Ardrossan  Beith  Dalry  Dunlop  Fenwick  Irvine  Kilbirnie  Kilmaurs  Kilwinning  Largs  Loudoun  Stevenston  Stewarton  West Kilbride

 

What is known of PREHISTORIC MAN IN AYRSHIRE, as revealed to us from ancient caves, cairns, stone coffins, mounds, long barrows, shell heaps, remains of cannibal feasts, cromlechs, crannogs, rock-graves, camps, turf-spirals, hillforts, stockades, dinans, kits, military trenches, ' Druidical circles,' hut-circles, vitrified walls, monoliths, rocking-stones, treaty-stones, sanctuary-stones, rock-sculpturings, cups and rings ; and by flint, stone, jasper, agate, bone, horn, Druid's glass, iron, bronze, brass, gold, silver, leather, etc., implements, utensils, ornaments, and weapons; wood-carving, urn s with human ashes, etc,; pottery, pigments, etc.

Besides consulting the available literature on the subject, I have traversed nearly ' every inch' of the county on foot, and have collected with my own hands hundreds of prehistoric relics from caves, crannogs, shell-mounds, rock-shelters, sands, gravels, etc" taking measurements, and making drawings which have been reproduced in this volume. I have been fortunate, through the kind offices of R. W. Cochran Patrick, Esq., LL. D., of Ladyland, etc., in getting electro-cliches of some of the blocks wherewith the Ayr-Wigton and Galloway collect ions are illustrated, and these will speak for themselves.

John Smith MONKREDDING, KILWINNING, 1895.