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The MacThoy's Scottish homeland in the Thoi Valley
is a veritable paradise. To this day, it is overrun
with wild game and the Thoy River-- now Loch Thoi --teems with
fish.
And yet with this second Canaan for a back drop, the
Clan choose to be rovers, maintaining a precarious
hunter-gatherer relationship with the land. It
never seems to have occurred to them to become farmers.
They returned every year for the
Beltaine
Festivals, and their only "crop," the hops which grew
wild in the area. In the valley, they waited for the war season to conclude
and the countryside to resume its tranquil demeanor.
On the shores of the Thoi River, the village of Dunn
Burrow was first settled in early 50 B.C. near the
outer wall of the
MacThoy Keep. Remains of a Roman road
attest to Dunn Burrow being a point of destination
at this time.
The life
of old Dunn Burrow village has been divided into
four sections. This task was made easy by
virtue of the fact that the village was razed and
burned to the ground on three separate occasions and
the fourth by earthquake and then fire, making the
demarcations simple to identify in the soil.
The final
demolition occurred in 1703. It is surmised that the
earthquake's survivors built Modern Dunn Burrow
about six miles up stream.
The Dunn Burrow continues. . .
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