Showing 1-20 of 308 miscellaneous posts. Most recent first | Next 20 
|
In 1880 there is a reference to the close proximty to Mine Howe of "Lang Howe, Round Howe, Stoney Howe, Stem Howe and Chapel", from which I take Stoney Howe to be the burnt mound near Breck
|
|
Having noticed photographically that a line from the Barnhouse Stone through Maeshowe passes on to the Setter tumuli below Sordon (NMRS record no.HY31NW 14 at HY34581544 & 34631543, to whit two Bronze Age burial mounds) I wondered about the relative position of the Ke(i)thesgeo stone (HY31SW 41 at HY30351136). Pencilling in the position of the stake showing its former position onto a 1:25,000 map a line passes from it through Maeshowe to the Setter barrows, though missing out the Barnhouse Stone rather. Makes a useful backstop up on the Clouston hillside.
|
|
RCAHMS NMRS record no. HY31SW 3 at HY39731260. This site came to light on a Friday afternoon when a steam threshing mill broke through the surface and became stuck. John Mooney and WilliamTraill came the same day for a look over and on the next Traill and Dr.Marwick gave "a more thorough examination". Its walls are a mix of large ?natural boulders and small quarried stones. The corbelled roof sits on four stones a yard apart, slightly over a foot from the walls and and roughly foursquare [that they are unequal in height suggests to me a possible origin as standing stones]. This oval gallery chamber is 15'3" NW/SE by 8'6", with a 27"x30" passage running approximately 10' from the NW end that is lintelled by oversized untooled slabs. In the walls there are several rectangular niches [including a slot near the floor on the RH side] all of which were empty except for a skull in that opposite the entrance [I assume the one behind the ladder]. More skulls were found about the inner side of the "south pillar". A mass of other bones were also found. At the outer end of the passage was shell midden material [ritual sealing ?]. All of this from report in "The Orkney Herald" of November 17th 1926. Viewed from the new entrance running clockwise the stones are southerly [LH near], westerly [LH far], northerly [RH far], easterly [RH near].
|
|
this season's dig has begun and they now have 30 ox skulls in the foundations for which they can find nothing similar in Scotland [though J.W. Cursiter mentions the 1901 uncovering by storm near Skara Brae of a 3' deep ox midden 100' long, beneath which another storm two years later disclosed a building].
|
"This site has more than 420 stones is considered one of the most important of Central Brittany. Its construction dates back to more than 1,500 years. In 1989, after excavations, the majority of the standing at half-buried in the Heath there was discovered. The site extends over 7 hectares. Some stones weighing over 35 tons and can measure up to 5 meters"
Aubrey Burl has 22 schist stones (with three still standing) in two intersecting rows 55m N/S and 78m WSW/ENE [rather ragged on his plan]
|
|
Low had a little excavate but found nothing
|
|
Brand 1703 "the Minister of Sandwick's Manse is said to have been the residence of one of the kings of Picts... to this day called Koningsgar or the King's House... tho now kept in some repair... The figure thereof and the contrivance of its two Rooms or Chambers one above and one below, of narrow dimensions, and antick, and the Building hath been but coarse."
|
|
In 1849 the Stone of Odin, smashed in 1814, is reported as having been 150 yards to the N of the Stones of Stenness. Trouble is Pococke has it 124 yards E of a stone that was 18 yards to the SE of the circle and William Aberdeen's perspective drawing slightly later depicts it to the E and south of the circle too. Pococke's drawing of the the lesser circle from the north shows other stones to its E and perhaps a block between it and the henge but no holed stone.
|
Low ~1774 "[Stones of Stenness] not ditched about like ... [Ring of Brodgar]..but surrounded with a raised mound partly raised on the live earth, as the other was cut from it"
Wilson 1842 " the completer... circle of the... Stones of Stennis... as you approach them you pass here and there a solitary stone or broken remnant, as if there had been... a connecting range or approach, all the way from the bridge to the great circle. The latter is encompassed by a still entire mound, surrounded by a foss [sic], and there is a filling up of the foss and a lowering of the mound, just at two entrance places, opposite each other, north and south."
|
1760 Pococke's drawing shows a second stone on the opposite side of the road a little further away from the roadside. This is longer than it is tall and resembles a recumbent [though I suppose it could be a very large natural boulder like the Savile Stone]. The 'companion' stone is actually a diamond shape which if to the same scale as the Watch Stone would come oot as some 14' high and wide ! As far as I can tell from Pococke's drawing it would have been about grid ref HY30671275.
Wilson 1842 "Close to either side of the southern end of the bridge... stands a great sentinel stone...
...as you approach [the Ring of Brodgar] you pass here and there a solitary stone or broken remnant, as if there had been... a connecting range or approach, all the way from the bridge to the great circle"
|
There were once more stones than those in the circle
1760 "There are two standing to the South, one is wanting, and there are two stones standing, a third lying down, then three are wanting, there being a space of 27 yards so that there were eight in all : Eighteen yards South East from the circle is a single stone, and 124 yards to the East of that is another [Odin Stone] with a hole in one side towards the bottom, from which going to the circle is another [stone] 73 yards from the fossee [sic], the outer part of which fossee is 16 yards from the circle" and as this was summertime I guess stumps lay hidden in the grass.
Low ~1774 ""[Stones of Stenness] The drawing shows the stones in their present state, which is four entire and one broken [??recumbent]. It is not ditched about like ... [Ring of Brodgar]..but surrounded with a raised mound partly raised on the live earth, as the other was cut from it... near the circle are several stones set on end without any regular order, or several of them so much broken, hinder us as to the design of them.""
It seems that sometime between 1760 and 1842 several were nudged and then between 1842 and Thomas visit several were destroyed as described. His disbelief arises because he only knew of the circle itself. One of the external stones was a companion to the Watchstone on the other side of the road and further from it, a fat ?recumbent still there in 1842.
1842 "Stones of Stennis... in one case in a vast circle surrounded by a mount, in the other in insulated groups of two or three together, either forming parts of an approach to the circle, or themselves the sole remnants of other corresponding circles...
none of them is very thick in proportion to its height and breadth... The summits are generally diagonal... and they seem also in many cases to be imbedded in the earth by a corresponding sloping corner. Their original position was no doubt perpendicular although others are leaning to their fall, and not a few are lying flat upon the ground...
Although the gigantic remnants near the Kirkwall road are too few in number to indicate the circular form, yet that... is sufficiently manifested by the distinct traces of a large green mound in which they are enclosed... almost continuous semicircle... the other segment having been ploughrd up... One of the largest of these stones now lies flat... having been loosened it is said... by the plough, and soon after blown over by a gale"
|
Pococke 1760
"[from the Ring of Brodgar] There is a single pillar about 50 yards to the North East, and a barrow to the North and South, one to the South West and another to the North East...
another circle of stones [Stones of Stenness] which are 15 feet high, 6 feet broad, the circle is about 30 yards in diameter, and the stones are about 8 yards apart. There are two standing to the South, one is wanting, and there are two stones standing, a third lying down, then three are wanting, there being a space of 27 yards so that there were eight in all : Eighteen yards South East from the circle is a single stone, and 124 yards to the East of that is another [Odin Stone] with a hole in one side towards the bottom, from which going to the circle is another [stone] 73 yards from the fossee [sic], the outer part of which fossee is 16 yards from the circle : there are several small barrows chiefly to the East [Clovy Knowes]." His map shows a large squat stone close to the shore E of the S end of the bridge - this and the possible causeway perhaps a reminder of when the main road went along the driveway to Stenness Kirk.
Low ~1774 unpublished ms "History of the Orkneys" quoted in 1879 edition published by William Peace [referring to a lost drawing, that published being one by William Aberdeen from the1760's]
"[Stones of Stenness] The drawing shows the stones in their present state, which is four entire and one broken [??recumbent]. It is not ditched about like ... [Ring of Brodgar]..but surrounded with a raised mound partly raised on the live earth, as the other was cut from it... near the circle are several stones set on end without any regular order, or several of them so much broken, hinder us as to the design of them."
William Aberdeen's annotated map [donated to Royal Society of London 1784] is the source of observations attributed later to Hibbert
"When Oliver Cromwell's men were in this county they dug tolerably deep in the top [of Maeshowe] , but found nothing but earth" also that site used for archery + "[E of Ring of Brodgar] a small mount... still retains the name of Watch Hill or Tower [Plumcake Mound rather than Fresh Knowe I think]."
|
|
The Dyke o'Sean, aka the Dyke of Seean 'line' [i.e. boundary dyke] RCAHMS NMRS record no. HY21SE 68 presently runs from HY28901367 to HY29431362 (across the parish boundary as it now is) but formerly ran from loch to loch with the Loch of Stenness end "built on each side" , with a cart once being with difficulty extracted therefrom. Close by the dyke's north side is the Wasbister Disc Barrow and to its east a mound now not classified as burnt, then a whole settlement. The paucity of sites between it and the Ring of Brodgar complex would appear to indicate a prehistoric date, especially seeing how busy that landscape is N of the dyke. The nearest found by geophsics are two possible ring ditches HY21SE 93 somewhere in the field to the south's southern half. At some remove, near the complex at HY29051322, by Stenness loch is an L-shaped cropmark some 55m long and ending at the shoreline. RCAHMS NMRS record no. HY21SE 89 is seen as a drain and/or enclosure but may be compared to a feature (HY465131) in the Carness Brecks below Blackhall.
|
In order to enlarge a field by the Bridge of Brodgar a large amount of a tumulus had to be removed as it impinged upon the corner. The labourers had cut a section 3-4' deep and thrown the earth removed up onto the mound. Amongst the discard they found what is described as a sinker. Description of 'sinker' is an incised water-worn sandstone 7 1/2 inches long, a tapered oblong with a groove around the side. One side quartered to contain sadly degraded images, other decorated with two fishes and a probable seal. Yep, it's that stone. No wonder this site had been ascribed to a [Pictish] broch. Some years before an arrow-head and a scraper, both of flint, had been found in the mound. (P.S.A.S. XXII [1887-8] article by James Noble).
The mound appears to have been dug even earlier as Thomas' map of 1851 has some detail of the structure [not apparent on reproductions] including an entrance passage along the side facing the road. Cut was made near back of tumulus. Now I have had a photocopy fom the library and using an Agfa lupe my passage runs along the N side of the east lobe of a kidney shape occupying the S side of the ?top. Opposite the west lobe is a circle and then a curve runs arond the remaining [north-eastern quadrant], possibly joining the outside line of the 'kidney'.
|
On my images of HY21SE 9 & 24 eastern=downhill, southern=Brodgar etc.
The greener grass looks to show where excavations have taken place (or on level bits ground disturbed by walking I suppose).
|
|
HY21NE 12 at HY28001647 is a flat-topped turf-covered mound of earth & stones 25'D, a metre high but topped by a 5'D mound of almost the same height. A barrow-digger started work on the 'building' but was thankfully stopped byy the farmer. The NMRS reference to a rouge pot etc is an error for my news index for Skara Brae NW 12
|
Wasbister Cairn, NMRS record no. HY21SE 19 at HY28811397, is a small mound of earth and stones on the SE slope of the hill between the Ring of Brodgar and Bookan farm, by the top end of the fence from the road. There was a stone setting around the base and its present dimensions of ~8mD by 0.6m high accords well with 27x1.5' then (though I make it vary 6.4-6.5m across, giving some idea of the annular ring's dimensions).
Wasbister Mound, RCAHMS record no. HY21SE 20 at HY28961378. is a possible burnt mound 6mD by 0.3m high (I only made out 5m across and measuring from lowest point of immediately surrounding land 0.6m high) close to a "small loch" and roughly 100 yards E of the 'disc barrow'.
|
RCAHMS NMRS record no. HY21SE 9 consists of two cairns at HY28591427 and 28601422, both N/S aligned, with no finds known. Call them i) and ii) I shall. In 1880 i) measured six feet high and some fifty feet across, being almost sub-rectangular, now it is down as a grassy N/S oval 23.7m by 15.7m and 1.7m high of many small stones having a slight depression in its top. Item ii) was described as eighty feet around and four-and-a-half high, now is an oval 20.6m by 15.7m varying from 2.5m high on the uphill side to only 1m on the downhill side - not what you would expect from a level mound on a hillside. At its centre many small stones are exposed in a not quite circular depression some 6mD. Could the basin of burnt ?soapstone [HY21SE 44] found in 1926 have come from this vicinity ?
In the 16thC Jo Ben saw the complete skeleton of an alleged 14' giant who had been found in a tomb on a small hill near the loch of Stenhouse, with coins beneath his head [presumably Viking], and I wonder if this relates to the "stone coffin" the 1880 ONB records on being found on an eminence described as being "thrown [up] by the Brecks" 1/4 mile S of Bookan and almost 1/2 mile SW of Bockan. Usually for coffin one should read long cist. The cairn looked to be a smaller version of Skae Frue so there must have been something distinctive they then both held in common, most likely a large robbed depression in the centre. Unfortunately no such site exists now [or there was a reluctance to identify it with a recognised site] so the best guess is that it should be identified with a mound on the other side of a defunct farm track from HY21SE 9 ii) which merges with the quarry's E side [could the quarry have 'swallowed up' the actual site if this was not it ?]. RCAHMS NMRS record no. HY21SE 24 at HY28571426 is some 13mD and like the cairn over the way is higher on the uphill side, varying from 1.7m to 0.8m [could they sit in a larger depression that perhaps preceded the quarry ??]
|
|
The chambered tomb mound can be seen on 2 photos in "Current Archaeology" April 2010 article on Ness of Brodgar : p.12 behind house, p.15 behind Lochview stones [if these were part of an avenue between the stone circles it would have to be fairly sinuous to go around the mound]
|
|
Hedges regards the semi-circular structure with passage as perhaps Pictish
|
Showing 1-20 of 308 miscellaneous posts. Most recent first | Next 20 |
Unemployed and so plenty of spare time for researching contributors' questions and queries and for making corrections. Antiquarian and naturalist. Mode of transport shanks's pony. Talent unnecessary endurance. I love brochs.
|
Log in |
Register
Top of page