Orkney Smr Note

Date May 1986

Event ID 619453

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Orkney Smr Note

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/619453

Fragment of a Pictish symbol stone of grey-buff sandstone

was ploughed up by Mr Harcus in cultivating the potato patch in

the tumail immediately S of his garage/smithy (which formerly was

the dwelling-house, the immediate predecessor of the present one)

- April 1986. The spot was slightly E of the middle of the

potato garden, which Harcus says is a stony patch where the

plough won't go as deep as elsewhere. His grandfather came to

Ness about 1930 and the people previously in the farm are said to

have dug up two human skulls in this garden, which is thought to

be an old burial ground. This is adjoined on the N side by the

garage/smithy, which was widened by the present Mr Harcus by

demolishing the S side-wall and rebuilding it on a further S

alignment. In digging the foundation for this Mr Harcus found a

great depth of rich shell midden material, which Harcus failed to

bottom, and had to construct the wall on a concrete raft.

The stone is a slab of grey-buff sandstone. The face

bearing the sculpture is dressed, with maximum dimensions of

589mm x 308mm. the other side is roughly flaked, and evidently

the slab has been split longitudinally, thus losing its original

other face, at some time between the Pictish work and its

re-cutting for a secondary use. This re-cutting has involved the

making of a new straight edge, along which two round-sectioned

grooves, 3-4mm deep, have been cut. Both angles along this edge

have been rounded, and a third, similar groove has been cut along

the face, 30mm inwards from the recut edge. This groove impinges

upon the Pictish figure's head end. Within some 200mm of this

groove, the surface of the stone has been smoothly polished,

whereas this surface at the far end of the fragment, and around

the scrolled tail of the figure, has a lightly pecked finish.

The effect of this secondary treatment has been to reduce the

depth and clarity of the Pictish cutting at the head of the end

figure. The re-cut edge has a thickness of 46-50mm, while at the

far end, where the other face is the rough flaked surface, the

thickness is 83mm.

The Pictish figure extends a maximum of 377mm from the recut

edge. The carving takes the form of a round-sectioned groove

executed by pecking. The groove lacks clearly-defined edges, the

rounding being continued over the intervening ridges which form

the internal detail of the figure. Thus although the technique

is essentially one of incision, the effect produced is akin to

shallow bas-relief, with a maximum depth of 3-4mm below the

dressed surface, cf OR 1003,

Information from Orkney SMR (RGL) May 86.