Publication Account
Date 1996
Event ID 1016336
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Publication Account
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1016336
This was formerly a very large burnt mound, about 2m high, which had accumulated round an oval building on a slope above a small burn. The basal courses of the shelter survive to a height of almost a metre, the floor is paved and round the walls is a series of compartments formed by upright slabs, but the major feature is the sunken trough, massively built with thick stone slabs forming the sides and bo ttom of a watertight box, 1.6m by 1.0m and 0.6m deep. When this trough was first excavated, it was half-full of burnt stones left from the last cooking. The eastern part of the shelter had been disturbed by recent quarrying for road-metal, but sufficient remained of the hearth to show that it had been set in an alcove in the wall and that the fuel used was peat. The position of the hearth suggests that the building was not roofed, for even if the alcove were itself roofed by lintels or corbelling, the danger of settin g the rafters alight would be considerable; given the steam that must have been produced by the trough, an enclosed building would have been unbea rable to work in, steam and smoke combining to make it impossible either to see or to breathe.
Information from ‘Exploring Scotland’s Heritage: Orkney’, (1996).
