Eday, Calf Of Eday, Saltworks
Salt Works (Period Unassigned)
Site Name Eday, Calf Of Eday, Saltworks
Classification Salt Works (Period Unassigned)
Alternative Name(s) Calf Of Eday, The Salt Pans; Starling Ayre
Canmore ID 3155
Site Number HY53NE 21
NGR HY 5744 3910
NGR Description HY 5744 3910 and HY 5757 3874
Datum OSGB36 - NGR
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/3155
- Council Orkney Islands
- Parish Eday
- Former Region Orkney Islands Area
- Former District Orkney
- Former County Orkney
HY53NE 21 5744 3910 and 5757 3874.
(HY 5744 3910 and 5757 3874) 'The Salt Pans' are two ruinous buildings on the west shore of the Calf of Eday, one close to Starling Ayre and the other about 1/4 mile to the north.
The south building measures about 60' by 24' and the north about 50' by 25'. They are of similar plan, each being oblong, with one rounded end, and divided transversely about the centre by a thick partition wall which apparently contained a fireplace in each face. The south building also possesses two low, double openings placed opposite one another in the side walls of its west division.
There is no evidence for the date of these buildings, but Brand (J Brand 1701) records the construction of twelve salt-pans in the island about 1633, while a charter, dated 1672, which was in the possession of the proprietor, Major H H Hebden MC, in 1936, proved that a salt pan existed at that date.
RCAHMS 1946, visited 1936.
These ruinous buildings appear to have been identical and generally as described by RCAHM. The main walls are 1.0m thick whilst the internal partition walls are 2.3m thick and survive to a maximum height of 2.0m. There is no trace of salt pans in the area, but the buildings themselves have undoubtedly been used for the manufacture of salt, which was recovered from sea water evaporated by the heat from the two fires.
Local traditional supports this view. Name 'The Salt Pans' is not known locally.
Surveyed at 1/2500.
Visited by OS (AA) 23 July 1970.
There is documentary evidence for a saltworks on the Calf in the seventeenth century and the masonry of these two buildings, which stand on the shoreline facing Carrick House, is consistent with that date. Each has an apsidal end, now largely washed away, standing into the sea, and is built around a massive central wall, 6m long and 2.3m thick. In each face there was probably a fireplace; the surviving one in the SE building has a segmental arch with lime-mortared voussoirs. In the N wall of this building is an elaborate system of openings, which appear to be air-intakes. The inland end of each building is dug back into the coastal slope, a nd behind and above it is a mound, probably the remains of the peat-stack. The two buildings are remarkably uniform in size, having had an estimated internal overall length of 13.4m the compartment on the sea side of the central wall being 5.6m wide a nd the one on the inland side 5.2m.
RCAHMS 1984, visited September 1983.
