Note 139 — Chapter V · TEMPLES AND MEMORIAL STONES.

The name Stennis, of Norwegian origin, was obviously the apposite description suggested to the first Scandinavian voyagers by the appearance of the singular tongue of land, crowned by its monolithic circle; but the death of Earl Havard, as mentioned in the Northern Sagas, conferred on it new associations and a corresponding name. Professor Munch, whose natural bias as a Norwegian might have inclined him to claim for his countrymen the erection of the Great Scottish Circle, remarks, in a recent letter to me:—"Stennis is the old Norn Steinsnes, that is, 'the promontory of the stones;' and that name it bore already when Havard fell, in the beginning of the island, being Scandinavian. This shows that the Scandinavian settlers found the stones already standing;—in other words, that the standing stones belonged to the population previous to the Scandinavian settlement."