Field Visit
Date 17 June 1931
Event ID 1130555
Category Recording
Type Field Visit
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1130555
Broch, West Burra Firth.
This broch (Fig. 498) is situated near the head of West Burra Firth on a low, rocky islet, known as the Holm of Hebrista, which is said to have been formerly "connected with the land by a bridge of large stepping-stones over which the sea flows at full tide" (1). No clear indications of such a causeway are now to be seen, and except at very low tide the broch is inaccessible without a boat. Much of its ground-plan can still be made out, but many of the details are greatly obscured by fallen material. The over-all diameter is 58 ft., and the wall averages 15 ft.in thickness. Although the outer face has collapsed on the S. and on the N.E., it still stands eight or nine courses high elsewhere. The entrance faces the Firth and is approached through a cleft in the rocks, the mouth of which is at the end of a little cove. The doorway and entrance-passage, with their surroundings, are completely blocked, but it is evident that there has been the usual "guard-chamber" to right and to left. It will be observed from the plan that there have been four other cells or chambers within the thickness of the wall, and that, while two of these are of the usual oval form, two are shaped somewhat like dumb-bells. One of the latter is reached by a short entrance passage, but the passage to the other is longer and turns at an angle, resembling in these respects the passage leading to one of the oval cells. What happened in the fourth case is doubtful. Just above the mass of debris, which fills the interior, there is a scarcement varying in width from 9 to 11 in. and running at the same level as the solitary lintel-stone of the entrance-passage which remains in position. Above it the wall has a slight inward batter. Over the main entrance and the entrances to the cells are openings, each closed above by a lintel, doubtless the lower members of vertical series of similar openings such as are often found in brochs. The upper members of the series have, of course, disappeared along with the galleries and the staircase.
Many relics are said to have been found here from time to time. Whether there was any connection between the broch and the so-called "cuml" (No. 1413 [HU 2569 5718]) on the adjacent and still smaller islet is extremely doubtful.
RCAHMS 1946, visited 17 June 1931.
(1) Spence, Shetland Folk-Lore, p. 54.
OS 6" map, Shetland, 2nd ed., (1903).
