Skara Brae Research Articles

Carved stone balls

387 carved stone balls are catalogued and classified according to number of knobs and type of decoration, and 42 decorated balls are illustrated. The 240 examples with known provenances are concentrated in NE Scotland; of the few found in archaeological contexts, those from Skara Brae are the most helpful for dating. Proof of function is lacking. A R

The Stones of Stenness, Orkney

HY 307125. Report of excavations on the Class I henge together with discussion (by E W Marwick) of the folklore surrounding an outlying standing stone, the Stone of Odin, and a catalogue of important 18th and 19th century illustrations of both sites. Excavation of the henge revealed that a ring of twelve stones was originally planned and that a complex stone and timber setting occupied the centre, grooved ware was found in both the central feature and the ditch terminal. Radiocarbon dates in late 3rd millennium bc suggest that the henge was contemporary with Skara Brae and tombs of Maes Howe type. AR

Some observations on puff-balls from British archaeological sites

Abstract The occurrence of the puff-ball Bovista nigrescens in four British archaeological sites, approximately 2000 years old, is investigated, and the related Calvatia utriformis is reported for the first time in archaeological excavations from one of these sites. The circumstances of their discovery at two of these sites (Skara Brae and Vindolanda) strongly suggest that they did not arrive there fortuitously. The puff-balls are considered to have been used as haemostatic agents and/or as tinder. A detailed morphological comparison of early specimens with present-day material is made.

Joseph Banks at Skara Brae and Stennis, Orkney, 1772

AMONG Banks’s many activities still awaiting professional assessment, his archaeological undertakings are not the least important. At his home, Revesby Abbey, on the edge of the fens near Boston in Lincolnshire, were two tumuli some 300 feet long and half as broad which had been opened before his time but must have excited his curiosity as a boy; in a visit to the west of England when he was twenty-four years old he recorded tumuli near Eastbury, (1) and later that same year he described the careful excavation of a Beaker tomb in South Wales. His methods were greatly in advance of those current at the time. There are many references to archaeological investigations in his later papers and diaries; the most important of these are surely the accounts of the opening of the tombs at Skara Brae on the Links of Skail, and the plans of that area and of the stones of Stennis made in the late autumn of 1772 on his return from Iceland and the Hebrides.

Autumn Killing

It is commonly held in the existing literature that prehistoric peoples were compelled to kill off an abnormally high proportion of their livestock in autumn because of a lack of winter fodder. There is literary evidence for autumn killing in several European localities (n. 1). It is therefore a plausible assumption that earlier cultures are hardly less likely to have been more successful in overcoming this difficulty. This article is concerned to examine whether this assumption is valid.The inference generally made about autumn killing rests almost entirely on Watson’s report on the Skara Brae bones (n. 2). By the use of Watson’s method such a claim may also be made for the Old Sleaford sheep, and this is shown here. But there are grounds for supposing that such a claim is methodologically unjustified, and we have endeavoured to set out a method by which such claims may be tested.

Pins and the Chronology of Brochs

Prehistorians have unreservedly extended the Early Iron Age in territories north of the Roman Empire to include, in addition to a pre-Roman Iron Age, a Roman Iron Age during which the native barbarism evolved without a break though not unaffected by the Empire. That a Late Iron Age continued in Scotland, as in Scandinavia, during post-Roman times has been less readily realized. Professor Childe nominally ended his Prehistory of Scotland with the 4th century A.D. and spoke of an unbridged chasm thereafter, four or five centuries long, to which few and undecisive relics were attributable. The extent of archaeological perplexity 30 years ago was such that J. G. Callander maintained that Skara Brae represented the same Iron Age culture as the brochs and earth-houses. Following the studies of brochs and wheel-houses by Lindsay Scott and Lethbridge, which agreed that they formed a single culture datable to the first three centuries A.D., the latter wrote recently that the culture of the Western Isles between the 3rd century and the 9th ‘is completely unknown and I think unsought’.

Recent Acquisitions by the British Museum

IN the announcement of the additions to the archæological and ethnographical collections of the British Museum (Bloomsbury) during the past month it is stated that the antiquities from Skara Brae, Orkney, which were deposited in the collections on loan in 1933 have now been given to the Museum by the owner, Mr. Walter G. Grant. It will be remembered thatthis site was excavated by Prof. Gordon Childe, whose careful investigation of this remarkable prehistoric town, or village, revealed a picture of early culture so complete as to constitute on its primitive scale something in the nature of a 'Knossos' of the north. Among other antiquities accruing to the Museum are the remarkable and important collections of bronze knives, spear-heads and bracelets, gold ornaments and pottery acquired by Sir Leonard Woolley in his excavations at Atchana in Syria, including pottery imported from Cyprus and Mycense, as well as local ware of about 1650–1450 B.C. in imitation of Cretan pottery of Minoan type. The National Art Collections Fund has given a slab from the stone balustrade of a staircase of the palace at Persepolis, dating from the reign of Darius the Great or Xerxes, somewhere between 520 and 460 B.C. It is carved in relief with the figure of a human-headed lion, winged and wearing a horned headdress. The Christy Trustees have presented a fine and important group of Peruvian pottery from the southern coastal area of Peru in the neighbourhood of Nasca. This Nasca ware, now thought to date fromabout 200 B.C. to A.D. 200 is an early, though not the earliest, formof Peruvian prehistoric pottery, and is distinguished by the variety of colouring and the fineness of line of its painted decoration.

REVIEWS

La Science du Droit Positif, By Jean Defroidmont. Eusebius Paniphili: A study of the Man and His writings. Five Essays by F. J. Foakes‐Jackson.Broadcast Minds. By Fr. Ronald Knox. Skara Brae. A Pictish Village in Orknry. By Professor V. Gordon Childe Smith, B.Litt., etc. With Chaptrrs by Professor T. H. Bryce and Profrssor D. M. S, Watson, F.R.S.Render Unto Caesar. By Margot Robert Adamson.GRAMOPHONE

The Skara Brae Village in Orkney

The Skara Brae Village in Orkney

Skara Brae, a Pictish Village in Orkney. By V. Gordon Childe.

Previous articleNext article No AccessBook ReviewsSkara Brae, a Pictish Village in Orkney. By V. Gordon Childe.George Grant MacCurdyGeorge Grant MacCurdy Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by American Journal of Archaeology Volume 36, Number 2April–June 1932 The journal of the Archaeological Institute of America Views: 2Total views on this site Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.2307/498659 Views: 2Total views on this site Copyright © 1932 by the Archaeological Institute of America. All rights reserved.PDF download Crossref reports no articles citing this article.

SKARA BRAE: a Pictish Village in Orkney. By V. Gordon Childe, B. LITT., With chapters by Prof. T. H. Bryce, F.R.S. and Prof. D. M. S. Watson, F.R.S. Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co., 1931. pp. xiii, 208, with 60 plates and 24 figs., plans and sections. 31s 6d.

SKARA BRAE: a Pictish Village in Orkney. <i>By</i> V. Gordon Childe, B. LITT., With chapters by Prof. T. H. Bryce, F.R.S. and Prof. D. M. S. Watson, F.R.S. <i>Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner &amp; Co.</i>, 1931. pp. xiii, 208, <i>with</i> 60 <i>plates and</i> 24 <i>figs.</i>, <i>plans and sections</i>. 31<i>s</i> 6<i>d</i>.

Prehistoric Cornish Village

RECENT excavations in the prehistoric village of Chrysauster, ten miles from Penzance, under the Ancient Monuments Branch of the Board of Works, have added considerably to the evidence bearing on the age and character of one of the most interesting of ‘British’ settlements. The exploration of the large house opened up by Mr. T. D. Kendrick in 1928 has been completed; two houses untouched by previous explorers have been completely excavated, and the round walls and floors uncovered by Borlase in 1873 and J. B. Cornish in 1897 have been cleared. This settlement, of which eight houses remain overground, with the remnant of its covered pathway of approach, entered by a granite arch, strongly recalls Skara Brae in the Orkneys, which has recently been excavated by Prof. Gordon Childe. The resemblance of the structures to those of Skara Brae is noted by the writer of an article on Chrysauster which appeared in the Times of Jan. 23; but the author would appear to be imperfectly acquainted with the character of the former site. He is in error in regarding Chrysauster as the only known example of prehistoric houses filing along either side of what is apparently a village street, for this arrangement is one of the most characteristic features of Skara Brae. The northern site is more primitive in character, and undoubtedly earlier than Chrysauster, of which the occupation is now dated by the pottery at from about the first century B.C. to the second century A.D. Some of the pottery suggests coarse imitation of contemporary Roman ware. The inhabitants were in part agriculturists, as is indicated by the lynchets behind the village, and, in all probability, tin-streamers. Tin-slag and lumps of shapeless iron have been found, but little else indicative of the character of the material culture.

Final Report on the Operations at Skara Brae

Final report on excavations of the stone-built Neolithic settlement. Work focussed on areas south and west of the 'Market Place', middens, drains and huts, some of which had been deliberately abandoned. The phases of occupation are considered in detail. Finds included decorated pottery, celts, hammerstones and a variety of stone tools. Two intrusive cist burials were discovered. Includes detailed reports on animal bones and human remains.

Notes on (1) Certain Prehistoric Relics from Orkney, and (2) Skara Brae: Its Culture and its Period

A report on a range of artefacts, mostly unprovenanced, including flint arrowheads, scrapers, axes, knives. pottery, stone axes and hammers and a carved stone ball. In relation to occupation at Skara Brae the author argues for an Iron Age rather than a Neolithic one.

Operations at Skara Brae during 1929

Report on second season of excavation at the stone-built 'village' notable for the recovery of large numbers of carved stones. Work demonstrated that occupation was long lived, and a separate industrial area was identified.

Provisional Report on the Excavations at Skara Brae, and on Finds from the 1927 and 1928 Campaigns

Further excavation and stabilisation of the stone buildings revealed several thousand bone objects including beads, animal teeth and needles. A large midden deposit contained animal bones, limpet shells, ashes, cracked stones, coarse and very friable potsherds, and various artefacts, including Skail flakes, bone pins and beads. An 'inscribed' slab was found close to the burial of two skeletons. Other finds included vessels of whale bone and stone.

General Remarks on the Dwellings of the Pre-Historic Races in Orkney, with a Special Notice of the Picts' House of Skerrabrae, in the Parish of Sandwick, showing the Present State of the Excavations lately made there

This article discusses brochs and barrows in Orkney with the aim of discovering more about the original inhabitants of Britain. The author speculates on how the age of these structures could be estimated by examining the architectural styles and any artefacts or human remains found during the excavations. The paper then focuses on William Watt’s excavations at Skara Brae, including some features of the structures and some of the finds unearthed on the site such as animal bones.

Notice of Ruins of Ancient Dwellings at Skara, Bay of Skaill, in the Parish of Sandwich, Orkney, recently excavated

This article discusses the buildings and artefacts found at the settlement of Skara Brae, as excavated by Mr William Watt. The author provides the dimensions of the ruined buildings, as well as the details and locations of any items found during the excavation. He also suggests the methods by which some of the artefacts might have been created by the original inhabitants. A list of items found at Skara Brae and illustrations of the site are included.