St Kilda, Hirta, Village Bay, Cleit 155

NF19SW 21.22 10068 99510

The head dyke abuts this small drystone structure which also possesses a small cell at the N end. Its position and form thus indicate that it was built before the late 1830s, and it was in this cleit that the only surviving cleit door was found.

Measuring 3.91m in length by 0.91m internally, with a lintelled roof 1.45m above floor-level, the main building is aligned roughly N-S. Unusually, the entrance is in a corner position at he N end of the W side-wall. Externally, the walls are battered and made up of relatively small stones; inside, the masonry consists of fairly large boulders, and the walls are slightly corbelled. The rounded S end traverses the line of the head dyke which abuts the flanking walls.

The W side-wall continues northwards to form a small subcircular cell which measures 1.42m by 0.99m transversely, its corbelled roof surviving to a height of 1.04m. Beside and above the cleit entrance, 0.81m above the cleit floor, there is a small opening into the cell; the aperture is 0.46m high and 0.76m deep. The cell has partly collapsed on the E side where there may be another entrance or an aumbry.

A wall, which forms part of a higher-level enclosure, appears to be bonded into the cleit immediately N of the doorway, and a ruined wall, apparently partly dismantled, adjoins the E side of the cell.

G P Stell and M Harman 1988.

NF 101 991 (centre) As part of the Management Agreement with Historic Scotland, the monuments within Village Bay were recorded and monitored, and certain cleits, dykes and enclosures were repaired in 2001 under supervision by members of the two volunteer work parties. Detailed work included the completion of the identification of around 300 cleits for active management, and the production of a report on cleit preservation, as well as rapid assessments of coastal erosion and the deposition of builders' debris within some of the roofless structures along the village street.

Report to be deposited in the NMRS.

NF 101 991 (centre) As part of the Management Agreement with Historic Scotland, the monuments within Village Bay were recorded and monitored, and certain cleits, dykes, drains and enclosures were repaired under supervision by members of the volunteer work parties which went out to St Kilda in 2002.

A photographic survey of the coastline in Village Bay was carried out and compared to images taken in 1999. The survey indicated erosion along the NE side of the bay. Two sherds of hand-made pottery were recovered and a layer of burning noted in an exposed section.

The annual monitoring of cleits across the island was carried out and the photographic survey of them continued.

Report to be deposited in the NMRS.

Sponsors: HS, NTS.

S Bain 2002