Hoy, Braebister
Broch (Iron Age)(Possible), Fort (Prehistoric), Shell Midden (Iron Age), Unidentified Pottery (Iron Age)
Site Name Hoy, Braebister
Classification Broch (Iron Age)(Possible), Fort (Prehistoric), Shell Midden (Iron Age), Unidentified Pottery (Iron Age)
Alternative Name(s) Brough Of Braebister; Braebuster
Canmore ID 1564
Site Number HY20NW 20
NGR HY 21314 05228
Datum OSGB36 - NGR
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/1564
- Council Orkney Islands
- Parish Hoy And Graemsay
- Former Region Orkney Islands Area
- Former District Orkney
- Former County Orkney
HY20NW 020 2130 0522.
(HY 2130 0522) Brough {NR}
OS 6" map, Orkney, 2nd ed., (1903).
A raised or artifical mound
Name Book 1880.
These slight and scattered remains of a substantial stone structure suggest that the walls may have been about 12 feet thick. The building,therefore, was probably a broch. A few large blocks of stone are still to be seen in situ, especially on the edge of the cliff at the W side.
A mound 10 to 12 feet high, across the neck of the headland, is modern, and probably consists of the remains of the structure not worth removing.
A saddle-quern was recently found on the site and a kitchen midden at the edge of the cliff on the w. yielded limpet and cockle shells, with fragments of broch type coarse pottery.
RCAHMS 1946, visited 15 July 1929.
There is no conclusive evidence to suggest that this grass-covered artifical mound situated on a promontory was a broch, although in various parts of the slopes there are considerable traces of walling and earthfast stones. No trace of the midden could be seen, and the present whereabouts of the finds could not be ascertained.
Re-surveyed at 1/2500.
Visited by OS (RD), 20 September 1964.
Field Visit (July 1970)
Brough of Braebister HY 2130 0522 HY20NW 20
The narrow headland formed between deep geos at the mouth of Braebister Burn has its approach blocked by a steep, elongated bank 3.5m high and 3.5m broad, running across the isthmus. Occasional disconnected lengths of wall-face and some erect slabs are visible; the underlying structure may be of 'blockhouse' type. Immediately behind it, at the clifftop on the S side, is a limpet-shell midden, and the remaining area of the promontory summit is occupied by rectilinear slab-structures barely protruding above the turf.
RCAHMS 1989, visited July 1970.
(RCAHMS 1946, ii, p. 109, No. 380; Lamb 1980, 34, 76; OR 1912).
Publication Account (2002)
HY20 1 BRAEBISTER
HY/213052
Possible broch on Hoy I., on a small rocky headland between two deep geos or gullies. Only some scattered stones and a few large blocks remain, and the site has evidently been quarried. A saddle quern was found at the site not long before 1929, and fragments of alleged broch pottery were recovered from a midden deposit in the edge of the cliff to the west [2].
Sources: 1. OS card HY 20 NW 20: 2. RCAHMS 1946, 2, no. 380, 109 and fig. 335 (plate).
E W MacKie 2002
Note (23 February 2015 - 31 May 2016)
What may be a fort occupies a coastal promontory formed between two geos some 15m deep, though the exact character of the visible remains is uncertain. It was held to be a heavily-robbed broch by RCAHMS investigators in 1929 (1946, 109, no.380), when a thick bank extending across the neck of the promontory was dismissed as no more than a dump of discarded rubble, but Raymond Lamb, who visited in 1970, observed traces of walling and erect slabs in this bank, and part of a slighter outer bank with a shallow external ditch (1980, 76). The extent of the interior is not recorded, but probably measures in the order of 30m from ESE to WNW by 18m transversely (0.05ha). It has been heavily occupied and in 1970 numerous set stones were visible, while in 1929 midden material and pottery were found eroding out of the S flank and a saddle quern at the W.
Information from An Atlas of Hillforts of Great Britain and Ireland – 31 May 2016. Atlas of Hillforts SC2836
