Lochlee, near Tarbolton, Ayrshire, explored by Dr R. Munro in 1878, was 100 ft. in diameter, and had a double row of piles, bound by horizontal stretchers with square mortise-holes, enclosing an area 60 ft. in diameter. In the centre was a space 40 ft. square, bounded by the remains of a wooden wall and paved inside with split logs. A partition divided it into two equal parts, one of which had a doorway opening to the south, and close by it an extensive refuse-heap. In the middle of the other part was a stone-paved hearth, with remains of three former hearths underneath. The substructure was built up from the bottom of the loch, partly of brushwood but chiefly of logs and trunks of trees with the branches lopped off, placed in layers, each disposed transversely or obliquely across the one below it. A crannog in Loch-an-Dhugael, Balinakill, Argyllshire, described by the same explorer in 1893, revealed a substructure similar to that at Lochlee, with a double row of piles enclosing an area 45 to 50 ft. in diameter, within which was a circular construction 32 ft. in diameter, which had been supported by a large central post and about twenty uprights ranged round the circumference.
From their common feature of a substructure of brushwood and logs built up from the bottom, the crannogs have been classed as fascine-dwellings, to distinguish them from the typical pile-dwellings of the earlier periods in Switzerland, whose platforms are supported by piles driven into the bed of the lake. The crannog of Cloonfinlough in Connaught had a triple stockade of oak piles, connected by horizontal stretchers and enclosing an area 130 ft. in diameter, laid with trunks of oak trees. In the crannog of Lagore, county Meath, there were about 150 cartloads of bones, chiefly of oxen, deer, sheep and swine, the refuse of the food of the occupants. In the crannog of Lisnacroghera, county Antrim, iron swords, with sheaths of thin bronze ornamented with scrolls characteristic of the Late Celtic style, iron daggers, an iron spear-head 16½ in. in length, and pieces of what are called large caldrons of iron, were found. Among the few remains of lacustrine settlements in England and Wales, some are suggestive of the typical crannog structure. The most important of these is the Glastonbury lake village, excavated by Mr A. Bulleid and Mr St George Gray. It consists of more than sixty separate dwellings, grouped within a triangular palisaded defence, formed in the midst of a marsh now partially reclaimed. The dwellings were circular, from 18 to 35 ft. in diameter, the substructure formed of logs and brushwood mingled with stones and clay, and outlined by piles driven into the bottom of the shallow lake. The walls of the houses seem to have been made of wattle-work, supported by posts sometimes not more than a single foot apart. The floors are of clay, with a hearth of stones in the centre, often showing several renewals over the original. The relics recovered show unmistakably that the occupation must be dated within the Iron Age, but probably pre-Roman, as no evidence of contact with Roman civilization has been discovered. The stage of civilization indicated is nevertheless not a low one. Besides the implements and weapons of iron there are fibulae and brooches of bronze, weaving combs and spindle-whorls, a bronze mirror and tweezers, wheel-made pottery as well as hand-made, ornamented with Late Celtic patterns, a bowl of thin bronze decorated with bosses, the nave of a wooden wheel with holes for twelve spokes, and a dug-out canoe. Another site in Holderness, Yorkshire, examined by Mr Boynton in 1881, yielded evidence of fascine construction, with suggestions of occupation in the latter part of the Bronze Age. Similar indications are adduced by Professor Boyd Dawkins from the site on Barton Mere. On the other hand, the implements and weapons found in the Scottish and Irish crannogs are usually of iron, or, if objects of bronze and stone are found, they are commonly such as were in use in the Iron Age. Crannogs are frequently referred to in the Irish annals. Under the year 848 the Annals of the Four Masters record the burning of the island of Lough Gabhor (the crannog of Lagore), and the same stronghold is noticed as again destroyed by the Danes in 933. Under the year 1246 it is recorded that Turlough O’Connor made his escape from the crannog of Lough Leisi, and drowned his keepers. Many other entries occur in the succeeding centuries. In the register of the privy council of Scotland, April 14, 1608, it is ordered that “the haill houssis of defence, strongholds, and crannokis in the Yllis (the western isles) pertaining to Angus M’Conneill of Dunnyvaig and Hector M’Cloyne of Dowart sal be delyverit to His Majestie.” Judging from the historical evidence of their late continuance, and from the character of the relics found in them, the crannogs may be included among the latest prehistoric strongholds, reaching their greatest development in early historic times, and surviving through the middle ages. In Ireland, Sir William Wilde has assigned their range approximately to the period between the 9th and 16th centuries; while Dr Munro holds that the vast majority of them, both in Ireland and in Scotland, were not only inhabited, but constructed during the Iron Age, and that their period of greatest development was as far posterior to Roman civilization as that of the Swiss Pfahlbauten was anterior to it. (See Lake Dwellings.)
Authorities.—Dr R. Munro, The Lake Dwellings of Europe: being the Rhind Lectures in Archaeology for 1888 (with a bibliography of the subject) (London, 1890); Ancient Scottish Lake-Dwellings or Crannogs (Edinburgh, 1882); Col. W. G. Wood-Martin, The Lake-Dwellings of Ireland, or Ancient Lacustrine Habitations of Erin, commonly called Crannogs (Dublin, 1886); Sir W. Wilde, Descriptive Catalogue of the Antiquities in the Museum of the Royal Irish Academy, article “Crannogs,” pp. 220-233 (Dublin, 1857); John Stuart, “Scottish Artificial Islands or Crannogs,” in the Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, vol. vi. (Edinburgh, 1865); A. Bulleid, “The Lake Village near Glastonbury,” in Proceedings of the Somersetshire Archaeological Society, vol. xl. (1894). (J. An.)
CRANSAC, a town of southern France, in the department of
Aveyron, 28m. N.W. of Rodez by rail. Pop. (1906) town, 4988;
commune, 6953. The town is a coal-mining centre and has cold
mineral springs, known in the middle ages. There are iron-mines
in the neighbourhood. Hills to the north of the town
contain disused coal-mines which have been on fire for centuries.
About 5 m. to the south is the fine Renaissance château of Bournazel, built for the most part by Jean de Buisson, baron of Bournazel, about 1545. The barony of Bournazel became a marquisate in 1624.
CRANSTON, a city of Providence county, Rhode Island,
U.S.A., adjoining the city of Providence on the S. Pop. (1890)
8099; (1900) 13,343; (1910) 21,107; area, 30 sq. m. It is
served by the New York, New Haven & Hartford railway.
The surface of the E. part is level, that of the W. part is somewhat
rolling. Within the city are several villages, including
Arlington, Auburn, Edgewood, Fiskeville and Oaklawn. The
inhabitants of the country districts are engaged largely in the
growing of hay, Indian corn, rye, oats and market-garden
produce; in the several villages cotton and print goods, fuses for
electrical machinery, and automatic fire-protection sprinklers are
manufactured. The value of Cranston’s factory product
increased from $1,402,359 in 1900 to $2,130,969 in 1905, or 52%.
The state has a farm of 667 acres in the S. part of the city;
on this are the state prison, the Providence county jail, the
state workhouse and the house of correction, the state almshouse,
the state hospital for the insane, the Sockanosset school for
boys, and the Oaklawn school for girls—the last two being
departments of the state reform school. The post-office address
of all these state institutions is Howard. Cranston was settled
as a part of Providence about 1640 by associates of Roger Williams,
and in 1754 was incorporated as a separate township, but in 1868,
in 1873 and in 1892 portions of it were reannexed to Providence.
The township is said to have been named in honour of Samuel
Cranston (1659–1727), governor of Rhode Island from 1698 until
his death. It was incorporated as a city in 1910.
CRANTOR, a Greek philosopher of the Old Academy, was born, probably about the middle of the 4th century B.C., at Soli in Cilicia. He was a fellow-pupil of Polemo in the school of Xenocrates at Athens, and was the first commentator on Plato. He is said to have written some poems which he sealed up and deposited in the temple of Athens at Soli (Diog. Laërtius iv. 5. 25). Of his celebrated work On Grief (Περὶ πένθους), a letter of condolence to his friend Hippocles on the death of his children, numerous extracts have been preserved in Plutarch’s Consolatio ad Apollonium and in the De consolatione of Cicero,
