Bookan
Chambered Cairn (Neolithic)
Site Name Bookan
Classification Chambered Cairn (Neolithic)
Alternative Name(s) Buckan
Canmore ID 1697
Site Number HY21SE 10
NGR HY 2864 1412
Datum OSGB36 - NGR
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/1697
- Council Orkney Islands
- Parish Sandwick
- Former Region Orkney Islands Area
- Former District Orkney
- Former County Orkney
HY21SE 10 2864 1412.
HY 2864 1412) Tumulus (NR) Stone Cist found A.D. 1860.
OS 6" map, Orkney, 2nd ed., (1903).
This Orkney-Cromarty Bookan-type chambered cairn (A S Henshall 1963) presents some rather unusual features. As the result of excavation in 1861 the chamber, now roofless and much broken-down, is exposed at ground level. Only the tops of a few slabs project from the debris in the centre.
Petrie, describing this excavation, states that the mound was about 44ft diameter by 6 ft high but had, even then, been partially examined on some former occasion and tthe upper part was ruinous. On cutting into the mound a circular wall or facing, about ft high, was found, about 11ft within the base edge of the cairn. A low passage, 6 1/4 ft long by 1 3/4 ft wide and high, led from this wall to a central cist, 7ft 1 in. by 4ft by 2ft 8 ins deep, in which lay a flint lance-head and pottery sherds of at least three small vessels or cups but no bones. At the north end of this was another cist, 4ft 8 ins by 2ft 9 ins by 2ft 8 ins deep. On the east side of the central cist or chamber was another cist and on its west side two cists, all of similar dimensions and each containing remains of human skeletons.
G Petrie 1863; RCAHMS 1946.
A chambered cairn, generally as described by the above authorities, but much smaller than planned by Henshall. Several of the stones of the chamber could not be traced. It now measures c. 160.0m. in diameter and 1.6m. high. The circular wall within the base edge of the cairn, the entrance passage, and the cists shown on the Commission plan and described by Petrie are no longer visible and the cairn is in a very ruined condition. The present whereabouts of the finds could not be determined.
Resurveyed at 1/2500.
Visited by OS (RB) 27 April 1966.
Only portions of 4 upright slabs of the chamber remain, 3 in alignment on the W side, and 1 (1.4m distant from the N slab) on the E side, all parts of the SW & N compartments shown on Petrie's plan. The statement by OS in 1966 (RB) that the cairn is much smaller than that planned by Miss Henshall is erroneous, due to a wrong scale being applied to the plan by the OS Recorder. The plan has been replaced and amended. The section, however, is incorrect, that by the RCAHM (after Dryden) being more accurate.
Visited OS (JLD) 17 May 1981
Orkney-Cromarty round cairn with Bookan-type chamber.
J L Davidson and A S Henshall 1989.
Excavation (June 2002)
HY 286 141 Excavation at Bookan chambered cairn (HY 21 SE 10) in June 2002 showed that the tomb excavated by Farrer, and described and planned by Petrie in 1861, was only the primary phase in the history of the site. After the tomb had fallen into disrepair or been deliberately slighted, the original cairn, c 7m in diameter, was incorporated in a larger cairn, c 16m in diameter, bounded by three concentric revetments. A deposit of human skeletal material was recovered from one of the side chambers. Various aspects of the layout and architecture of the original tomb, like the arrangement of side chambers around a central chamber and the removable side-chamber 'doors', would seem more akin to Maeshowe type tombs than Orkney Cromarty tombs. However, the size and aspects of the architecture would seem to be noticeably different from other chambered cairns.
Archive deposited in Orkney SMR and the NMRS.
Sponsors: Orkney Islands Council, Orkney Archaeology Trust, Orkney College.
N Card 2002
Magnetometry (June 2002 - October 2002)
A geophysical survey using magnetometry was undertaken in and around the Heart of Neolithic Orkney World Heritage Site between June and October 2002. Over 30ha was surveyed, including the Ring of Brodgar, the fields to the S of the Stones of Stenness (including Big Howe, HY 31 SW 31), an area around Bookan chambered cairn, and the fields between Brodgar Farm and the Bridge of Brodgar. Preliminary results have clarified the extent of known sites and discovered several new ones.
Archive to be deposited in Orkney SMR and the NMRS.
Sponsors: HS, Orkney Islands Council, Orkney Archaeology Trust, Orkney College.
N Card 2002
Orkney Smr Note
The chamber walls were of dry masonry. The plan seems to have
been similar to that of Calf of Eday NW, the main part of the
chamber being rectangular in plan and surrounded by compartments
divided from each other and partly divided from the chamber by
upright slabs reaching to the roof. The other slabs dividing the
compartments from the main chamber were probably relatively low
sill-stones. Petrie states that the passage was too small to have
been used. [R2]
Information from Orkney SMR [n.d.]
