Description

The monument is a burial mound dating probably to the Bronze Age (between about 2000 and 800 BC). It is visible as a substantial, upstanding, circular grass-covered earthen mound. It survives to a height of approximately 1.2m and measures approximately 16m in diameter. It occupies low-lying improved and rough grassland at around 40m above sea level. The monument was first scheduled in 1940, but the documentation did not meet modern standards: the present amendment rectifies this.

The scheduled area is circular on plan and measures 30m in diameter. It includes the remains described above and an area around them within which evidence relating to the monument's construction, use and abandonment is expected to survive, as shown in red on the accompanying map. Specifically excluded from the scheduled area are the above-ground remains of a post-and-wire fence to allow for its maintenance.

Source: Historic Environment Scotland

Statement of Scheduling

The monument is of national importance because of its potential to make a significant addition to our understanding of funerary and burial practice in the Bronze Age. Burial mounds and earthen barrows form an important and relatively widespread element of Orkney's Bronze Age landscape, and provide evidence for the major social and economic changes which took place during this period. Orkney's barrows are unusual in Scotland, and important within a British context, as the majority are earthen mounds as opposed to stone-built cairns. Black Knowe retains its field characteristics to a marked degree and is a significant example of its type. Excavation of similar sites elsewhere in Orkney has demonstrated that this monument has high potential to contain one or more burials and associated features, such as the remains of funeral pyres or mortuary structures. Its significance is enhanced by its association with a wider landscape of Bronze Age burial monuments located on marginal land over the N half of Orkney Mainland. Our understanding of the dating, form, function and distribution of Bronze Age barrows would be diminished if this monument was to be lost or damaged.

Source: Historic Environment Scotland

Sources

Bibliography

RCAHMS records the monument as HY22SE 38.

References

Downes, J 1995, 'Linga Fold', Current Archaeology 142, 396-399.

Downes, J 1997, The Orkney Barrows Project survey results and management strategy (unpubl rep to Historic Scotland: ARCUS, University of Sheffield).

RCAHMS 1946, The Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland. Twelfth report with an inventory of the ancient monuments of Orkney and Shetland, 3v, Edinburgh, 26, no. 54.

Towrie, S 2013, The Knowes o' Trotty, http://www.orkneyjar.com/history/knowestrotty/ [accessed August 2013].

Source: Historic Environment Scotland