Orkney Riddler

      So, This is Orkney .  A straggling group of islands off the north coast of Scotland  Hoy, and the Old Man of Hoy. The Churchill Barriers The block ships, scuttled to prevent German submarines from entering Scapa Flow during WW2. The Italian Chapel,  built by Italian prisoners of war, while theybuilt the Churchill Barriers during WW2. Stromness,  Orkney's second town. Stromness,  again Kirkwall's main business town, and one of three major ports. Kirkwall ba' outside the cathedral, a wild, confusing , and exilerating ball scrum through the streets of the town.  Abandoned WW2 structures Cliffs and beaches  Sunsets Rackwick Bay More sunsets Haar More Haar The Ring of Brodgar  The Ness of Brodgar  The Stones of Stenness  Skara Brae That's Orkney!  (In summer!) "A Bizarre Idea " What's the Story " Neolithic Migrants to Orkney " The story of the First, Founding Immigrants to Orkney  But " They must have had boats...

  Relative Sea Level     There is only a limited amount of water on the planet, and when the last ice age was dumping snow on land, it built many kilometre thicknesses of ice sheets on polar regions, and on mountainous areas.  The placing of ice sheets on land had two effects. The first was that the water that had been dumped on the land, frozen, reduced the amount of water in the global sea. The second was that the weight of the ice on the land placed tremendous pressure on the geology that it rested on. That pressure forced the land that was under the ice-sheet,  down into core of the planet. It is these two characteristics that have had a major impact on post-glacial sea levels in the northern hemisphere, but as I will explain its not that simple. Global sea-level rise   There is a limit to the extent of our ability to go back in time to measure sea levels in the Quaternary period. In many places records in the geology,  for various reasons, only go...

  The Story of the Neolithic Migration to Orkney  Nomads The Neolithic people of Britain were a nomadic group of cultures that entered the country from the Dutch region of northern Europe from before 7000 years ago until after 6000 years ago. They came on foot, across a land bridge that is now shallow water between Holland and East Anglia, in England.  These people brought with them a suite of technologies,  including pottery, domesticated animals, landscape structures, economic systems, community activities, timber joinery, structural engineering, and small-scale industries. They had boats, but these were limited to dugout canoes for use on inland waters, lakes, harbours, and perhaps for crossing rivers. These were people who had arrived in Northern Europe from the south, gathering in the Scheldt valley. As a group of various peoples we call these the Swifterbant Culture, and it was much later that the various groups included here, having established mobile popul...

  Conclusion The Theory here, begins with people in Early Neolithic times being able to walk from Caithness to Orkney until 3000BC., it continues by suggesting that a land bridge that joined Caithness to Orkney was washed away at that date.  The evidence that I hope I have demonstrated to support the theory is as follows:- The population of Orkney drops after 3000BC.  Barnhouse and many small settlements are abandoned in 3000BC.  The Stones of Stenness and Ring of Brodgar are abandoned, unfinished, probably at that date.  The Westray islands are (mostly) abandoned at 3000BC, and not colonised again until the second half of the 3rd millennium BC.  Skara Brae, and the Ness of Brodgar, both have dated deposits from before 3000BC indicating some kind of occupation, but not till after 3000BC are the revolutionary solid structures with stone lined drains and other necessary amenities designed and constructed.  The dates of the human bones found in the cairns...

  They Must Have Had Boats! The persistent belief is that Neolithic people had boats. Sheridan (below) and others, have confidently detailed where the maritime trade routes went between Europe and Britain. So, it must be right, mustn't it? There follows the academic understanding of the evidence for water transport around British shorelines from:- "Ships and Boats:Prehistory to 1840 Introductions to Heritage Assets (Historic England)" "Early Prehistoric (500,000-4000 BC) Speculation about the development of water transport during the early prehistoric period is widespread, and some commentators have even suggested that the first boat, as opposed to a log ‘raft’, may have simply been a log hollowed out by disease. It is believed that Palaeolithic watercraft in north-west Europe were most likely limited to the use of log or hide floats and/or rafts in inland waters, particularly as there is no evidence for the waterborne movement of peoples between the British landmas...