is no.

Cairnpapple sits on top of the highest hill in Central Scotland, as evidenced by a modern radio mast

Apart from megalithic remains, the Lothians are rife with accounts of King Arthur: “Arthur’s Seat” stands tall over the city of Edinburgh. In literature, J.R.R. Tolkien based Lord of the Rings around Edinburgh and Scotland: the Lothians were Lothlorien, a magical and timeless kingdom. The returning King and his wandering company, whom Tolkien called the Dunedain, were named after the ancient city of Edinburgh.
Tolkien was not the only one who felt the Lothians were a magical kingdom. Tantallon Castle, just East of North Berwick, is a dramatic setting for any castle. No surprise then perhaps that it has been identified as the Grail Castle. According to some, this was the original Camelot, the castle of King Arthur. Attempts were made in the 1960s to find evidence, treasure or even the Holy Grail in these ruins, but funding was insufficient to uncover anything. Almost by default, the results would have been negative.
Similarly, a 19th “historian” was convinced that Edinburgh was the true site of Jerusalem, and he wrote several lengthy tomes on the subject; Arthur’s Seat was supposed to be Calvary Mount. The imagination often runs away with reason, but flights on fancy happen more easily when the soul is moved; and the natural beauty of the Lothians and the Borders has inspired poets as well, as history can attest.

Still, the gap created by scientific disinterest in Scotland, has opened the way for pseudo-scientific theories. Specifically an interest in a connection between ancient Egypt and Scotland has come to the forefront; a connection which has been sponsored by Mohammed El Fayed, owner of Harrods’, Egyptian born, and Scottish castle owner. Some of these Egyptian connections, it has to be said, are based on medieval records.
Walter Bower, Abbot of Inchcolm Abbey, completed the Scottichronicon, in 1435. Bower was born in Lothian’s capital, Haddington, in 1385 and entered the seminary of St Andrews, before becoming abbot of the small Augustinian monastery off the coast of north-east Scotland. It is often stated that Bower wrote the history of Scotland, but in truth, he “merely” concluded it. After the death of Fordoun, the historian Sir David Stewart of Rossyth asked him to complete the Chronicles of Scotland, which had been brought up by Fordoun only to the 23rd chapter of the fifth book. In transcribing the part written by Fordoun, Bower inserted large interpolations. He completed the work in sixteen books, which brought the narrative to the death of King James I. In describing ancient Scotland, Bower spoke of a time before the Romans, when the North had been visited by ancient Egyptians.
He stated: “In ancient times Scota, the daughter of the pharaoh, left Egypt with her husband Gaythelos by name and a large following. For they had heard of the disasters which were going to come upon Egypt, and so through the instructions of the gods they fled from certain plagues that were to come. They took to the sea, entrusting themselves to the guidance of the gods. After sailing in this way for many days over the sea with troubled minds, they were finally glad to put their boats in at a certain shore because of bad weather.”
According to Bower, this shore was in north Britain. He argued that Scota and her following settled in Scotland. When relations with the natives deteriorated, they left for Ireland, merging with the local population to form the tribe known as the Scotti. Many centuries later, they returned to Scotland, defeating the Picts and conquering the Highlands
Bower names the pharaoh as Achencres, which is the Greek rendering of Akhenaten, the heretic pharaoh who tried to abandon the Amon centred religion of Thebes and convert Egypt to the worship of the Aten, the solar disk, the visible aspect of his religion which seemed to deify the solar light. In recent years, many authors have touched upon the Egyptian-Scottish connection; one, Lorraine Evans, has tried to collect evidence from archaeological sites to show that the ancient Egyptians did visit Britain and that the allegations of Walter Bower are historical truths.
When Evan’s book, Kingdom of the Ark, was published, some historians felt compelled to react. One Scottish historian in medieval history, Dr Dauvit Brown, of Glasgow University, discounted Evans’ theory, saying she had been taken in by the Scottichronicon, which was a “mythical account”. “She doesn’t seem to understand historical sources,” he said. “We might not know where we originated from, but we’re not Egyptians, that’s for sure.”
This statement underlines the basic problem people like Brown face, but do not deal with. In a court of law, evidence cannot be divided. And colleagues of Brown have used this approach with the Scottichronicon: they claimed certain items are historically true, whereas others weren’t – including the Egyptian origins of the Scots.

Evans placed the arrival of Egyptians in Scotland at around 1300 BC. A connection between ancient Egypt and megalithic Scotland might seem fanciful. But, as this book will show, the entire ancient world from 3000 BC onwards moved towards a solar religion, not just Egypt. Though the scientific world might be divided between Egyptologists and archaeologists, history itself is a whole. The new “solar” trend was visible, at the same time, in both Scotland and Egypt, and elsewhere. It formed a radical departure towards the modern age, in which cities and individuals are held in higher esteem than small communities where decisions were made by the group as a whole, rather than by chosen individuals.
A key point which has to be made is that archaeologists feel that this movement might have originated in Scotland. Though they will not go as far as to suggest that the sphere of influence stretched all the way to Egypt (they argue it spread from Scotland towards the South, reaching Southern England and Brittany, i.e. the normal sphere of Megalithic Western Europe), it is nevertheless a fact that the “British solar religion” preceded the building trend linked with solar religion that hit Egypt in the middle of the 3rd millennia BC – 500 years after it started in Scotland. The question as to whether these two might be related is never addressed; not even statements like “both developed the solar oriented religion independently” are heard.
What this book will reveal is that much of the symbolism of solar worship in Egypt can be traced back to the Lothians. In Egypt, the hieroglyph for the sunset is the solar disk between the twin peaks of a mountain. The hieroglyph for sunrise is a solar strip over a conical, so called “primordial” hill. These features are difficult to observe in Egypt – they are difficult to observe anywhere in the world. But they do exist in the Lothians. But let us not run before we can walk. Although this book will not address the question of whether or not an Egyptian colony settled in Egypt, it will reveal that the Lothians form an integral part of the spread of the solar religion – and that the symbolism used by this religion is found both in the Lothians, as in Egypt, as elsewhere.

In recent years, the romance of yesteryear has been replaced with the hard knowledge that many of the most significant Scottish and often British archaeological finds have been made in the Lothians. This was not a scientific reaction to the “esoteric researches” in search of the New Jerusalem or the Holy Grail. Like so much of modern archaeology, it was performed purely because of Mankind’s further intrusion in nature; in this case, the development of the dual carriageway of the A1. Britain’s policy that any building developments that may involve sites of potential historical interest must be accompanied by archaeological research, has been a god-send for many – and specifically for Lothian archaeology.
In the past, there was idle speculation based on no evidence; lately, there have been many discoveries, but no interpretation or setting these discoveries within their proper framework. It is now time to marry both these principles again. The role of the Lothians within Scottish archaeology and Megalithic religion has been largely untouched, and the emergence of solar worship and its Scottish origins has been only briefly touched on by a small handful of authors.

Once the two concepts, archaeology and mythology, are joined together once again, the Lothians will reveal why its ancient people believed the land had been specifically favoured by the Gods. They will reveal the sacredness of the land, and place it within its proper, symbolic context – and not modern ideas of Holy Grails, which, at best, belong more to our era, than to the era of the Megalithic Lothians.

Chapter 1. Lug, King of the Lothians

The ancient Egyptians believed their land was the land of the gods; the pharaoh was the direct link to the gods and their representative on Earth. His rule would safeguard the nation and maintain the order, with the help of the gods. They identified all foreigners with the “chaotic powers”. In Egyptian depictions of warfare, found on many temple walls of Upper Egypt, the foreign enemies are always portrayed as a chaotic gathering of people, whereas the Egyptian army is depicted as ordered lines of warriors.
These ideas are in fact quite commonplace in that every nation tries to portray its unique relationship with “God”. Before every war, the governments of nations will call upon their people bearing the message that God is on their side, that they are good and the enemy is evil. In a world where politics and religion are further and further removed, it is “cheap” to spice political acts with religious symbolism.
But in some countries, such as the United Kingdom, an echo of an ancient system is still visible. The political head of state, the king or queen, is also the titular head of the Church. In most countries, the division between State and Church has become more and more marked. In France, the separation of Church and State formed a prime goal of the Revolution at the end of the 18th century. As in Egypt, the king had been considered to be the High Priest; it was felt that the people could not rule without the full backing of the gods, and as such the king also had to be priest.
In those ancient days, the nation was blessed by the gods, but not all places expressed a unique relationship between the land and god. Only a few locations did and they became the sites of major religious complexes, be they named temples, sanctuaries, churches, or otherwise. Most such sites are now taken over by “civilisation”, or urbanisation: the religious importance of Edinburgh, in particular Edinburgh Castle, was even by medieval times already obscured. But some writers do now argue that the oldest part of Edinburgh is still St Margaret’s Chapel, in the heart of the Castle; the religious importance of the original site has been eclipsed by the military power of the Rock, and its royal connections.

In more remote areas, however, legends describing the sacred relationship between the land and the gods survived more easily. The Giant’s Causeway is the most famous natural wonder of Northern Ireland, on its north coast. Created by slow cooling basalt some sixty million years ago, it is a dramatic secluded setting, in some ways reminding the visitor of Land’s End, in Cornwall, Southern England that other dramatic encounter of land and sea. But whereas the name Land’s End does not have any mythological overtones, the Giant’s Causeway has.
Clochan na bhFómharach, Irish for “the stones of the Formorians”, reveals its association with the Formorians, the earliest mythical inhabitants of Ireland. The Scottish giant Finn McCool, or Fionn mac Cumhaill, is believed to have constructed the site, in an effort to come to Ireland for a trial of strength. Another variation on the story says that the giant built it so that he could visit his girlfriend in Scotland. The basalt columns form “stepping stones” that lead from the cliff face and disappear under the sea. They reappear on Staffa, on the west coast of Scotland – hence the connection and the legend of a “causeway” connection Scotland with Ireland.
What created this legend are the dramatic, strange and spectacular natural formations. When we as Mankind encountered this, we noted how peculiar some of these shapes were. They fired our imagination and became selected as places of importance, and often of religious significance. Not only in Northern Ireland but everywhere in the world ancient tribes have connected such formations, most often hills or rocks, with the legends of their forefathers and their heroes or their gods. Wherever we go, even to Australia, this connection is apparent; Ularu, formerly known as Ayer’s Rock, the dramatic hill formation in the middle of Australia, is at the core of the religion of the Aboriginals.
British author Paul Devereux describes how “myth” in ancient times was not just stories from the past: “To tribal, non-Western societies, however, myth was (and in a few cases still is) a living reality, directly informing their beliefs, view of the universe, social arrangements, rituals – and landscapes.” Devereux describes how in Australia, in 1933, an elder took a Western researcher to such a ritual landscape, where he then pointed out the mythic ancestors as they were seen in the features of the terrain. The Australian aboriginals stated how in the Dreamtime, the Earth was flat, but then the giants walked the Earth, creating the landscape. Author Danny Sullivan states: “When the Dream Time came to an end, the creators marked every place in which they had performed a task or ceremony with a rock, a hill, a watercourse or some other natural feature. Each tribe has possession of one part of the whole creation myth and the finishing place of a ‘line of songs’ is where the myths and songs change hands to another tribe and hence form a tribal boundary.”

Scotland’s landscape might seem largely void of such mythical connections, as little or no written history survives that ties the Scots into its surroundings. What are most remembered are the settings of heroic battles between the Scottish people and its adversaries: Culloden, Bannockburn, Flodden all feature in this line, as do the castles and homes of those fighting in these battles. But this relationship is recent, and does not express the relationship between the people and their myths. At the same time, Celtic scholar and Highland specialist Anne Ross states that it is known that one of the prime Celtic characteristics was their obsession with the landscape, expressed as both a love and an obsession with the locality.
According to some authors, such as Borders specialist Alistair Moffat, there is more to this absence. Moffat believes there has been a deliberate and centuries-long campaign of English rulers to suppress the Scottish people and their identity. This is definitely true. Take away a person’s history, and you take away their identity. The same applies to a group of people. Some dictators, like Adolf Hitler, tried to replace their nation’s history with a mythical account, of Aryan “super nations” originating in Central Asia, with a mission to rise to its perceived former glory by conquering and extinguishing “lower” races. But at the same time, there were other factors. Even in Scotland, there is a noticeable difference between sites heavily affected by Protestant ministers preaching, and those largely left intact. It was specifically the Protestant ministers who objected to “pagan decadence”; since the 16th century Protestant reformer John Knox was a child of the Lothians (born in Haddington), did it ever stand a chance of survival?
Scotland has been affected by this removal of cultural identity. One of the most intriguing Celtic tribes, the Gododdin, lived in what is now the Lothians. We know that they entertained a special relationship with the Romans: rather than being conquered by them, as happened to the “English Celts”, the Gododdin entered into an alliance with the Mediterranean invaders. This set them apart from the standard pattern of Roman occupation, yet no serious scholar has ever fully addressed the question as to who these people were, and particularly why they became the exception. When speculation arises, scholars often point to the “mystery” of it all, and if pressed they will agree that indeed the Gododdin are “special”, but that is all. As a result, the ancient identity of the Lothians is labelled “interesting”, but does not give back to its people its sense of history.

The Land of the Gods

The belief that the land was favoured by the Gods is often accompanied by a belief that the land was originally ruled by the Gods. The belief in a mythical race that ruled the land is universal, though local variations do exist. In Australia, the Aboriginals believe that in the Dreamtime, when the giants ruled the Earth, the land was flat. Then, it was walked by the giants, who created Ularu and the other sacred hills that formed part of a “sacred perambulation” of the land, whereby the Aboriginals performed a pilgrimage to all sacred sites, walking in the footsteps of those giants. The land was subdivided by the various Aboriginal tribes and given into the care of specific tribes, who had to look after the paths and its sacred sites. Though divided, the entire network remained alive and continued to form the framework of the myths of the Aboriginals.
The ancient Egyptians also believed that their land was once ruled by the gods themselves. The Egyptian High Priest Manetho, ordered by the Greek invaders to write down the history of his nation, incorporated a rule of the Gods over Egypt that lasted more than twenty thousands of years. This period was followed by a rule of the “Shemsu Hor”, the Followers of Horus, which again lasted several thousands of years. These “heroes” (the word originates from these people) then handed over the rule to the first Pharaoh, Menes, of the First Dynasty. Manetho’s List of Kings, as this document has become known, is still used as the foundation of Egyptological timelines. It is the document that lists Akhenaten, the king which previous Egyptian priests had tried to carve from memory. The inclusion is just one sign of the solidity of Manetho’s knowledge of the history of his nation.
Under the rule of Ptolemy III, the Egyptians began the building of the Temple of Edfu, in 237 BC. It wasn’t completed until 57 BC. The texts inscribed on its wall speak of how the temple was designed with a divine plan that “dropped down from heaven to Earth near the city of Memphis” and how the temple had originally been established as a cult centre by the Shemsu Hor in honour of their leader, Horus of Behdet, long before the arrival of the Pharaohs.
Nevertheless, although they accept the validity of his king list, Egyptologists do not give any historical credibility to his statement about a Rule of the Gods or Followers of Horus. Instead, they are termed “mythical rulers”, like the giants of Australia, or the Formorians of Ireland. Even though texts such as The Royal Canon of Turin speak of the reign of the Shemsu Hor as lasting 13,420 years, since they were based on oral tradition alone, their validity is not even questioned – just denied. Still, the ancient Egyptians believed in a “First Time”, very much like the Dreamtime, when the gods, the neteru, such as Osiris and his son Horus, ruled; it was a time of absolute perfection, “before rage or clamour or strife or uproar had come about.”
That giants built the megaliths was still recorded as fact by English medieval writers. Geoffrey of Monmouth in Historia Regnum Brittaniae, stated that the stones of Stonehenge were brought from Africa to Ireland by giants. Later, Merlin was commissioned by Aurelius Ambrosius to bring the stones to Britain so that they could be set up as a war memorial.
Fortunately, in recent times the “giants” of the Celtic world have not been subjected to such a literal interpretation as the gods of the Egyptians, according to which some authors believe that the Egyptian civilisation started approximately 30,000 years ago; “recent”, knowing that one author has labelled by the same reckoning the Sumerian civilisation to be 360,000 years old – 354,000 years older than artefacts found by archaeologists in the field.
It is, however, a two-edged sword. Because such literal interpretations of the myths were never made, people’s attention has never been drawn to the megalithic monuments that are scattered throughout the Celtic world – and which predate the Celts.
Many ancient monuments attract controversy and few authors were able to generate as much controversy as Erich von Däniken in the early 1970s. Von Däniken travelled around the world, in search of enigmas that science had either been unable to explain, or where von Däniken found the explanations lacking. What von Däniken himself stated – and which most of his sceptics have disregarded – is that his book, Chariots of the Gods, was littered with several hundred of question marks. He was questioning established science, asking them whether the enigmas of history might be the result of an extraterrestrial presence that had visited the Earth; whether the gods were ancient astronauts.
The ensuing spotlight that was thrown on enigmas such as Peru’s Nazca lines forced archaeologists to come up with a better explanation than had been offered so far. In this, and other cases, they succeeded. Though the Nazca lines on the Peruvian altiplano did not turn out to be a spaceport for ET, the new investigation revealed how the lines and figures interwoven in the network formed an integral part of the religious life of the local people, who believed that they were spirit paths, “flown” by the spirits of the dead and the ancestors. The local people maintained the sites, sweeping them when required, so that their souls continued to soar, and could be interrogated at the oracle sites they had built along the network.

The stories of giants building the megalithic monuments of the British Isles, or the accounts of the Formorians, have never been subjected to such controversy. If anything, they have always remained firmly in the domain of the imagination, woven into the stories of the “fairy people”.
Nevertheless, the megalithic stones are factual. The people who built them must therefore be factual. These megaliths, a Greek word meaning “giant stones”, were for a long time believed to be of Celtic origins. When they were given their name, it incorporated their mythical connection, with the giants of prehistory.
The dramatic dolmen Lanyon Quoit in Cornwall is known as The Giant’s Table. The Harolds Stones near Trellech in Monmouthshire is a stone row, with a folklore tradition that they were thrown down from the nearby Sugar Loaf mountain by Jack o’Kent, a giant, when he was playing pitch and toss with the Devil. In the Orkneys, the Yetnasteen, on Rousay, was labelled Jotunna-steinn, Giant Stone, by the Norsemen who landed on the islands. This and a number of other standing stones on the Orkneys were linked with the belief that once upon a time a giant had been turned to stone by the warm rays of the morning sun. A local legend stated that the petrified giant has but one release from his eternal prison. Immediately after midnight each New Year’s Day, the Yetnasteen was said to come to life and walk the 300 yards to the Loch of Skockness, where it drank from the water before returning once more to its lonely vigil.

Loth of the Lothians

In the Lothians, we find the story of one such giant, Loth. The name “Lot(h)” means “Lothian ruler”. The interchangeability of titles and names of rulers is a recurring motif, and this can be said of Lot: it seems that like the title of “pharaoh” in Egypt, “Lot” was a generic name for the ruler of the Lothians, the area that fell under his control.
Though tourists identify Scotland mainly with the Highlands, most of its people have always lived in the South, where Edinburgh, Scotland’s capital, has formed the centre of Scottish history. Edinburgh is located in what is now termed Midlothian, after the division of “the Lothians” created three councils: West, Mid and East Lothian.
Millennia before this administrative division, when the Romans invaded Britain, the Lothians were occupied by a tribe who called themselves the Gododdin, which the Romans Latinised to Votadini. The names are similar, with the original name on first impression containing the words God and Oddin, perhaps a reference to the Scandinavian god Odin, also known as Wotan. Odin was the Norse supreme deity, connected with warfare and battle, and their positive outcome, victory.
Odin was a compulsive seeker of wisdom, consumed by his passion for knowledge, to the extent that he sacrificed one eye and also hung himself from the tree Yggdrasil, whilst pierced by his own spear, to acquire knowledge. He hung there for nine days and nights, thereby learning nine magical songs and eighteen magical runes. The purpose of this strange ritual was to obtain mystical insight through mortification of the flesh and would be followed by priests in many religions: fasting, abstaining from intercourse, etc. are all examples of how the physical body has to be tortured in order to obtain insights into the divine; in some cults, this went as far as amputation or other forms of bodily alterations, such as blindness or skull alterations.

Historians, however, believe that name Gododdin is derived from the P-celtic word Goddeu, which means “the forest” or “the land of trees”. If so, it is clear that the landscape of the Lothians has radically changed since then, as the fertile grasslands of its low-lying landscape, interspersed with gentle sloped hills are now what typifies the Lothians.
The Gododdin fit within the overall framework of accepted history, which states that before the Romans, the land was occupied by Celtic tribes. Although the Gododdin were Celtic, they were not a Gaelic tribe; they were Britons, speaking Brythonic, the forerunner of modern Welsh. Many place names in the Lothians still reveal a Brythonic (Old Welsh) root, from Traprain in the East to Abercorn in the West, and Edinburgh itself, still known in modern Gàidhlig (Scottish Gaelic) as Dun Éideann, a direct transliteration from the original Brythonic Din Eidyn.
The Gododdin were not unique in this regard; the same was also true in the South-West of Scotland. In the first millennium, that area formed a second Brythonic kingdom of Y Strad Glud (Strathclyde), with its capital at Dumbarton, or Din Brython (Fortress of the Britons). Dumbarton Rock is a prominent landmark and so was the capital of the Gododdin tribe: Traprain Law, near Haddington, the town that would for a long time remain one of the most important Scottish towns, including the birthplace of the above mentioned Walter Bower – today it is still the centre of power for East Lothian Council.

Traprain Law, a sacred hill that is the focus of a sacred landscape in East Lothian, surrounded by megalithic stones

Traprain Law, a sacred hill that is the focus of a sacred landscape in East Lothian, surrounded by megalithic stones

The Gododdin, a Celtic tribe that apparently left no written record themselves, are nevertheless very important in literature: the first major poem to survive in the Welsh language, Aneirin’s Y Gododdin (written circa 600 AD), records the defeat of the Gododdin at the combined hands of the Anglians of Brynaich (Bernicia, or Northumberland) and the Saxons of Deifr (Deira, or Yorkshire). This poem is well-known to Welsh schoolchildren today as “the first Welsh poem”, though it is thought to have been written in or around Edinburgh. It is one of the lesser known stories of British history, but “Welsh” was spoken in the Lothians in those days and a massive migration of Welsh speakers seems to have occurred from that area towards Wales in the first millennium AD – possibly as a result of this battle.
The account speaks of the heroism, the honour and the beauty of the Gododdin warriors, their love of huge quantities of mead, and ultimately their downfall at the Battle of Catraeth, thought to have been at modern Catterick in North Yorkshire. We know that Din Eidyn, or Edinburgh, was overrun by the combined Anglo-Saxons of Northumbria around 638 AD. By 638 AD, the Gododdin had relocated their main centre from Traprain Law to Edinburgh – the town which would, since that Anglo-Saxon invasion in the 7th Century, remain the capital of Scotland. But it marked the end of the Gododdin’s rule – and Celtic dominance – over the Lothians.

In short, the Gododdin occupied the land known as the Lothians and the Borders, identified with Loth. According to some, the origin of the name Loth is shrouded in mystery – an easy getaway not to try to explain something.
Some early Latin spellings of Lothian are Lodoneo (11th century), Loeneis (12th century), Leudonia (12th century), and in 12th century Welsh as Lleudinyawn (modern Lleuddiniawn). These spellings were then “translated” into the local Scots, turning them into Lowthyan, Lothiane, eventually becoming the modern Lothian. Other variations are Luwddoc, Lludd and Lloyd.
Lleuddiniawn, the 12th century Welsh name, means “Land of Lleu”. In the Y Mabonigi, Lleu is identified as the sun god. He is Llew Llaw Gyffes, son of Arianrhod, the moon goddess. As such, the Lothians are the “Land of the Sun God”.
This special relationship between the god and the land can also be found in Ireland. Manannan Mac Lir is one of the most popular deities in Celtic mythology. He is Lord of the sea and of the three great waves of Ireland, and son of the mystical god Lir, ruler of Time and Deep Space. We already know of Fionn Mac Cumhaill, a form of Manannan, who was said to travel from Ireland to Scotland. It forms part of the stories of how this giant travelled around Ireland in many different shapes and guises, in the same tradition of the gods of Egypt or the Aboriginals.
He was also the foster-father of Lugh, the sun god. He wrapped the young child in his vast cloak and took him away in his boat to his Otherworld lands beyond the sea, often an island, a “Land of the Blessed”, literally a land where people lived in close relationship with their god. The Isle of Man takes its name from this ancient Celtic deity who has his stronghold on South Barrule mountain.
To quote Lorraine MacDonald, from Gods of the Celts: “As guardian of the Blessed Isles of the Celts, he also has strong associations with Emhain Abhlach, the Isle of Apple Trees, where the magical silver apple branch lies. To the Celts, the Blessed Isles that lie beyond the sea are the gateways to the Otherworlds, where the soul journeys to after death. Manannan is the guardian of these gateways between the worlds. He is the Ferryman, who comes to transport the souls of the dead through the veils.” This Otherworld often was not somewhere in a land far away, but the sacred features of the land, the hills or caves, were often seen as such gateways to the dimension of the soul also.
Already, it shows how the Celtic people in the Lothians, as happened elsewhere, linked the land with the Gods.

The Celtic deities were primarily associated with the land itself, manifesting their presence and influence through hills, rivers, caves, trees and even stones. In Celtic mythology failure to honour the sovereignty of the land itself often resulted in the loss of sovereign gifts.
In the Lothians, Loth’s name is linked particularly with Traprain Law, the Celtic capital. In a field on the Western flank of the hill, alongside a hedge, is a standing stone named Loth’s Stane. Its original position was in the middle of the field, but at some point the farmer decided to move it out of the way, to make his field easier to work. This is a shame, as the legend states that this stone marks the grave of King Loth and as such provides a unique marker of the identity of the Lothians – yet it was moved because it was “inconvenient”.
This action fits into a larger scheme which has become apparent across Britain for many centuries and shows the general disrespect the nation has had towards its prehistoric past. Megalithic stones, including those of Avebury, were removed, buried and sometimes even dynamited, to allow for easier maintenance of the fields. Near Loth’s Stone, the natural beauty of Traprain Law was destroyed as the East slope of the hill was used as a quarry. From the East, it has left a surgical, non-cosmetic mark on the outline of the hill. The same fate, though this time hardly visible, befell that other hill of the Lothians: Berwick Law, whose red volcanic stone was used, in the early 19th century, for the building of several houses in North Berwick, including the Granary, in the harbour.
Loth’s Stane is a standing stone of which there are many across the country. In Oxfordshire a standing stone 73 metres from the Rollright Stones is known as The King Stone. Like stories of petrified giants, this time the legend says that all the stones in the area were once human beings: a king and his army. They were met by a witch who owned the land over which the ambitious conqueror marched and as a result, they were turned to stone. The King became the solitary King Stone, his men were turned into the Rollright Stones circle, and his knights are the Whispering Knights burial chamber. According to the 18th century antiquarian William Stukeley, near the King Stone was a flat area of turf where young people met at a special time, possibly Midsummer Eve, “and make merry with cakes and ale”.

Thus, nothing sets the Loth’s Stone apart from other standing stones and it is clear that the stone does not mark the tomb of the king – that link is purely legendary. But rather than discard it, it is clear that the legend contains information that suggests we should not look at this stone in isolation, but within the context in which it appears: its relationship with Traprain Law, the seat of the king of the Celts.

The link between a king, Loth, and a hill is not unique. The apparent fact that this king was more mythical than historical is also not unique. Again, the closest parallels can be found in Ireland, but first, let’s visit Somerset. The most infamous example of a sacred hill is probably Glastonbury Tor. Rising above the town of Glastonbury, the Tor is crowned with the remains of the tower of St Michael’s Church. At its foot, the early 20th century occultist Dion Fortune portrayed the area as Avalon, the refuge of the Grail, the resting place of King Arthur, and the destination of Joseph of Arimathea, towing his nephew Jesus along before his rise to become the Saviour of Mankind.
In reality, Glastonbury is nothing of the kind, but what is important is how people from the 1930s onwards put layer upon layer on the significance of the landscape, and particularly on the Tor. Whereas the Celts believed that the Gods never died, but instead were constantly reborn, so it is clear that the Celtic legends have continued to live on and have been added to. From a sociological perspective, this is exactly what Erich von Däniken and similar authors continued to do also.
Originally, the mythology of Glastonbury Tor was much less impressive – but so much more genuine. In essence, the hill was believed to be an entrance to the Underworld. The Christian hermit, St Collen, lived in a cell on the slopes of the hill, thus forming a Christian obstacle to the pagan practices of the people for whom the hill was part of their sacred landscape, and hence religion. The story goes that St Collen once met the king of fairyland and the leader of the Wild Hunt within the Tor. This story, now classified as folklore, was literally the “lore of the folk”, of the people, whose only way of maintaining their original beliefs was to store the information in their “folklore”; Christianity had closed the possibility of maintaining it in “official records”; the megaliths were part of the pagan religion which had been conquered and labelled as “devil worship”.

The Irish solar giants

The devil has never been connected with the Irish sacred hill of Knocknarea. Knocknarea is the magical cairn-decked mountain just West of Sligo town, at the end of the Coolrea Penninsula. The mountain is a 320 metres high limestone hum sculpted by the retreating glaciers at the end of the last Ice Age. The area around Knocknarea is covered in ancient remains, including Carrowmore, which is one of the largest megalithic sites in Western Europe, and the largest in Ireland.