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Publication Account
Date 2002
Event ID 585634
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Publication Account
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/585634
1 KNOWE OF BURRISTAE
HY/43174293
Broch on flat ground on the SW shore of Westray, appearing now as a turfed mound on its landward side.
A stretch of concave inner wall face is exposed at one point on the seaward side, with a mass of rubble in front of it; the tops of several slabs on edge could be seen among this in 1928, presumably fragments of structures inside the central court. There is a lintelled void or doorway in the curved face [2, fig. 74], 57 cm (1 ft. 10.5 in.) wide and 84 cm (2 ft. 9 in.) high from sill to lintel, and which is c. 25 cm (10 in.) above a scarcement ledge. This opening leads to a mural gallery behind, which must be an upper one. The scarcement is 20.0-21.6 cm (8 - 8.5 in.) wide and is described as “projecting”; it is probably at least partly corbelled. The curvature of the wall suggests an interior diameter for the structure of 7.9 m (26 ft.), and one may assume the rest of it has been destroyed by the sea. The building should be a hollow-walled broch but the design of its ground level storey is unknown.
By 1990 the scarcement and lintelled opening had evidently collapsed [5].
Sources: 1. OS card HY44SW 1: 2. RCAHMS 1946, 2, no. 1034, 350 and figs. 73-4 (plates) and 454 (plan): 3. Hedges et al. 1987, 128-29: 4. Lamb 1983, 29: 5. Discovery and Excavation in Scotland 1990, 45.
E W MacKie 2002
