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Sanday, Howar
Animal Burial (Prehistoric), Midden (Early Iron Age) - (Viking), Pit(S) (Prehistoric), Sherd (Pottery)(Prehistoric), Vessel(S) (Steatite)(Period Unassigned)
Site Name Sanday, Howar
Classification Animal Burial (Prehistoric), Midden (Early Iron Age) - (Viking), Pit(S) (Prehistoric), Sherd (Pottery)(Prehistoric), Vessel(S) (Steatite)(Period Unassigned)
Canmore ID 3428
Site Number HY63NW 22
NGR HY 6171 3718
Datum OSGB36 - NGR
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/3428
- Council Orkney Islands
- Parish Cross And Burness
- Former Region Orkney Islands Area
- Former District Orkney
- Former County Orkney
HY63NW 22 6171 3718.
A kitchen-midden at Howar (HY 61 37) yielded four pieces of steatite vessel which may be either Early Iron Age or Viking. They are in the Free Library Museum, Kirkwall (No. 28)
S Grieg 1940.
The farmer at North Howar indicated a turf-covered eminence, approximately 50.0m in diameter, at HY 6171 3718 where he believes a 'building' to be buried because of the amount of stone and shells turned up when ploughing but there are no surface traces. This is possibly where the potsherds were found.
Visited by OS (RL) 7 July 1970.
Note (1980)
Howar, Sanday HY 61 37 HY63NW 22
Steatite vessels from a kitchen-midden may be Iron Age or Viking.
RCAHMS 1980
(Greig 1940, 150; OR 359)
Archaeological Evaluation (28 June 2013 - 30 June 2013)
HY 61791 37254 A trial trenching evaluation was carried out. Ten trenches were excavated across the proposed development area. The sporadic presence of charcoal, shell and small fragments of animal bone in these soils suggest they reflect the spreading of midden material on cultivated land. In most trenches only a single buried soil was encountered, with the following exceptions.
Trench A - A sequence of banded deposits c0.5m thick (max), probably representing deposits of midden material, was located underlying windblown sand. A prehistoric pot fragment was retrieved from these deposits.
Trench B - Three pit-like features were located. One had a small animal (piglet/dog) burial in the upper fill. These may be at a depth which will not be affected by the development and were not further investigated at this stage.
C Parker - ORCA
(Source: DES; OASIS ID: orkneyre1-157718)
Orkney Smr Note
Find from a kitchen-midden at Howar, near Lambaness, Sanday. - Four pieces of one or more steatite vessels, one perforated ears. The pieces are, all of them, so fragmentary that the size of the vessels as they were once, cannot be determined. Impossible to determine whether these pieces date from Viking times or belonged to the coarse vessels of the early iron age... Their thickness suggests the possibility of the latter conjecture, but nothing can be ascertained. Length of pieces respectively 14, 13, 8 and 9cm. [R1]
Information from Orkney SMR [n.d.]
