Archaeology Notes

Event ID 645023

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Archaeology Notes

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/645023

HY45SE 18 4554 5124.

Traces of a built structure, locally known as 'The Picts' House' occur on the crest of a high sandy bank close to the shore of the Bay of Skaill and c1 /2 mile NE of Hahouse. The structure was opened a few years before 1928, and found to consist of a roughly circular chamber and a long narrow passage full of clean sand. No mention was made of finds during the excavation but when the site was visited, a small fragment of pottery and an indefinite piece of bronze pierced for a pin or rivet was picked up from a kitchen midden of the usual shells and food refuse which had been exposed by heavy winter seas.

RCAHMS 1946, visited 29 June 1928.

Exposed for a length of c.30m in the face of an eroded sand dune at HY 4554 5124 are traces of dry-stone walling and midden material, indicating the unintelligible remains of an early occupation site.

Visited by OS, 28 June 1970.

HY 455 512 The coastal settlement mound of Evertaft was recorded by EDM survey and section drawing. It has suffered considerable erosion over the last four years and now survives as a strip of interleaved middens, drystone structures and sand layers running 60m along the coast and c 25m inland. Its maximum thickness is c 4.5m. A radiocarbon date on cereal grain from low in the profile has yielded an assay of AD 131-419 (AA-39134, 1750?55 bp cal 2s). Samples were recovered for ecofactual analysis and further dating using OSL and radiocarbon. Twenty test pits excavated in the immediate hinterland of the site revealed little surviving evidence for associated anthropogenic deposits. However, this survey was hampered by a thick blanket of wind-blown sand which may obscure deeply buried features. The single exception was five courses of stonework associated with other loose rubble at HY 454 512. This might be the structure previously noted in the NMRS at HY 4539 5119, recorded in 1970 but not relocated in 1981.

Sponsor: University of York.

J Barrett, T O'Connor and S Dobson 2000