Note (return) — Chapter II

The only buildings or structures existing in Cat in Pictish and early Norse times were a few vitrified forts, some underground erde-houses, hut-circles innumerable, and perhaps a hundred and fifty brochs, or Pictish towers as they are popularly called, which had been erected at various dates from the first century onwards, long before the advent of the Norse Vikings is on record, as defences against wolves and raiders both by land and sea, and especially by sea. Notwithstanding agricultural operations, foundations of 145 brochs can still be traced in Ness and 67 in Strathnavern and Sudrland, but they were not all in use at the same time, and they are mostly on sites taken over later on by the Norse,5 because they were already cultivated and agriculturally the best.