Eynhallow, The Graand

No. 615. Cairn, The Graad.

Between the stone (No. 616) and the chapel (No. 613), but a little to the E, is an oval cairn, the major axis of which lies roughly E and W. It is 21ft long by 15ft 9in broad, but has lost much of its original height. On its N side is a slab, 3ft 7in long and 1ft 10in high, which is packed on the outside with stones and probably forms part of a cist.

Visited by RCAHMS 27 July 1929.

Notebook MS 36/106, 55-6

At HY 3590 2874, on a gentle slope, are the turf-covered remains of an oval mound of heavy stones, as described by the RCAHMS. This could be a cairn or stone clearance. If the upright slab on the N side, described above, is a cist slab, the covering cairn must have had a diameter of about 7.0 m, and has been destroyed on the N side.

Surveyed at 1:2500.

Visited by OS (NKB) 11 June 1967.

HY32NE 14 3590 2874.

(HY 359 287) An oval cairn lies between Eynhallow Monastery (HY32NE 2) and standing stone (HY32NE 13) but a little to the E.

It lies roughly E-W and measures 21 ft by 15 ft 9 ins, but has lost much of its original height. On its N side there is a slab, 3 ft 7 ins long and 1 ft 10 ins high, which is packed on the outside with stones and probably forms part of a cist.

Information from OS (ES) 24 May 1967

Source: RCAHMS 1946.

Eynhallow HY 3590 2874 HY32NE 14

Crowning a rock-outcrop on the slope below the monastery-is a roughly oval heap of big stones confusedly tumbled together against a massive upright slab on its N side, the heap now measuring about 7.5m by 5m. Its lack of coherent structure strongly suggests a clearance-heap, the planting of an upright flagstone to form the core of such a heap being a practice still or occasionally current.

RCAHMS 1982, visited August 1982

(RCAHMS 1946, ii, p. 234, No. 615; OR 773)

HY 36041 29076 A desk-based assessment and walkover survey of the island of Eynhallow was undertaken in April 2007. A total of 65 sites were recorded, ranging from post-medieval buildings to prehistoric structures. Of particular interest was the identification of a previously unrecorded burnt mound in the N of the island, several possible prehistoric burial mounds and a well preserved sequence of field dykes. Although further work is required to understand these boundaries, initial assessment suggests there is clear phasing and chronological depth to these features which may include potential prehistoric land divisions.

Report to be deposited with the Orkney SMR and RCAHMS.

Funder: Hunter Archaeological Trust, Viking Society for Northern Research, Orkney Archaeological Trust, Orkney College Geophysics Unit.

Although these remains have been previously recorded as those of a possible burial cairn (RCAHMS 1946; OS 1967) or of a clearance cairn (Lamb in RCAHMS 1982; Moore and Thomas 2008), they may be those of a ruined farmstead. A small square unroofed building is shown here on the 1st edition of the OS 25 inch map (Orkney Sheet LXXIX.7, 1882), while a farmstead known as ‘South House’ is depicted in approximately this location upon a sketch plan of 1827 (Orkney Archives Ref. D1/440/1).

Visited by RCAHMS (GFG) 12 August 2015

Moore and Thomas 2008, Site 34