Pricing Change
New pricing for orders of material from this site will come into place shortly. Charges for supply of digital images, digitisation on demand, prints and licensing will be altered.
Upcoming Maintenance
Please be advised that this website will undergo scheduled maintenance on the following dates:
Thursday, 9 January: 11:00 AM - 3:00 PM
Thursday, 23 January: 11:00 AM - 3:00 PM
Thursday, 30 January: 11:00 AM - 3:00 PM
During these times, some functionality such as image purchasing may be temporarily unavailable. We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause.
Archaeology Notes
Event ID 645900
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Archaeology Notes
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/645900
HY60SW 3 608 015.
(HY 608 015) Several fairly large stones and a considerable deposit of cockle and other shells have been exposed on some rising ground near the sea shore, about 100 yds N of Copinsay farm house. The deposit is visible also for some distance along the face of the steep bank above the adjacent sea beach. Fragments of pottery and a bone needle were found here some years ago. The needle was about 4" long, slightly curved at the point and had a neatly drilled hole about 1/2" from the head. (J Mooney 1926).
RCAHMS 1946, visited 1930.
In the vicinity of Copinsay farm, three kitchen middens can be seen in the cliff edge.
At HY 6085 0157 (A) N of the farm, there are deposits of sea-shells, and 24.0m S of these, at HY 6083 0154 (B) there is a vast quantity of animal bones which has been buried until recent coastal erosion has revealed them, and many of the skeletons are almost whole.
About 25.0m W of the farmhouse, at HY 6077 0149 (C) there are further deposits of shells and small animal bones. Two sherds of plain, hand-formed pottery were found here.
Surveyed at 1:2500.
Visited by OS (NKB) 30 August 1964.
(HY 6077 0149) Pottery, Bones, Shells etc found (NAT)
OS 1:10,000 map, (1970).
The usual shell and animal bone and some pottery, of general 'Iron Age' type (i.e. anything from the last few centuries B C up to say 900 A D) have been found in midden 'C' by Mr Ian F Smith, Headmaster, Hope School, St Margaret's Hope, Orkney. He has retained a substantial part of the basal half of a pot in the School, and has donated some sherds to the NMAS.
Information from a letter and 6" plan from Dr J Close-Brooks, National Museum of Antiquities of Scotland (NMAS) to OS 14 January 1976
On either side of the lighthouse jetty below the farm, an extensive midden deposit is visible at three separate spots, and there is an exposure of burnt stones on the sandy surface immediately inland. In the northernmost midden Mooney records the finding, in the 1920s, of a bone needle with a peforated head.
J Mooney 1926; RCAHMS 1946; RCAHMS 1987, visited August 1964.
