Setter, Syra Dale

HY31NW 13 3459 1575.

(HY 3450 1575 : HY 3463 1578) Tumuli (NR)

OS 6" map, Orkney, 2nd ed., (1903).

Both mounds are artificial and composed of earthand small stones.

Name Book 1880.

Both mounds have been considerably disturbed. The larger and more northerly mound is 50ft by 40ft and 5 to 6ft high. In it two cists, each with three slabs remaining, can be seen. Of the cists, the westerly is 4ft by 2ft 9 ins and the easterly 4ft 4 ins by 2ft 8 ins to 3ft. Human and animal bones are said to have been found in them but no details are preserved. The southern mound is 34ft in diameter and 4 1/2 to 5ft in height. Excavated to a considerable depth in the centre, the cavity is now so full of debris and overgrown that any cists remaining are completely concealed.

RCAHMS 1946.

Two heather and grass covered cairns with stones visible in their central depressions, generally as described by the Commission, and situated in a marshy valley at about 150ft OD.

Only the more easterly cist is intact: a broken stone lying beside the cist probably represents the remains of a capstone. The more westerly cist has only one of its side-slabs visible.

Resurveyed at 1/2500.

Visited by OS (NKB) 31 May 1966.