Description

The monument consists of a chambered tomb of Neolithic date, into which a roundhouse was set in the early Iron Age. Quanterness was already disturbed when it was excavated by Professor Renfrew in 1972-3. He clarified the plan of the chambered tomb, as a slightly elongated mound concealing a rectangular chamber with six side-chambers. The main chamber was entered by a passage running from the E. Considerable quantities of human and animal bone were recovered, together with pottery and artefacts of bone and stone. At the outer end of the entrance passage, embedded in the mound of the cairn, was a circular structure which was shown after excavation to be a roundhouse of mid first millennium BC date. Quanterness was the first site at which this association between Iron Age roundhouses and chambered tomb mounds was noted, and similar results have come from other Orcadian sites since then, notably at Howe near Stromness. Portions of the Iron Age roundhouse, and almost the entire body of the cairn except for its chambers, were left intact for future reference. The area to be scheduled is an irregular quadrilateral, with its outer edge 10m within the inner face of the surrounding wall, giving maximum dimensions of 60m E-W by 45m, to include the cairn, the roundhouse and an area around them in which further archaeological remains are likely to survive, as marked in red on the accompanying map.

Source: Historic Environment Scotland

Statement of Scheduling

The monument is of national importance as the location of very significant archaeological excavations which provided many new insights into the society and culture both of Neolithic and of Iron Age society. Although partly excavated, the large bulk of the site has not been examined, and it retains the potential to provide very important information about the known structures. There is a high likelihood of further structures associated with the cairn mound or its subsequent adaptation and modification.

Source: Historic Environment Scotland

Sources

Bibliography

The monument is recorded in the RCAHMS as HY 41 SW 4.

Ordnance Survey 6' map, Orkney, 2nd ed., (1903).

Renfrew, A. C. (1979), Investigations in Neolithic Orkney.

Source: Historic Environment Scotland