Càrn na Marbh (meaning "mound" or "

cairn A cairn is a human-made pile (or stack) of stones raised for a purpose, usually as a marker or as a burial mound. The word ''cairn'' comes from the (plural ). Cairns have been and are used for a broad variety of purposes. In prehistory, t ...

of the dead") is a re-used

Bronze Age The Bronze Age () was a historical period characterised principally by the use of bronze tools and the development of complex urban societies, as well as the adoption of writing in some areas. The Bronze Age is the middle principal period of ...

tumulus A tumulus (: tumuli) is a mound of Soil, earth and Rock (geology), stones raised over a grave or graves. Tumuli are also known as barrows, burial mounds, mounds, howes, or in Siberia and Central Asia as ''kurgans'', and may be found through ...

, located in

Fortingall Fortingall () (lit. "Escarpment Church"—i.e. "church at the foot of an escarpment or steep slope") is a small village in Glen Lyon, Perthshire, Scotland. Its nearest sizable neighbours are Aberfeldy and Kenmore. Local legend claims that it ...

Perthshire Perthshire (Scottish English, locally: ; ), officially the County of Perth, is a Shires of Scotland, historic county and registration county in central Scotland. Geographically it extends from Strathmore, Angus and Perth & Kinross, Strathmore ...

Scotland Scotland is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It contains nearly one-third of the United Kingdom's land area, consisting of the northern part of the island of Great Britain and more than 790 adjac ...

. The mound was used in the 14th century for burying victims of the plague away from the church graveyard. A stone, known as Clach a' Phlàigh, "the Plague Stone" crowns the mound and may be an original

standing stone A menhir (; from Brittonic languages: ''maen'' or ''men'', "stone" and ''hir'' or ''hîr'', "long"), standing stone, orthostat, or lith is a large upright rock (geology), stone, emplaced in the ground by humans, typically dating from the Eur ...

and commemorates the plague victims who were buried here in the 14th century. A tablet on the stone is inscribed with the words:

''“Here lie the victims of the Great Plague of the 14th Century, taken here on a sledge drawn by a white horse led by an old woman.”''

Local legend says it was the focal point of an ancient

Samhain Samhain ( , , , ) or () is a Gaels, Gaelic festival on 1 November marking the end of the harvest season and beginning of winter or the "Celtic calendar#Medieval Irish and Welsh calendars, darker half" of the year.Dáithí Ó hÓgáin, Ó hÓ ...

(Halloween) festival. A great fire or ''Samhnag'' was lit on top of it each year. The whole community took hands when it was blazing and danced round the mound both sunwise and anti-sunwise. As the fire began to wane, some of the younger boys took burning embers from the flames and ran throughout the field with them, finally throwing them into the air and dancing over them as they lay glowing on the ground. When the last embers were showing, the boys would have a leaping competition across the remains of the fire, reminiscent of the

Beltane Beltane () or ''Bealtaine'' () is the Gaels, Gaelic May Day festival, marking the beginning of summer. It is traditionally held on 1 May, or about midway between the March equinox, spring equinox and summer solstice. Historically, it was widely ...

festival. When it was finished, the young people went home and ducked for apples and practised divination. There was no

Scottish Scottish usually refers to something of, from, or related to Scotland, including: *Scottish Gaelic, a Celtic Goidelic language of the Indo-European language family native to Scotland *Scottish English *Scottish national identity, the Scottish ide ...

tradition of '

guising Trick-or-treating is a traditional Halloween custom for children and adults in some countries. During the evening of Halloween, on October 31, people in Halloween costume, costumes travel from house to house, asking for treats with the phrase " ...

', the bonfire being the absolute centre of attention until it was consumed. The Samhain celebrations here apparently came to an end in 1924. The mound of ‘Càrn na Marbh’ is located in the same village as the

Fortingall Yew The Fortingall Yew is an ancient European yew (''Taxus baccata'') in the churchyard of the village of Fortingall in Perthshire, Scotland. Considered one of the oldest trees in Britain, modern estimates place its age at an average of 5,000 years ...

,"Wanted: Fat, old, gnarled trees"
(28 June 2007) Telegraph.co.uk. Retrieved on 29 September 2007. "The Fortingall Yew near Callendar in Scotland - believed to be the oldest tree in the UK and possibly Europe." and the general area is famed for its Bronze Age burial mounds, and preserved standing stones. The site was Christianised during the Dark Ages, perhaps because it was already a sacred place. Place-name and archaeological evidence hint at an

Iron Age The Iron Age () is the final epoch of the three historical Metal Ages, after the Chalcolithic and Bronze Age. It has also been considered as the final age of the three-age division starting with prehistory (before recorded history) and progre ...

cult centre at

which may have had this ancient tree as its focus.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Carn Na Marbh Bronze Age sites in Scotland History of Perth and Kinross Archaeological sites in Perth and Kinross Tumuli in Scotland