Publication Account
Date 1996
Event ID 1016304
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Publication Account
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1016304
The island of North Ronaldsay is famous both for its sheep and for its sheep dyke. The sheep are of a very old native breed and they feed chiefly in seaweed, being confined to the foreshore by a stone dyke, some 1.5m high, which encircles the entire 19km perimeter of the island. The original 19th century building and continuing maintenance of the dyke represent communal labour by the islanders, and the whole method of sheep husbandry here is an invaluable and almost unique survival of a once widespread communal system of agriculture.
Equally interesting are the two earthen dykes, the Matches Dyke (HY 756546-767544) and the Muckle Gairsty (HY 750534-768521), which run roughly east-west across the island dividing it into three unequal parts. Local legend attributes the dykes to a man who divided the land between his three sons, apparently according to the old udal system of inheritance; whether or not the legend is true, the two dykes are almost certainly territorial boundaries of some sort. Their date is uncertain: they appear on a map published around 1770 but they could well be very much earlier, perhaps prehistoric in origin. There is a particularly well preserved length of the Muckle Gairsty running south-south-eastwards from Northness in the south-east tip of the island (HY 766527-768522), where it is 4m wide and almost 2m high.
Information from ‘Exploring Scotland’s Heritage: Orkney’, (1996).
