Friday, November 25, 2005
HARPROO
Harproo is a stream-name, and at the time of my visit a shallow stream proceeded over the present farmtrack down to the beach from the Bu road. This was an old hill dyke seemingly similar in dimensions to that close by Kongarsknowe, being just over a metre deep and approximately 6m across where it meets the shore.Actually I took the Breck footpath from the kirkyard then rushed across the shallowest bit of the Bu burn. On the cliff-top either side the drystone wall is terminated in lichen-covered stones on the order of a metre high. Fairly standard. But sitting on the base of the 'trench' is a stone of a very different character (HY33190413). It is a head higher than any other stones in Orphir. It differs from the other stones in being completely devoid of lichen and having the colouration typical of stones that have been in the vicinity of a farmyard all the time. I am firmly of the opinion that this is HY30SW 11, the Bu of Orphir standing stone, transplanted. With the other stones it has several 'loose' modern gates roped across. This stone is 1.9m high and 0.2m thick, is 0.6m across the base (which appears to be stone-packed) tapering to 0.3m at the top.
The site of HY30SW 16 is in the area shown by by Johnston on the two maps between p.12-3 & 14-15 of his private printing, to both of which he has added the name Harproo in the relevant position - it is depicted as a square structure/foundations on the second of these. By the field border of the Bu boundary in the 1980's were found N/S aligned rectangular foundations with cross-wall (HY332042), near the shoreline. This is being eroded where it meets high tide.Though I was ignorant of it at the time my photos reveal I probably have Yarproo in the cliff close to the E terminal stone as several stones about half a metre below the cliff-top in an area about a metre across and ?under half deep.
It is simpler to come down the farmtrack. At the road end is a similar arrangement of two stones aligned plus a third slightly away. As all these are similar it is my guess that the farm stone could have been a replacement for one swept out to sea. My impression is that the W margin of the track is more like the original ?prehistoric bank would have been, but I have not yet walked the track.
FIVE HILLOCKS, RASHEYBURN
To some early antiquarians The Five Hillocks (according to RCAHMS NMRS record no. HY40NE 4 the five in the NW corner of the site at HY45980536) were the Circle of Loda mentioned in the now largely discredited poems of Ossian. But archaeological survey found a kidney-shaped site of eight mounds, one lobe smaller than the other where there was report of a break in the surrounding bank. All have been excavated at some time unknown. In one the depression extends down to the base and exposes a small edge-set earthfast slab that could represent a cist. Since the first report one barrow has been lost, and at the time of the second report the southernmost was going the same way. The bank is spread low about 10' across, the mounds are up to 7' high and 15-40' across.
The site can be approached by the track to the right of Fernbank on the road to Holm. On my second visit I saw that the barred wooden gate merely lay across the fence, ingress lies by a middling height 'Orkney gate'. They're making these things taller and tighter but I got by just moving the top a little. Didn't want to lay the thing down in case it became tangled - if you do the same take into account the barbwire around the fencepost (I wondered what the scratching noise was !). The closest I could approachfrom this field was the mounds' field boundary, there will be a way in but it looks as if that would involve a lot of 'going around the houses' as I can see no convenient trackway (from the main road leastways). I was intrigued by the amount of stone protruding from the ground in various alignments as I traversed the wide trackway. Fortunately the site is very close to the fieldfence. This runs at 35 degrees west of north. From here the view runs from mound 5 in the RCAHM's 1946 inventory at the extreme left to the barely perceptible mound 3 at the right. The individual item that first strikes one is where a large area of stones is exposed. Nearer to there is a layer of what appears to be dark earth above the stones. But though the site in general bears a resemblance to the Grimsquoy mound/s near the airport by the Sands of Wideford, which has been call a burnt mound, it is too great a distance from the Rashieburn itself to be one. However of more obvious importance is something that the last archaeological report did not mention so must have been exposed since then. In a mound to the left of the one just mentioned is a very short length of drystane-walling two stones long and four or so courses high. A few metres to the righ, apparently in another mound from my limited perspective, there is another stone at the level of the upper course. Perhaps a continuation. As with Grimsquoy one has to wonder what the number of mounds was originally, were there once more, have there been additions to a lesser number or a sub-division of such ?
Harproo is a stream-name, and at the time of my visit a shallow stream proceeded over the present farmtrack down to the beach from the Bu road. This was an old hill dyke seemingly similar in dimensions to that close by Kongarsknowe, being just over a metre deep and approximately 6m across where it meets the shore.Actually I took the Breck footpath from the kirkyard then rushed across the shallowest bit of the Bu burn. On the cliff-top either side the drystone wall is terminated in lichen-covered stones on the order of a metre high. Fairly standard. But sitting on the base of the 'trench' is a stone of a very different character (HY33190413). It is a head higher than any other stones in Orphir. It differs from the other stones in being completely devoid of lichen and having the colouration typical of stones that have been in the vicinity of a farmyard all the time. I am firmly of the opinion that this is HY30SW 11, the Bu of Orphir standing stone, transplanted. With the other stones it has several 'loose' modern gates roped across. This stone is 1.9m high and 0.2m thick, is 0.6m across the base (which appears to be stone-packed) tapering to 0.3m at the top.
The site of HY30SW 16 is in the area shown by by Johnston on the two maps between p.12-3 & 14-15 of his private printing, to both of which he has added the name Harproo in the relevant position - it is depicted as a square structure/foundations on the second of these. By the field border of the Bu boundary in the 1980's were found N/S aligned rectangular foundations with cross-wall (HY332042), near the shoreline. This is being eroded where it meets high tide.Though I was ignorant of it at the time my photos reveal I probably have Yarproo in the cliff close to the E terminal stone as several stones about half a metre below the cliff-top in an area about a metre across and ?under half deep.
It is simpler to come down the farmtrack. At the road end is a similar arrangement of two stones aligned plus a third slightly away. As all these are similar it is my guess that the farm stone could have been a replacement for one swept out to sea. My impression is that the W margin of the track is more like the original ?prehistoric bank would have been, but I have not yet walked the track.
FIVE HILLOCKS, RASHEYBURN
To some early antiquarians The Five Hillocks (according to RCAHMS NMRS record no. HY40NE 4 the five in the NW corner of the site at HY45980536) were the Circle of Loda mentioned in the now largely discredited poems of Ossian. But archaeological survey found a kidney-shaped site of eight mounds, one lobe smaller than the other where there was report of a break in the surrounding bank. All have been excavated at some time unknown. In one the depression extends down to the base and exposes a small edge-set earthfast slab that could represent a cist. Since the first report one barrow has been lost, and at the time of the second report the southernmost was going the same way. The bank is spread low about 10' across, the mounds are up to 7' high and 15-40' across.
The site can be approached by the track to the right of Fernbank on the road to Holm. On my second visit I saw that the barred wooden gate merely lay across the fence, ingress lies by a middling height 'Orkney gate'. They're making these things taller and tighter but I got by just moving the top a little. Didn't want to lay the thing down in case it became tangled - if you do the same take into account the barbwire around the fencepost (I wondered what the scratching noise was !). The closest I could approachfrom this field was the mounds' field boundary, there will be a way in but it looks as if that would involve a lot of 'going around the houses' as I can see no convenient trackway (from the main road leastways). I was intrigued by the amount of stone protruding from the ground in various alignments as I traversed the wide trackway. Fortunately the site is very close to the fieldfence. This runs at 35 degrees west of north. From here the view runs from mound 5 in the RCAHM's 1946 inventory at the extreme left to the barely perceptible mound 3 at the right. The individual item that first strikes one is where a large area of stones is exposed. Nearer to there is a layer of what appears to be dark earth above the stones. But though the site in general bears a resemblance to the Grimsquoy mound/s near the airport by the Sands of Wideford, which has been call a burnt mound, it is too great a distance from the Rashieburn itself to be one. However of more obvious importance is something that the last archaeological report did not mention so must have been exposed since then. In a mound to the left of the one just mentioned is a very short length of drystane-walling two stones long and four or so courses high. A few metres to the righ, apparently in another mound from my limited perspective, there is another stone at the level of the upper course. Perhaps a continuation. As with Grimsquoy one has to wonder what the number of mounds was originally, were there once more, have there been additions to a lesser number or a sub-division of such ?
ORPHIR Oct-Nov 2005
Researching in the Orkney Room I chanced to overhear staff taliking about something going on at the Earl's Bu in Orphir so had to go and see what. This turned into the first of 3 more trips to the parish. This blog is a product of all three treated as one
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WHITE MOSS TO NEARHOUSE
In James Omond once he has left the Mill of Kirbister he talks of the main Orphir road passing through a region of “fairies, ghosts, and goblins” called White Moss. Which makes me think of Markstone Moss elsewhere and wonder if the site of that name is misplaced rather than gone, people having a habit of confusing an area named with the usually far smaller area where the legend resides on the map (or alternately with tiny sites looking on the wrong end of the legend !). How wonderfully the walking mind wanders.
After you pass the Germiston road junction there is a permanent pool of water roadside occupying a rectangular hole. The 1882 map shows nothing there and you can see no rock to make it a quarry. Its presence unremarked annoys me - is it something missed off the earliest map or where a WW2.building had been ? The negative impression of some construction set deeply into the ground being wholly removed certainly. Just along from this I see for the first time the obscure evidence for a circular earthwork. On several previous visits I have looked for James Omond's "old circular building... almost level with the ground" where Johnston's map places it. Finally I realize that this is wrong, for it places both that and the Graystane between the main and mill roads whereas "The Book of Orphir" places them securely either side of the main road. And so this must surely be Cursiter's possible hillfort after all. From it came many curious stones, chief among which was the muller for a saddle quern [the moving top stone]. This had at its back several grooves to fit the fingers in and must have looked mighty fine.
Before reaching the Swanbister junction there is a gate allowing access to the Greystane field. It is slightly rusty and secured with a rope, so be extra careful climbing over. The stone is very carefully shaped. In fact someone has said this can't be a standing stone because it has straight lines and nice angles (recently a real archaeologist at a public event said you can tell proper standing stones because they are larger than 'straining posts'. Which would rule out a significant proportion of the officially recognised ones !). If this had been an erratic someone would have had to erect it, it didn't get this way by itself. The shoulder has obviously been created in fairly modern times, archaeologically speaking. Perhaps when the modern main road was created (the track of the mill road being the obvious original way) it was desired to split it up for carting away but proved too hard. Another possibility is that someone thought to create two slighter posts out of it for use elsewhere and was similarly balked. Certainly this would produce the fat square-section stone fenceposts seen elsewhere in Orkney - there seems to have been a fashion for them at one time, and I can see no antiquity in these.
Next I went back and passed the ruin of Sweanabow (not named for another Bu district as bow here is used for agricultural land held in common or possibly a cattle parc). As I made for the corner E corner of the field there was an area (east of the building and nearer the burn) of damp spongy ground that I take to be what is left of the well shown on the 1882 map at HY35810628 : the one on the modern map further up at HY35720636 does not appear on that - actually I must confess I initially identified a short rectangular cutout along the edge of the bank lower down as this well. Continuing I struck across to the burn that runs down from the road and followed up the west bank. By the corner is a triple watercourse junction and one tall stone in one of the fences there. Coming up I came firstly to a depression alongside the stream, roughly rectangular and seeming man-made, which I tentatively identified with a well as noted above. Next I came to where the larger of two broad flat bridges cross the channel. Leading up to it is what remains of a wallbank of fairly large stone blocks lining the east bank and a few stones my side. It stands two or so feet high and over the original a big slab of concrete has been placed to enable tractors to cross, but underneath the traffic has caused the blocks to start falling apart. After this comes the point at which the burn turns slightly and there are two fencepost-sized stones in a short angled stretch in the barbwire fence by the east bank. The northern one looks to stand alone but that to the south has plenty of packing with a couple of feet of ? submerged fieldwall projecting downhill a little lower than that. Looking across at the two I saw two small horizontal rocks by a cut. My thought was that this was a feeder channel. Later when I went to the other side, however, I saw it to be a closed off depression a foot or more deep with at least two slabs inside, a thin one presently upright. I think this narrow almost slot has to be what is down as a well on the modern O.S. Nearer the road is the second bridge, simply one large thin stone slab fairly low over the water. Above this are two modern erect stones on either side of the burn, which continues under the road through an unremarkable 'modern' channel.
Then I walked along the uphill boundary and across the shallow hump that is the glacial till opposite Highbreck. Facing Highbreck the steatite cremation urn came from the continuation of this that the house sits on, from somewhere on the left. Next feature along is another channel under the road, with an erect stone on its left. It is multi-period. There is the original drystane tunnel with a couple of erect slabs in front like the low 'passage' before the Hillhead of Scapa well (only without the back wall of course). Then coming from the two slabs are concrete sides and end over which a big rusty iron pipe runs. There is another such pipe in front of the channel entrance which ends clean cut a few inches from the erect stone. Now I headed to the muddy way through to the next field, gated by two erect stones in slightly different alignments. The southern one is at a major field junction and perhaps these downhill areas are of a field system before what are called the 'improvements' of the latter half of the second millenium. Lastly I went across to the Smoogro road junction. Here there are three erect stones on the west side. The main road and side road ones are rounded and have lichen like the rest in these fields. The middle one is obviously a (comparatively) recent addition; slightly darker, all straight edges (tho' still tapering), and devoid of a certain naturalness.
Could go no further, so retraced my steps. At the Swanbister junction there are the dwellings of Nearhouse, apparently absent (there are a few dots in the track complex) in their entirety from the 1882 map like Highbreck. An uncultivated triangle of land roadside here once turned up a cist. There now is a small jumble of ?stone/slabs that could be taken for this but surely would have been noted if 'twere and so must be a mere simulacra. I'd love to enter this peedie patch of land for a closer look simply on the off chance, but it gives off unmade garden vibes vis-à-vis the cottage close by.
ORPHIR VILLAGE TO HARPROO
Approaching Orphir village there is a fine old church on the left, with excellent seats and calm garden for the partaking of your piece (sarnies etc.) behind. This is the junction that leads to Gyre and the Viking Heritage Centre whotsit. Below the church building work has started, no' even foundations yet. They've dug big holes alongside the road for services. Here large flags have been exposed that I would love to be something but obviously is not (then, farmers now when they stick in grant-funded fences seem to knock pieces out of the old walls and occasionally even uproot them completely, and yet in Orkney we are lucky enough to have some drystane walls going back to the Neolithic - now we are losing all our history). Along the road I saw one of my favourite archaeologists and, I thought, a couple with an interest in the Vikings. Which seemed to confirm the game was afoot. Still time to see what so I left the Bu till later.
As you go down the old King's Highroad towards Gyre you can see Konger's Knowe on the left a couple of field's away from the road, so I decided to essay that first.
Unfortunately the old field dyke boundary is a formidable obstacle still, broad and deep and mired in vegetation, so I had to content myself with standing on top of the almost buried wall this side of the dyke. On trying to find a way further down I thought I was in luck when I saw two tall stones across the dyke, but though I thought there were other materials there I could not see through the plants. Only after I came back did I realise that this was the old gate in the boundary referred to by Johnston (HY34440489) else I would certainly have taken preliminary photos and measurements. I had not expected an actual physical entity surviving to now. Think of a farm gate using middling standing stones for posts only with a width nearer to that of a domestic garden gate - the stones stand 1.1m spaced 1.3m apart, whilst in Orkney farmgateposts are either 2.4m or in the region of 3.6-4m. There's an outside chance that Johnston was wrong and grind could mean 'green field', however this would make for a massive coincidences. All the gaps in the old Evie hill-dyke were called slaps but that is way over in East Mainland and a matter of culture and/or a different kind of feature.
So I struck back across the line that connects to the bit of road that goes over Gyre. This line is an old track and submerged ?fieldwalls, perhaps a bank too.
Above the stackyard of Gyre is the findspot (HY340047) at "the crown of the breck" for what A.W. Johnston called 'chambered cinerary urns', a term which Anne Brundle of the Orkney Museum thinks was used at the time to describe cists with divisions. I expected nothing, the modern road cutting through the farmtracks that were. So I was surprised to find that this section, the piece of road between the stackyard and the drystane fieldwall, had not been taken for fields. Amazingly it is still unenclosed, occupying an area several metres in either direction that lies between the section of road above the stackyard and the field boundary walls. There are a few stones connected but these appear to be the top of a mostly buried wall. So at least for know the site is preserved for the future. There is what seems to be a spoil heap, stones buried in and on the earth. Strange the way the modern materials are by the roadside end as once you climb up on it older stuff becomes apparent. Doubtful this comes from the original excavations even so ?
It can be no coincidence that in 1972 a double cist HY30SW 12 was found by the stackyard the other side of the road (HY34090464). This held four skulls in the SE
compartment and another in the NW ! Seeing the distance between here and the stackyard in person I see no reason why this could not be a small cemetery like
Queenafiold. But presuming Anne's memory is certain why so many of this specific type ?? On my last visit I thought I finally had the cist's location pegged, the relevant side of said stackyard being the smaller side road that has cottages along it. I went up and down carefully, to no avail. Then I chanced to look under a small 'recent' concrete ?watertower in a tiny 'field' and saw some kind of hole. Here there are a few small modern blocks. Also several thin slabs lying about the shallow grassed up depression. Couldn't really make out anything clear, not even anything I could really photograph for reference. Looked possible surely. Unfortunately upon looking up the record card I saw the tractor driver had dug the find from a bank, no mention of tower construction. So I am still flapping. If it ain't this it could still be from one of the 'chambered cinerary urns' perhaps.
Now I chose a better route for my re-discovered tumulus: going back up the road I entered the quarry field (used for building the slab fences hereabouts in the early to mid-19th century) and went diagonally. At the opposite corner (whose 'Orkney gate' is thankfully down) there is an ornamental gatepost of impressive size that led once to a since-vanished dwelling (as did others of the type uphill from Gyre). I call it a phase 1 type, which is conical and of drystone construction. Phase 2 is constructed the same but cuboid. Phase 3 the construction changes to stone blocks. Then they become smaller or are made of modern materials, no thoughts on which concept comes first. Could be totally wrong of course !
From there I at last walked across into the Kongarsknowe field. There is a large circular pool of water by the lower half of the turf-covered mound, probably in a natural depression. What was most necessary was to find out the knowe's composition. Even from afar I had seen exposed bits. Looked like the usual earth with a few small stones. Only up real close did this reveal itself to be mostly ?decayed rock, probably sandstone. Though there appeared to be no signs of structure I cannot believe this to be a (wholly) natural mound. Unable to tell its shape and there was too much wind for the tape measure. It paced out to about 70m around the steeper, unploughed, main bit. From here the mound slopes more gradually until it peters out somewhat over 90m circumference. The central portion (? rocky core) is well over two meters high (possibly three) and the 'base' another metre below that. On my second visit I took measure of the site. It covers an area 35~37m in diameter but the 'core' is not circular, being 29m long and 17½m across the upper mound. The pond behind it is 35m maximum diameter, making the depression the same size as the knowe. Which is surely significant of something.
Johnston marks its first appearance on paper to 1797. Then likely about the time the slab fences were being built by Fortescue of Swanbister (as reported in "The Farmers Journal" of February 1877) according to "Old Lore Miscellany..." he wished to investigate the Fairy-brae of Congesquoy" but was warned by James Flett in Lerquoy not to dig this "old landmark". Marwick in his book on field-names says that the Congesquoy near the Bu of Cairston probably indicated a quoy acquired by an earl. Here the Upper and Lower Congesquoy appear late and IIRC are within the commonalty. However Johnston's 1820 map shows Congasquoy (sic) to the other side of the dividing line, and Kongar instead means ' king's farm ' (as in Consgar).
Going down the hill there is Gear Field to the left whose previously seperate roadside half was called at various times in the past Norquoy and Church Field. In the lower quadrant (HY338045) foundations, stone implements, bones & ashes have been found. Johnston's map has a Maseygate 'church road' from the Bu farm area ending at the lower wall where the Bu boundary is.
The Viking interpretation centre is open most of the time and comes in useful for ablutions and such, I know of nowhere else in Orphir for the distraught walker to gain relief. A good place to visit besides. No sign in the region of any vehicles or archaeological bodies when I went there. I took the Breck footpath from the Round Church and by the shore there was a rectangle impression in the pebble beach against the shore that was certainly the result of digging. But with no-one and nothing around I assume nothing remotely official - my big ears had led me astray.
Looking to west I could see across a gap in the low cliff a group of fair-sized erect stones. Nothing ventured, nothing gained, I rushed right across the shallowest bit of the Bu burn in order to reach the site. The name that I have for this area is Harproo. This is a stream-name, and so it is no surprise that a shallow stream proceedsover the present farmtrack down to the beach from the Bu road (it is simpler to come down the farmtrack). This was an old hill dyke seemingly similar in dimensions to that close by Kongarsknowe, being just over a metre deep and approximately 6m across where it meets the shore. My impression is that the W margin of the track is more like the original ?prehistoric bank would have been, but I have not yet walked the track. On the cliff-top either side the drystane shore wall is terminated in lichen-covered stones on the order of a metre high. Fairly standard. But sitting on the base of the 'trench' is a stone of a very different character (HY33190413). It stands a head higher than any other stones in Orphir. It differs from the other stones in being completely devoid of lichen and having the colouration typical of stones that have been in the vicinity of a farmyard all the time. I am firmly of the opinion that this is HY30SW 11, the Bu of Orphir standing stone, transplanted. With the other stones it has several 'loose' modern gates roped across. This stone is 1.9m high and 0.2m thick, is 0.6m across the base (which appears to be stone-packed) tapering to 0.3m at the top. At the Bu road end of the track is a similar arrangement of two stones aligned plus a third slightly away. It is my guess that the farm stone could have been a replacement for one swept out to sea.
RCAHMS NMRS no. HY30SW 16 at HY332042 is by the same field border of the Bu boundary. In the 1980's N/S aligned rectangular foundations with cross-wall were found near the shoreline. An alternative name for the site is the Kirkyard, being traditionally a chapel and graveyard. The area is being eroded where it meets high tide and - though I was ignorant of it at the time my photos reveal in the cliff close to the E terminal stone several stones about half a metre below the cliff-top in an area about a metre across and ?under half deep. Johnston reports bones and large stones coming from here. Unless it be multi-period I am not entirely convinced of its attribution, Harproo means 'stream of the heap' and the suposed chapel site over near the Hillock of Breakna broch is the also ambiguously named Cairns of Piggar. On the other hand the foundations could always be unconnected with the other remains.
My ignorance of the tides stopped me going further around to the Head of Banks. Here Johnston shows Corn Goes (i.e. geo), the Courting Hole, and Black Goe. Near the first of these three he notes (HY332039) two small stones near the cliff edge as gravestones and the former presence of two more stones held to be for gallow sockets. It strikes me that one or both of these sites could (have) been the remains of a settlement similar to the Covenanters Graves in Tankerness. Further around the headland an earthwork appears on his map. This appears near the legend Tooacks of Oddi but doesn't definitely name it. Tuacks may be natural knolls on the side of hills or artificial mounds, sometimes called towers. All this headland for 2006 to investigate.
CAIRNTON TO SCORRA DALE
Back up on the road as you leave Orphir village behind there is a house called Cairnton on the left that doesn't appear on the 1882 map, though as with other places that does not mean the placename itself did not exist then. Good construction, decent grounds, surrounded by several ages of wall. My interest is piqued by the high western wall, that facing Scorradale. There is a stone hut inside the grounds with its back wall there. Strange thing is that the wall surrounding the grounds incorporates this but the hut wall is its own thing and so must have come before. House>hut>wall or hut>house is the sticking point in my interpretation despite that all fits so neatly now. As I am typing this up I am of a sudden reminded of the hut in the Tankerness House Garden's wall in Tankerness Lane, lately demolished.
By the LH side of the Scorradale junction is the enclosed steep-ended gar that looks to have been the ornament of a big hoose before it became overgrown. Going up the hill at the lower side of the way in a short erect stone ends flush a remaining section of drystane wall. And at right-angles a matter of inches away is a less rounded stone of similar dimensions sitting solitary. Apparently.
At the top of the hill is a popular viewpoint, with rough paths meandering aimlessly nowadays either side of the roadway. Going over the brow my attention has often been taken by a mound with garden plants sitting off the road in a hollow, like the remains of a dwelling on its own tump. This time I climbed of the roadway, after some yards up over a definite bank carefully into the depression. Alas after crawling over the man-height mound there were still no distinguishing features, so this would appear to be connected with the 1:25,000's disused quarry hereabouts, presumably its dump.
Furtherdown the hillside is an earthwork (HY316056) between Crumbrecks and the Scorradale road that looks more promising. Big lowish mound not far from the road ,with banks surrounding a large rectangular-looking interior, several bumps and some stone exposed. Can't find an easy way in. Back home this appears to be of 'modern' origin, another quarry shown on the 1882 map. Sigh.
Next up is the electricity sub-station junction. Pausing to look at the bridge next to it on the downhill side at the streamside edge of the field (HY31540580) I saw one rainy day a very exposed 'straining stone', flat edge aligned with the bank and feet practically dabbling in the water. The area of the stone visible from the road is 1.6m by 0.35-0.4m, with half-a-metre of this being below field level. There is a piece of packing the full width of the field side of it. Taking into account the concrete and wire about it it is difficult to understand how the stone stays vertical rather than being dragged fieldward, unless there be much lower packing hidden on the ditch side, taking its height down to the ditch bottom to 1.95m. It doesn't form the end of a drystane wall even though there is perhaps one overgrown under the roadside field boundary. I can see no markings present.
I saw a fallen brown stone that could mean this is the remains of a 'standing stone fence'.
The other presently standing stone (HY31510589) is near to the Glenrae farmroad junction. It is smaller than the other at 0.9m x 0.3m but resembles it in the only apparent packing slab being on the fieldward side. It is a possible candidate for the Giant's Thumb despite being down in Scorra Dale rather than actually up on Gruf/Ruff Hill. On the downhill side there is a notable concavity along the edge, as well as a few lesser curves on the uphill side, the latter ?natural flaking. When I fell back the right distance and held up my hand so that my thumb was placed appropriately the palm base of my fingers fell naturally at the other edge.
On the 1:25,000 there are two hills above Glenrae, namely Croy Hill then Gruf Hill. It is Johnston's calling the latter Ruff Hill that gives me room to think the Giant's Thumb did not lay where his map shows it. From the Scorradale road I cannot tell which of these hills is on the horizon. This hillside is strewn with small boulders that probably relate scorra to scouring. On my last visit there were large white blotches visible way up near the ridge. My thoughts ran to giant sheep or an unusual breed of kie. Zooming in showd the to be instead much larger boulders sticking out the hillside. The map shows some kind of track going along the SE side of the hills, but it looks like a bit much of a yomp even so. If only I had a better fix on the giant's stone (a failed throw at Hoy from Rousay), presuming my identification only simulacrum, it would surely lie here as lure in lieu.
Coming back down into Orphir main there is a magnificent vista spread out before you, with Kongarsknowe highly visible. I could see that as I neared the junction the hills over the Flow would frame it - walking the road below the Hill of Midland the top of it is often on a level with the hilltops across the water. Strangely, soon after you leave the hill base the knowe disappears from view - you can't see the mound from anywhere near Orphir village, only from some some places well down the road to Gyre does the mound show itself again. Imagine my amazement on finding that from the Scorradale junction itself there is the effect of it being part of a meniscus, the illusion being that Kongarsknowe is in a declivity whilst the top of the mound is dead level with the top of the hills across the water. Like the depiction of the eye as an eyeball within a lens. I'm not sure if this is a deliberate placement and my one photo failed to do it justice as perceived.
Researching in the Orkney Room I chanced to overhear staff taliking about something going on at the Earl's Bu in Orphir so had to go and see what. This turned into the first of 3 more trips to the parish. This blog is a product of all three treated as one
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WHITE MOSS TO NEARHOUSE
In James Omond once he has left the Mill of Kirbister he talks of the main Orphir road passing through a region of “fairies, ghosts, and goblins” called White Moss. Which makes me think of Markstone Moss elsewhere and wonder if the site of that name is misplaced rather than gone, people having a habit of confusing an area named with the usually far smaller area where the legend resides on the map (or alternately with tiny sites looking on the wrong end of the legend !). How wonderfully the walking mind wanders.
After you pass the Germiston road junction there is a permanent pool of water roadside occupying a rectangular hole. The 1882 map shows nothing there and you can see no rock to make it a quarry. Its presence unremarked annoys me - is it something missed off the earliest map or where a WW2.building had been ? The negative impression of some construction set deeply into the ground being wholly removed certainly. Just along from this I see for the first time the obscure evidence for a circular earthwork. On several previous visits I have looked for James Omond's "old circular building... almost level with the ground" where Johnston's map places it. Finally I realize that this is wrong, for it places both that and the Graystane between the main and mill roads whereas "The Book of Orphir" places them securely either side of the main road. And so this must surely be Cursiter's possible hillfort after all. From it came many curious stones, chief among which was the muller for a saddle quern [the moving top stone]. This had at its back several grooves to fit the fingers in and must have looked mighty fine.
Before reaching the Swanbister junction there is a gate allowing access to the Greystane field. It is slightly rusty and secured with a rope, so be extra careful climbing over. The stone is very carefully shaped. In fact someone has said this can't be a standing stone because it has straight lines and nice angles (recently a real archaeologist at a public event said you can tell proper standing stones because they are larger than 'straining posts'. Which would rule out a significant proportion of the officially recognised ones !). If this had been an erratic someone would have had to erect it, it didn't get this way by itself. The shoulder has obviously been created in fairly modern times, archaeologically speaking. Perhaps when the modern main road was created (the track of the mill road being the obvious original way) it was desired to split it up for carting away but proved too hard. Another possibility is that someone thought to create two slighter posts out of it for use elsewhere and was similarly balked. Certainly this would produce the fat square-section stone fenceposts seen elsewhere in Orkney - there seems to have been a fashion for them at one time, and I can see no antiquity in these.
Next I went back and passed the ruin of Sweanabow (not named for another Bu district as bow here is used for agricultural land held in common or possibly a cattle parc). As I made for the corner E corner of the field there was an area (east of the building and nearer the burn) of damp spongy ground that I take to be what is left of the well shown on the 1882 map at HY35810628 : the one on the modern map further up at HY35720636 does not appear on that - actually I must confess I initially identified a short rectangular cutout along the edge of the bank lower down as this well. Continuing I struck across to the burn that runs down from the road and followed up the west bank. By the corner is a triple watercourse junction and one tall stone in one of the fences there. Coming up I came firstly to a depression alongside the stream, roughly rectangular and seeming man-made, which I tentatively identified with a well as noted above. Next I came to where the larger of two broad flat bridges cross the channel. Leading up to it is what remains of a wallbank of fairly large stone blocks lining the east bank and a few stones my side. It stands two or so feet high and over the original a big slab of concrete has been placed to enable tractors to cross, but underneath the traffic has caused the blocks to start falling apart. After this comes the point at which the burn turns slightly and there are two fencepost-sized stones in a short angled stretch in the barbwire fence by the east bank. The northern one looks to stand alone but that to the south has plenty of packing with a couple of feet of ? submerged fieldwall projecting downhill a little lower than that. Looking across at the two I saw two small horizontal rocks by a cut. My thought was that this was a feeder channel. Later when I went to the other side, however, I saw it to be a closed off depression a foot or more deep with at least two slabs inside, a thin one presently upright. I think this narrow almost slot has to be what is down as a well on the modern O.S. Nearer the road is the second bridge, simply one large thin stone slab fairly low over the water. Above this are two modern erect stones on either side of the burn, which continues under the road through an unremarkable 'modern' channel.
Then I walked along the uphill boundary and across the shallow hump that is the glacial till opposite Highbreck. Facing Highbreck the steatite cremation urn came from the continuation of this that the house sits on, from somewhere on the left. Next feature along is another channel under the road, with an erect stone on its left. It is multi-period. There is the original drystane tunnel with a couple of erect slabs in front like the low 'passage' before the Hillhead of Scapa well (only without the back wall of course). Then coming from the two slabs are concrete sides and end over which a big rusty iron pipe runs. There is another such pipe in front of the channel entrance which ends clean cut a few inches from the erect stone. Now I headed to the muddy way through to the next field, gated by two erect stones in slightly different alignments. The southern one is at a major field junction and perhaps these downhill areas are of a field system before what are called the 'improvements' of the latter half of the second millenium. Lastly I went across to the Smoogro road junction. Here there are three erect stones on the west side. The main road and side road ones are rounded and have lichen like the rest in these fields. The middle one is obviously a (comparatively) recent addition; slightly darker, all straight edges (tho' still tapering), and devoid of a certain naturalness.
Could go no further, so retraced my steps. At the Swanbister junction there are the dwellings of Nearhouse, apparently absent (there are a few dots in the track complex) in their entirety from the 1882 map like Highbreck. An uncultivated triangle of land roadside here once turned up a cist. There now is a small jumble of ?stone/slabs that could be taken for this but surely would have been noted if 'twere and so must be a mere simulacra. I'd love to enter this peedie patch of land for a closer look simply on the off chance, but it gives off unmade garden vibes vis-à-vis the cottage close by.
ORPHIR VILLAGE TO HARPROO
Approaching Orphir village there is a fine old church on the left, with excellent seats and calm garden for the partaking of your piece (sarnies etc.) behind. This is the junction that leads to Gyre and the Viking Heritage Centre whotsit. Below the church building work has started, no' even foundations yet. They've dug big holes alongside the road for services. Here large flags have been exposed that I would love to be something but obviously is not (then, farmers now when they stick in grant-funded fences seem to knock pieces out of the old walls and occasionally even uproot them completely, and yet in Orkney we are lucky enough to have some drystane walls going back to the Neolithic - now we are losing all our history). Along the road I saw one of my favourite archaeologists and, I thought, a couple with an interest in the Vikings. Which seemed to confirm the game was afoot. Still time to see what so I left the Bu till later.
As you go down the old King's Highroad towards Gyre you can see Konger's Knowe on the left a couple of field's away from the road, so I decided to essay that first.
Unfortunately the old field dyke boundary is a formidable obstacle still, broad and deep and mired in vegetation, so I had to content myself with standing on top of the almost buried wall this side of the dyke. On trying to find a way further down I thought I was in luck when I saw two tall stones across the dyke, but though I thought there were other materials there I could not see through the plants. Only after I came back did I realise that this was the old gate in the boundary referred to by Johnston (HY34440489) else I would certainly have taken preliminary photos and measurements. I had not expected an actual physical entity surviving to now. Think of a farm gate using middling standing stones for posts only with a width nearer to that of a domestic garden gate - the stones stand 1.1m spaced 1.3m apart, whilst in Orkney farmgateposts are either 2.4m or in the region of 3.6-4m. There's an outside chance that Johnston was wrong and grind could mean 'green field', however this would make for a massive coincidences. All the gaps in the old Evie hill-dyke were called slaps but that is way over in East Mainland and a matter of culture and/or a different kind of feature.
So I struck back across the line that connects to the bit of road that goes over Gyre. This line is an old track and submerged ?fieldwalls, perhaps a bank too.
Above the stackyard of Gyre is the findspot (HY340047) at "the crown of the breck" for what A.W. Johnston called 'chambered cinerary urns', a term which Anne Brundle of the Orkney Museum thinks was used at the time to describe cists with divisions. I expected nothing, the modern road cutting through the farmtracks that were. So I was surprised to find that this section, the piece of road between the stackyard and the drystane fieldwall, had not been taken for fields. Amazingly it is still unenclosed, occupying an area several metres in either direction that lies between the section of road above the stackyard and the field boundary walls. There are a few stones connected but these appear to be the top of a mostly buried wall. So at least for know the site is preserved for the future. There is what seems to be a spoil heap, stones buried in and on the earth. Strange the way the modern materials are by the roadside end as once you climb up on it older stuff becomes apparent. Doubtful this comes from the original excavations even so ?
It can be no coincidence that in 1972 a double cist HY30SW 12 was found by the stackyard the other side of the road (HY34090464). This held four skulls in the SE
compartment and another in the NW ! Seeing the distance between here and the stackyard in person I see no reason why this could not be a small cemetery like
Queenafiold. But presuming Anne's memory is certain why so many of this specific type ?? On my last visit I thought I finally had the cist's location pegged, the relevant side of said stackyard being the smaller side road that has cottages along it. I went up and down carefully, to no avail. Then I chanced to look under a small 'recent' concrete ?watertower in a tiny 'field' and saw some kind of hole. Here there are a few small modern blocks. Also several thin slabs lying about the shallow grassed up depression. Couldn't really make out anything clear, not even anything I could really photograph for reference. Looked possible surely. Unfortunately upon looking up the record card I saw the tractor driver had dug the find from a bank, no mention of tower construction. So I am still flapping. If it ain't this it could still be from one of the 'chambered cinerary urns' perhaps.
Now I chose a better route for my re-discovered tumulus: going back up the road I entered the quarry field (used for building the slab fences hereabouts in the early to mid-19th century) and went diagonally. At the opposite corner (whose 'Orkney gate' is thankfully down) there is an ornamental gatepost of impressive size that led once to a since-vanished dwelling (as did others of the type uphill from Gyre). I call it a phase 1 type, which is conical and of drystone construction. Phase 2 is constructed the same but cuboid. Phase 3 the construction changes to stone blocks. Then they become smaller or are made of modern materials, no thoughts on which concept comes first. Could be totally wrong of course !
From there I at last walked across into the Kongarsknowe field. There is a large circular pool of water by the lower half of the turf-covered mound, probably in a natural depression. What was most necessary was to find out the knowe's composition. Even from afar I had seen exposed bits. Looked like the usual earth with a few small stones. Only up real close did this reveal itself to be mostly ?decayed rock, probably sandstone. Though there appeared to be no signs of structure I cannot believe this to be a (wholly) natural mound. Unable to tell its shape and there was too much wind for the tape measure. It paced out to about 70m around the steeper, unploughed, main bit. From here the mound slopes more gradually until it peters out somewhat over 90m circumference. The central portion (? rocky core) is well over two meters high (possibly three) and the 'base' another metre below that. On my second visit I took measure of the site. It covers an area 35~37m in diameter but the 'core' is not circular, being 29m long and 17½m across the upper mound. The pond behind it is 35m maximum diameter, making the depression the same size as the knowe. Which is surely significant of something.
Johnston marks its first appearance on paper to 1797. Then likely about the time the slab fences were being built by Fortescue of Swanbister (as reported in "The Farmers Journal" of February 1877) according to "Old Lore Miscellany..." he wished to investigate the Fairy-brae of Congesquoy" but was warned by James Flett in Lerquoy not to dig this "old landmark". Marwick in his book on field-names says that the Congesquoy near the Bu of Cairston probably indicated a quoy acquired by an earl. Here the Upper and Lower Congesquoy appear late and IIRC are within the commonalty. However Johnston's 1820 map shows Congasquoy (sic) to the other side of the dividing line, and Kongar instead means ' king's farm ' (as in Consgar).
Going down the hill there is Gear Field to the left whose previously seperate roadside half was called at various times in the past Norquoy and Church Field. In the lower quadrant (HY338045) foundations, stone implements, bones & ashes have been found. Johnston's map has a Maseygate 'church road' from the Bu farm area ending at the lower wall where the Bu boundary is.
The Viking interpretation centre is open most of the time and comes in useful for ablutions and such, I know of nowhere else in Orphir for the distraught walker to gain relief. A good place to visit besides. No sign in the region of any vehicles or archaeological bodies when I went there. I took the Breck footpath from the Round Church and by the shore there was a rectangle impression in the pebble beach against the shore that was certainly the result of digging. But with no-one and nothing around I assume nothing remotely official - my big ears had led me astray.
Looking to west I could see across a gap in the low cliff a group of fair-sized erect stones. Nothing ventured, nothing gained, I rushed right across the shallowest bit of the Bu burn in order to reach the site. The name that I have for this area is Harproo. This is a stream-name, and so it is no surprise that a shallow stream proceedsover the present farmtrack down to the beach from the Bu road (it is simpler to come down the farmtrack). This was an old hill dyke seemingly similar in dimensions to that close by Kongarsknowe, being just over a metre deep and approximately 6m across where it meets the shore. My impression is that the W margin of the track is more like the original ?prehistoric bank would have been, but I have not yet walked the track. On the cliff-top either side the drystane shore wall is terminated in lichen-covered stones on the order of a metre high. Fairly standard. But sitting on the base of the 'trench' is a stone of a very different character (HY33190413). It stands a head higher than any other stones in Orphir. It differs from the other stones in being completely devoid of lichen and having the colouration typical of stones that have been in the vicinity of a farmyard all the time. I am firmly of the opinion that this is HY30SW 11, the Bu of Orphir standing stone, transplanted. With the other stones it has several 'loose' modern gates roped across. This stone is 1.9m high and 0.2m thick, is 0.6m across the base (which appears to be stone-packed) tapering to 0.3m at the top. At the Bu road end of the track is a similar arrangement of two stones aligned plus a third slightly away. It is my guess that the farm stone could have been a replacement for one swept out to sea.
RCAHMS NMRS no. HY30SW 16 at HY332042 is by the same field border of the Bu boundary. In the 1980's N/S aligned rectangular foundations with cross-wall were found near the shoreline. An alternative name for the site is the Kirkyard, being traditionally a chapel and graveyard. The area is being eroded where it meets high tide and - though I was ignorant of it at the time my photos reveal in the cliff close to the E terminal stone several stones about half a metre below the cliff-top in an area about a metre across and ?under half deep. Johnston reports bones and large stones coming from here. Unless it be multi-period I am not entirely convinced of its attribution, Harproo means 'stream of the heap' and the suposed chapel site over near the Hillock of Breakna broch is the also ambiguously named Cairns of Piggar. On the other hand the foundations could always be unconnected with the other remains.
My ignorance of the tides stopped me going further around to the Head of Banks. Here Johnston shows Corn Goes (i.e. geo), the Courting Hole, and Black Goe. Near the first of these three he notes (HY332039) two small stones near the cliff edge as gravestones and the former presence of two more stones held to be for gallow sockets. It strikes me that one or both of these sites could (have) been the remains of a settlement similar to the Covenanters Graves in Tankerness. Further around the headland an earthwork appears on his map. This appears near the legend Tooacks of Oddi but doesn't definitely name it. Tuacks may be natural knolls on the side of hills or artificial mounds, sometimes called towers. All this headland for 2006 to investigate.
CAIRNTON TO SCORRA DALE
Back up on the road as you leave Orphir village behind there is a house called Cairnton on the left that doesn't appear on the 1882 map, though as with other places that does not mean the placename itself did not exist then. Good construction, decent grounds, surrounded by several ages of wall. My interest is piqued by the high western wall, that facing Scorradale. There is a stone hut inside the grounds with its back wall there. Strange thing is that the wall surrounding the grounds incorporates this but the hut wall is its own thing and so must have come before. House>hut>wall or hut>house is the sticking point in my interpretation despite that all fits so neatly now. As I am typing this up I am of a sudden reminded of the hut in the Tankerness House Garden's wall in Tankerness Lane, lately demolished.
By the LH side of the Scorradale junction is the enclosed steep-ended gar that looks to have been the ornament of a big hoose before it became overgrown. Going up the hill at the lower side of the way in a short erect stone ends flush a remaining section of drystane wall. And at right-angles a matter of inches away is a less rounded stone of similar dimensions sitting solitary. Apparently.
At the top of the hill is a popular viewpoint, with rough paths meandering aimlessly nowadays either side of the roadway. Going over the brow my attention has often been taken by a mound with garden plants sitting off the road in a hollow, like the remains of a dwelling on its own tump. This time I climbed of the roadway, after some yards up over a definite bank carefully into the depression. Alas after crawling over the man-height mound there were still no distinguishing features, so this would appear to be connected with the 1:25,000's disused quarry hereabouts, presumably its dump.
Furtherdown the hillside is an earthwork (HY316056) between Crumbrecks and the Scorradale road that looks more promising. Big lowish mound not far from the road ,with banks surrounding a large rectangular-looking interior, several bumps and some stone exposed. Can't find an easy way in. Back home this appears to be of 'modern' origin, another quarry shown on the 1882 map. Sigh.
Next up is the electricity sub-station junction. Pausing to look at the bridge next to it on the downhill side at the streamside edge of the field (HY31540580) I saw one rainy day a very exposed 'straining stone', flat edge aligned with the bank and feet practically dabbling in the water. The area of the stone visible from the road is 1.6m by 0.35-0.4m, with half-a-metre of this being below field level. There is a piece of packing the full width of the field side of it. Taking into account the concrete and wire about it it is difficult to understand how the stone stays vertical rather than being dragged fieldward, unless there be much lower packing hidden on the ditch side, taking its height down to the ditch bottom to 1.95m. It doesn't form the end of a drystane wall even though there is perhaps one overgrown under the roadside field boundary. I can see no markings present.
I saw a fallen brown stone that could mean this is the remains of a 'standing stone fence'.
The other presently standing stone (HY31510589) is near to the Glenrae farmroad junction. It is smaller than the other at 0.9m x 0.3m but resembles it in the only apparent packing slab being on the fieldward side. It is a possible candidate for the Giant's Thumb despite being down in Scorra Dale rather than actually up on Gruf/Ruff Hill. On the downhill side there is a notable concavity along the edge, as well as a few lesser curves on the uphill side, the latter ?natural flaking. When I fell back the right distance and held up my hand so that my thumb was placed appropriately the palm base of my fingers fell naturally at the other edge.
On the 1:25,000 there are two hills above Glenrae, namely Croy Hill then Gruf Hill. It is Johnston's calling the latter Ruff Hill that gives me room to think the Giant's Thumb did not lay where his map shows it. From the Scorradale road I cannot tell which of these hills is on the horizon. This hillside is strewn with small boulders that probably relate scorra to scouring. On my last visit there were large white blotches visible way up near the ridge. My thoughts ran to giant sheep or an unusual breed of kie. Zooming in showd the to be instead much larger boulders sticking out the hillside. The map shows some kind of track going along the SE side of the hills, but it looks like a bit much of a yomp even so. If only I had a better fix on the giant's stone (a failed throw at Hoy from Rousay), presuming my identification only simulacrum, it would surely lie here as lure in lieu.
Coming back down into Orphir main there is a magnificent vista spread out before you, with Kongarsknowe highly visible. I could see that as I neared the junction the hills over the Flow would frame it - walking the road below the Hill of Midland the top of it is often on a level with the hilltops across the water. Strangely, soon after you leave the hill base the knowe disappears from view - you can't see the mound from anywhere near Orphir village, only from some some places well down the road to Gyre does the mound show itself again. Imagine my amazement on finding that from the Scorradale junction itself there is the effect of it being part of a meniscus, the illusion being that Kongarsknowe is in a declivity whilst the top of the mound is dead level with the top of the hills across the water. Like the depiction of the eye as an eyeball within a lens. I'm not sure if this is a deliberate placement and my one photo failed to do it justice as perceived.
