SCAMILLI IMPARES-SCANDINAVIAN CIVILIZATION

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scampare; Lat. ex, out of, campus, field of battle, hence a vagabond deserter. This word must be distinguished from “scamp," to do work in a hasty, careless manner, which is apparently a variant of "skimp," "skimpy," and is to be referred to the root seen in O. Nor. skammr, short; Eng. "scant.".

implied challenge. These locks were braided with bright ribbons | adapted from Dutch schampen, to escape; O.Fr. escamper; Ital. or ornamented with a feather. After the successful warrior's return the scalp or scalps captured were dried, mounted and consecrated by a solemn dance. Some tribes hung the scalps to their bridles, others to their shields, while some ornamented with them the outer seams of their leggings. Scalping was sometimes adopted by the whites in their wars with the Redskins, and bounties have been offered for scalps several times in American history.

SCAMILLI IMPARES ("unequal steps," Fr. escabeaux inégales; Ger. Schutzstege), in architecture, a term quoted by Vitruvius when referring to the rise given to the stylobate in the centre of the front and sides of a Greek temple. His explanation is not clear; he states (iii. 4) that, if set out level, the stylobate would have the appearance of being sunk in the centre, so that it is necessary that there should be an addition by means of small steps (scamilli impares). In book v. chap. 9, he again refers to the addition on the stylobate. The interpretation of his meaning by Penrose and other authorities is generally assumed to be the addition which it was necessary to leave on the lower frusta of the Doric column, or on the lower portion of the base of the Ionic column, so as to give them a proper bearing on the curved surface of the stylobate; when levelling ground, however, it is sometimes the custom to fix at intervals small bricks or tiles which are piled up until the upper surfaces of all of them are absolutely level. If, as an alternative, these piles were so arranged as to rise towards the centre, instead of a level a slightly curved surface might be obtained, and the term "unequal steps" would apply to them. This was the opinion of M. Bernouf, a French author, who points out that scamillus is a diminutive of scamnum, a small step (Fr. petit banc), which in some parts of France is employed when levelling the surface of areas or courts. According to Penrose the rise of the curved stylobate of the Parthenon had already been obtained in the stereobate carrying it, long before the problem of bedding the columns on the curve had arisen.

SCAMMONY, a plant, Convolvulus scammonia (Gr. σkaμwvia), native to the countries of the eastern part of the Mediterranean basin; it grows in bushy waste places, from Syria in the south to the Crimea in the north, its range extending westward to the Greek islands, but not to northern Africa or Italy. It is a twining perennial, bearing flowers like those of Convolvulus arvensis, and having irregularly arrow-shaped leaves and a thick fleshy root. The dried juice, virgin scammony," obtained by incision of the living root, has been used in medicine as scammonium, but the variable quality of the drug has led to the employment of scammoniae resina, which is obtained from the dried root by digestion with alcohol.

SCANDAL, disgrace, discredit, shame, caused by the report or knowledge of wrongdoing, hence defamation or gossip, especially malicious or idle; or such action as causes public offence or disrepute. (For the law relating to scandal, more generally termed "defamation" see LIBEL AND SLANDER.) The Greek word σkávdaλov, stumbling-block, cause of offence or temptation, is used in the Septuagint and the New Testament. Classical Greek had the word σkardáλn@pov only, properly the spring of a baited trap; the origin probably being the root seen in Latin scandere, to climb, get up. While the Latin scandalum has given such direct derivatives as Spanish and Portuguese escandalo, Dutch schandaal, Eng. "scandal," &c., it is also the source of the synonymous "slander," Middle Eng. sclaundre, O. Fr. esclandre, escandle.

A particular form of defamation was scandalum magnatum, slander of great men,' words, that is, spoken defaming a peer spiritual or temporal, judge or dignitary of the realm. Action lay for such defamation under the statutes of 3 Edw. I. c. 34, 2 Rich. II. c. 5, and 12 Rich. II. c. 11 whereby damages could be recovered, even in cases where no action would lie, if the defa:nation were of an ordinary subject, and that without proof of special damage. These statutes, though long obsolete, were only abolished in 1887 (Statute Law Revision Act).

SCANDERBEG, or ISKENDER BEY (1403-1467), known also as the Dragon of Albania," the national hero of the Albanians, was the son of John (Giovanni) Castriota, lord of Kroia and of the Mirdite country in northern Albania, and of a Servian princess named Vaisava. His actual name was George (Giorgio) Castriota, and the name of Iskender Bey (Prince Alexander) was given to him by the Turks in complimentary reference to Alexander the Great. In 1423, when Murad II. invaded Epirus, George Castriota, with his three brothers, was handed over as a hostage to the Turks and sent to be trained in the service of the seraglio. His brilliant qualities of mind and body at once gained him the favour of the sultan; he became a Mussulman, was promoted to high military command and, though barely nineteen years of age, to the government of a sanjak. He remained in the Ottoman service for twenty years, dissembling his resentment when, on the death of his father, his principality was annexed and his brothers poisoned. In 1443, however, his opportunity came with Janos Hunyadi's victory at Nish. He seized Kroia by stratagem, proclaimed himself a Christian, and gathered the wild Albanian clansmen about him. In the inaccessible fastnesses The active principle is the glucoside scammonin or jalapin, of Albania he maintained a guerilla warfare against the Turks CHO. The dose of scammonium is 5 to 10 grains, of scammony during nearly twenty-five years, easily routing the armies sent resin 3 to 8 grains. Like certain other resins, scammony is inert until it has passed from the stomach into the duodenum, where it against him, and is said to have slain three thousand Turks meets the bile, a chemical reaction occurring between it and the with his own hand. In 1461 Murad's successor Mahommed II. taurocholate and glycocholate of sodium, whereby it is converted acknowledged him by a temporary truce as lord of Albania and into a powerful purgative. Its action is essentially that of a hydra- Epirus. He died in 1467 at Alessio, and his tomb was long the gogue, and is exercised upon practically the entire length of the alimentary canal. The drug is not a cholagogue, nor does it object of a superstitious veneration on the part of the Turks. markedly affect the muscular coat of the bowel, but it causes a Scanderbeg's resistance to the Turkish advance was invaluable great increase of secretion from the intestinal glands. It acts in to the cause of Christianity, but the union which he had mainabout four hours. In large doses it is, of course, a violent gastro-tained in Albania did not survive him. He was succeeded in intestinal irritant. In consonance with the statement that scammony acts only after admixture with the bile, is the fact that hypo-Kroia by his son, Giovanni Castriota, who in 1474 sold the princidermic or intravenous injection of the drug produces no purgation, pality to the Venetians, by whom four years later it was or indeed any other result. The drug frequently kills both the re-sold to the Turks. round-worm and the tape-worm, especially the former, and is therefore an anthelmintic. It is not largely used, but is very effective in the treatment of severe constipation, especially in children. SCAMP, an idle, worthless rascal; in earlier (18th cent.) usage especially applied as a cant term for a highway robber, a foot-pad, later of one who incurs debts and decamps without paying them. The word appears to be derived from a shortened form of "scamper," to run away, decamp, to move quickly or nimbly; which is generally taken to be a military slang word 1 It was formerly called diagrydion, probably from dáxpu, a tear, in allusion to the manner in which the juice exudes from the incised

root.

See Georges T. Petrovitch, Scander-beg (Georges Castriota); Essai de bibliographie raisonnée; Ouvrages sur Scander-beg écrits en langues française, anglaise, allemande, latine, italienne, &c. (Paris, 1881); Pisko, Skanderbeg, historische Studie (Vienna, 1895).

SCANDINAVIAN CIVILIZATION. The date of man's first appearance in Scandinavia is still an open question. But for all practical purposes Scandinavian archacology only begins with the Neolithic or Later Stone Age, since the country must have been covered with ice during the preceding period, the Palacolithic or Early Stone Age, when parts of Europe were already inhabited. Thus the expressions Earlier and Later Stone Age in Scandinavian archaeology merely refer to subdivisions

The earliest form, and that most common in Denmark, is the four-sided dolmen, formed by four or six large upright stones on which rests a huge rock, the whole being partly covered by a mound. These graves usually contain a number of skeletons. The next is the passage grave, a chamber approached by a passage, both built of great blocks of rough-hewn rock. The roof of the largest of these, near Falköping in Sweden, is formed of nine blocks of granite, and the whole attains a length of nearly 60 ft. Later again are stone cists, consisting of a comparatively small space walled in and roofed by thin blocks of stone, surrounded by a low mound. These graves seldom contain more than one skeleton, and mark the end of the Stone Age. Inhumation was practised throughout the period, though the bones found in the great graves are often marked by fire owing to the practice, apparently prevalent, of lighting fires in the grave chambers. The chambers are often full of remains up to within a foot of the roof, and in some cases parts of as many as a hundred skeletons have been found.

of the Neolithic Period. Men have left traces of their occupation | in Sweden. Norway is not, as might be supposed from the of Denmark from the time when firs were still the prevail- absence of graves, entirely deficient in the objects of this period, ing trees in that country, and a few tools of elk and reindeer but they are comparatively few in number, though quite on a par horn appear to belong to an even earlier period. Sweden and in technique with those of Sweden. As already indicated, the Norway were probably not inhabited until later, though it great difference between the culture of the shell-mounds and that seems that men were present in Sweden while the Baltic was still of the Later Stone Age is the method of disposing of the dead. a fresh-water lake. The dates assigned to this period vary very The dead of the former period, it is assumed, were placed in simple greatly: S. Müller suggests before 3000 B.C., while O. Montelius graves in the earth, while characteristic of the latter period places it at 8000 years before our era. Besides the elk- and are the megalithic graves found in profusion in Denmark and reindeer-horn tools mentioned above, a few rough flint imple- Sweden. ments seem to be the earliest traces of man in Scandinavia. In Norway and Sweden these are only found in the extreme south. The kjøkkenmoddinger or skaldynger, variously called in English kitchen-middens, refuse-heaps, or shell-mounds, are characteristic of Denmark in the next period. In these we find remains of primitive meals, consisting chiefly of oyster, mussel and other shells, and the bones of various fish, birds and animals, including deer, wild boar, seals, wolves and aurochs. It appears that the race which left these relics must have lived by hunting and fishing, and that they were probably semi-nomadic. They were evidently unacquainted with agriculture and had no domestic animals other than the dog. These refuse heaps are almost always found by the sea-shore or close to a lake. Some of them extend over an area of as much as 700 yds. by 20 yds. width, but their depth is usually not more than 3 to 10 ft. There are frequent traces of fire and hearth places, so that we may conclude that the food was both prepared and eaten on the spot. The flint implements consist of flakes or knives, awls and axes of various kinds, all made by a process of rough chipping. These are supplemented by articles of bone, horn and clay, including arrow or spear points, axes of horn, and bone combs. Earthenware vessels must have been much used, but only fragments have been found, made, of course, without the use of the wheel. Rare attempts at decoration consist of a few cuts or impressions round the top. The only ornaments found are the pierced teeth of animals and shells. In Norway and Sweden implements similar to those of the Danish shell-mounds have been found, but usually without the organic remains, except at Viste, near Stavanger, excavated in 1907. The first Swedish shell-mound was discovered in the north of Bohuslän in 1905, but is of a later type than the Danish. The remains at Nöstvet in the Christiania fjord show traces of a considerable population. Ground slate implements are found scattered along the coasts of Norway and Sweden, and are attributed to a nomadic people, whose arctic culture persisted much longer in these countries than in the much earlier flint civilization of the Kitchen-middens in Denmark. To this race are attributed a few rock-carvings and other sculp-minute axes. Amber was much used during the earlier part of tured representations of animals in a highly naturalistic style, almost equal to that of the palaeolithic cave-carvings of France, and showing close affinity with the artistic productions of the regions on the eastern side of the Baltic.

Later Stone Age.-The remains of the Later Stone Age show a very much more advanced civilization of a pastoral and later of an agricultural type, with domestic animals, such as cattle, horses, pigs, sheep and goats. As the number of "transition" finds, showing a gradual development from the older forms, is very small, and as, moreover, settlements of the kitchen-midden type are known to have existed right through the later Stone Age, or even longer, there is some ground for assuming that the earlier flint implements of Denmark were the product of an aboriginal race, gradually ousted and driven north by Aryans, immigrating with a superior culture.

By far the greatest proportion of the remains of the Stone Age are found in Denmark. While there are not more than five to six hundred Stone-Age graves known in Sweden, and only two or three in Norway, there are between three and four thousand on the island of Seeland alone. Besides Seeland, Lolland, Falster and the north-eastern part of Jutland appear to have been thickly inhabited during the Later Stone Age. In Sweden the southernmost part, Skane and Bohuslän, were probably the first to be inhabited: and then Vestergötland and Dal. Skåne has yielded more than three-fourths of all the Later Stone Age objects found

In the mounds surrounding the tombs animal bones and shells are frequently found, indicating feasts and sacrifices. It seems as if many of the graves, especially in Sweden, had at some time been considered as places for sacrifice, to judge by the saucerlike hollows constantly found on the upper side of the covering stones. The finds of tools, weapons, ornaments and pottery contribute greatly to our knowledge of the period, but probably the best specimens were not placed in graves, as we find the finest work elsewhere. The pottery is of good material and form, though still made without the aid of the potter's wheel. The indentations of the pattern are frequently filled in with a white chalklike substance. Many of the vessels are rounded at the bottom, and perforations or handles show that they are meant to hang. Wood was no doubt much used, but it is only by a fortunate chance that wooden vessels and a wooden spoon have been preserved to us in Denmark. It is probable that wool was used as well as skins for clothing, but if so it must be supposed that the spinning and weaving implements were of too perishable a material to have come down to us. Awls are constantly found, but not needles. Bone pins were used for fastening the clothes. The ornaments were chiefly pierced teeth of various wild animals, and objects of amber and bone, many of them in the form of

this age, but it is seldom found later on, probably because its value as an article of export had by then been realized. The Swedish archaeologist, O. Montelius, distinguishes four subdivisions in this period, towards the end of which the implements show a mastery over material unequalled in the rest of Europe, but it must not be supposed that this was attained at once. The tools include chisels, borers, knives, saws and axes, but the finest workmanship seems to have been reserved for weapons. Arrow-heads and spear-points of flint have chipped blades of marvellous fineness and symmetry. Daggers with handle and blade all made of one piece of flint are characteristic of the Northern Stone Age, and show how much weight was laid on ornamental appearance, since wooden handles would have been equally effective and far less troublesome to make. The battleaxes are of many forms, perfectly symmetrical and beautifully ground and polished. Those of other stone than flint have boles bored through them for the shaft. Wooden shafts were usually attached at right angles to the flint axes. Of these latter the thin-necked axe is the most characteristic. The distribution of flint implements reveals a considerable trading activity, as flint-bearing strata only occur in certain parts of Denmark and in Skåne, whence it must have been distributed over the whole of Southern Sweden through the channels of commerce. Considerable commercial activity must also have prevailed between the Scandinavians and their southern neighbours.

Fig. 1 from O. Montelius, Civilization of Sweden; Figs. 2-6, 10, 11 from S. Müller. Vor Oldtid and Urgeschichte Europas; Figs. 7, 8, 12

from G. Gustafson, Norges Oldtid.

Figs. 1, 3-6, 8, 9, 11 from S. Müller, Vor Oldtid; Figs. 2, 7, 12 from O. Montelius, Civ. Sweden; Fig. 10 from G. Gustafson, Norges Oldtid.