This site is entirely user-supported. See how you can help.
We don't have any photos of this monument yet. Why don't you be the first to send us one?
If Google Street View is available, the image is from the best available vantage point looking, if possible, towards the location of the monument. Where it is not available, the satellite view is shown instead.
Latitude: 58.8971 / 58°53'49"N
Longitude: -3.3107 / 3°18'38"W
OS Eastings: 324570
OS Northings: 1001823
OS Grid: HY245018
Mapcode National: GBR L566.L4B
Mapcode Global: WH6B7.3MQS
Entry Name: Whaness Burn, enclosed settlement 1420m NNE of Dwarfie Stane, Hoy
Scheduled Date: 28 February 2000
Source: Historic Environment Scotland
Source ID: SM8662
Schedule Class: Cultural
Category: Prehistoric domestic and defensive: settlement
Location: Hoy and Graemsay
County: Orkney Islands
Electoral Ward: Stromness and South Isles
Traditional County: Orkney
The monument comprises a substantial enclosed settlement which straddles the Whaness Burn on Hoy, in heather moorland immediately to the NE of a conifer plantation.
The enclosure is oval on plan and measures 90m from N to S by 70m transversely, within a substantial bank (up to 4m wide and 0.8m high), with a flat-bottomed ditch (up to 4m wide) and, in places, an external bank (up to 3m wide and 0.6m high) beyond this. About one third of the enclosure lies to the E of the burn. The enclosing banks are in-turned around the burn.
A series of features have been built against the inner wall, but most prominent is a group of mounds in the NE section which probably represent prehistoric houses. Immediately outside the enclosure in this area is a further mound which has been interpreted as a house of 'heel-plan' type fronted by a forecourt. A series of sub-pear dykes can be seen in the immediate vicinity of the enclosure.
The area to be scheduled is circular on plan and measures 160m in diameter, to include the enclosed settlement, adjacent features and an area around in which remains associated with their construction and use may survive, as marked in red on the accompanying map extract.
Source: Historic Environment Scotland
The monument is of national importance because it has excellent field characteristics and is a rare example of an enclosed prehistoric structure (the first recorded in Orkney) which appears, on the basis if its internal features, to be Bronze Age in date. its valley-bottom location is also particularly interesting.
This monument therefore has the potential to provide information about Bronze Age settlement and economy in Orkney, with a high probability of the survival of some organic remains. Its significance is further enhanced as one of a group of monuments around the Whaness Burn which may be related.
Source: Historic Environment Scotland
Bibliography
RCAHMS records the monument as HY 20 SW 15.
Reference:
RCAHMS (1989) The Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland. The archaeological sites and monuments of Hoy and Waas, Orkney Islands Area, The archaeological sites and monuments of Scotland series no 29, 13, No. 10, Edinburgh.
Source: Historic Environment Scotland
Other nearby scheduled monuments