RCAHMS Archaeological Survey: St Kilda

Date 2007 - 2011

Event ID 580629

Category Project

Type Project

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/580629

From 2007 to 2011, a team of archaeologists and surveyors from RCAHMS and the National Trust for Scotland (NTS) mapped the archaeological remains on Hirta and the other islands in the St Kilda archipelago. The project was led by RCAHMS surveyor Ian G Parker and archaeologist Angela R Gannon, with contributions from many other RCAHMS and NTS staff, in particular NTS archaeologist Jill Harden. The team used Global Positioning System survey equipment and ortho-rectified aerial photography to map the islands’ archaeological features at a scale of 1:5000. This is available as a digital linework dataset (TM 000078); also available is a database of all the cleitean (DT 000117), which uses the numbering sequence developed in the 1980s by Mary Harman. Summary descriptions for the all the groups of cleitean are available in Canmore. The survey referenced previous work undertaken by RCAHMS and Mary Harman, as well as more recent surveys undertaken by GUARD, the NTS volunteers and Andrew Fleming. To complement the 1985 RCAHMS plane table survey of the eastern side of Gleann Mor, additional 1:500 site plans (derived from both aerial photography and field observation) were created for sites in the NE and W sectors. RCAHMS photographer Steve Wallace supported the team in May 2008, producing digital images of the landscape as well as general and detailed views of the buildings and archaeological features.

Access to the outer islands was difficult: Dun and Boreray were visited in 2009 and 2010 respectively, but information on Soay relied on a trip in 2011 by J Harden and I McHardy (NTS), and Stac an Armin and Stac Li were not visited. For those archaeological features that proved inaccessible, mapping has relied on the evidence provided by aerial photography.

The results of the survey were augmented by further research and fieldwork and culminated in the publication of ‘St Kilda, the Last and Outmost Isle’ in 2015. This presents a comprehensive analysis of the archaeology of St Kilda, illustrated with maps, plans and a range of historic and contemporary imagery.

Information from HES Survey and Recording (ARG, GFG) August 2018.