Excavation begins on Wyre Neolithic settlement
Days after finishing on the excavation at the Ness o' Brodgar, Antiona Thomas was heading straight out to Wyre to start investigations into a suspected Neolithic settlement site on the island.
Work is due to start on Wednesday, with two evaluation trenches planned to cover some of the anomalies highlighted by the previous geophysics scans.
The site, at the Braes o' Habreck, yielded a “treasure trove” of Neolithic artefacts during a fieldwalking exercise in 2006 – items ranging from pottery fragments and stone tools through to immaculate, but deliberately-broken, stone maceheads.
The finds came from an area of the field which looks like containing the traces of two structures. One is a rectangular building, possibly domestic, the other, approximately five metres or so to the north-east, was large and circular and measured approximately 35 metres in size.
Anotonia said: “The Ness of Brodgar is a hard act to follow, but hopefully the Wyre dig shoul be as amazing as the finds from the fieldwalking last year suggested.
The project is funded by OIC, Society of Antiquaries Scotland, the Flaws family and Orkney College/Orkney Archaeological Trust. |
