Field Visit

Date 21 July 1928

Event ID 1161685

Category Recording

Type Field Visit

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1161685

RCAHMS Inventory: Orkney and Shetland

Mounds, Hillocks of Garth, near Garth.

In the corner of a cultivated field about 200 yds NW of the crofter's house at Garth, near Kirkwall, there is a fine group of mounds on high ground between 100 and 200 ft above sea-level. Originally the group has comprised at least nine mounds, but now only five survive in anything like good condition. The sites and approximate diameters of the other four can, however, still be traced, and it is possible that others again have been entirely blotted out in the adjoining cultivated ground. The mounds are all circular on plan; two, which have diameters of 21 feet and 34 ft. respectively, are reduced to mere foundations, and of the others the measurements are respectively 16 ft. by less than 1 ft; 23 ft. by just over 1 ft; 25 ft. by 2 ft; 19 ft. by 1 ft. 6 ins.; 30 ft. by 4 ft. 3 in.; 35 ft. by 4 ft. 6 ins., and 52 ft. by 5 ft. 3 in. All are now covered with turf and heather, but the largest, which was recently cut into by the farmer, proved to consist of an upper layer of blackened peaty soil overlying a mixture of earth mixed with small stones. Some of the mounds seem to have been partially excavated at one time or another, but no record of any finds has been traced.

RCAHMS 1946, visited 21 Jul 1928

OS 6" map cviii