Old Haiks

NO61SW 2 6100 30.

"In March 1826 a farmer on the estate of Wormeston, near Fifeness, in levelling a piece of ground, discovered,...10 feet from the surface, thirty cists disposed in two regular rows, at equal distances apart, and with the heads towards the north-east. Their arrangement was peculiar and obviously the result of some special design. A line drawn along their ends was nearly due east and west, and from this they declined obliquely, in the direction of north-east and south-west.

The whole lay parallel and equidistant from each other, and in the centre of each of the intervening spaces an ablong stone was placed so as to abut against the sides of the adjacent cists."

D Wilson 1863; G W Knight MS letter in Soc Antiq Scot Library, 1829.

Similar information to Wilson. "The bones were so entire that the farmer dug a hole and buried them" (Merson is the only authority to mention the contents of the cists).

NSA 1845 (A Merson)

"Numerous stone coffins...constructed of coarse flags and containing human bones" have been found in levelling the braes on the sea shore at Kingsbarns.

NSA 1845 (G Wright)

RCAHMS quotes Wilson.

RCAHMS 1933

(Area centred NO 6100 1130) Long cist cemetery at Old Haaks, in the parish of Crail; 30 graves, cists in two rows. (Name: Old Haiks at NO 6110 1136).

A S Henshall 1958; Proc Soc Antiq Scot 1862

Local enquiries proved negative. Nothing of significance was seen in the vicinity of 'Old Haiks'.

Visited by OS (WDJ) 3 September 1968

Site recorded by Maritime Fife during the Coastal Assessment Survey for Historic Scotland, Fife Ness to Newburgh 1996