Note
Date 1983
Event ID 1156108
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Note
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1156108
Holm of Papa Westray, North HY 5044 5227 HY55SW 2
First excavated in 1854, this Neolithic tomb, an Orkney-Cromarty stalled cairn, is currently being re-excavated (1982-3), revealing an oblong cairn, c.11m by 6m, with an inner and outer stone revetment, an entrance passage at the N end, and a rectangular burial-chamber. The chamber is 5.0m by 2.7m and is divided into four compartments by pairs of upright slabs; it contained a number of inhumation burials accompanied by plain pottery bowls, and a deposit of fish bones in a stone setting. The chamber had been deliberately infilled with earth, stones and food debris, including cattle, sheep, deer, shells
and fish bones. (A Ritchie)
RCAHMS 1983
(Petrie 1857, 62; Petrie Sketch Book no. 3 (in NMRS); RCAHMS 1946, ii, pp. 189-90, No. 545; Henshall 1963, 200-1; DES, 1982, 19).
