NOTWITHSTANDING the discovery every now and again of Scottish genealogical tables, dating, it is claimed by their discoverers, to the very first ages of time, it must be confessed there is no accurate year to year history until the tenth century of the Christian era. No such thing as systematic chronology appears till the twelfth century. To talk of restoring, as from the eighth century backwards, an anno regni reckoning by calling Kenneth II. the 69th King of the Scots, is simply to enter the domain of the variest fable and conjecture.[1]
81. On the other hand, it is quite logical to take Cæsar as our guide, and go back into the era of the Druids; to watch them holding 'a great many discourses about the stars,' as he mentions they did; to observe these Western astrologers fixing the date of the winter solstice, for instance.[2] Now, although the date tallies practically with our Christmas, it is anachronism to say that the Druids knew anything of that Christian commemoration day. Truly in this, as in other moot points, 'historians add to the difficulty by applying the language of their own times to events or public transactions of a different state of society,' as the restorers of the Scots Acts of Parliament
