Orkney Riddler

  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...

  The Swifterbant Culture     From:- "New evidence on the earliest domesticated animals and possible small‑scale husbandry inAtlantic NW Europe" by Philippe Crombé, et al "The coastal lowlands of Northwest Europe are situated at the periphery of the extensive loess belt of Centraland West Europe, which was colonized in the course of the 6th millennium cal BC by migrating farmers from the Near East and Anatolia. The transition from (Mesolithic) hunter-gatherers to (Neolithic) farmers-herders in this coastal lowland area  has been debated by numerous scholars over the past decades. The debate centers around two opposing models. The frst advocates a long-term and gradual transition towards farming and herding starting early in the 5th millennium cal BC, a process in which local hunter-gatherers played asignifcant role (acculturation/cultural difusion model). The second model, on the other hand, considers a rapid introduction of domesticates near the end of the 5th mill...

    The Excavation of Unstan Cairn by Robert Clouston Notice of the Excavation of a Chambered Cairn of the Stone Age, at Unstan, in the Loch of Stennis, Orkney. By Robert Stewart Clouston. (1884) (edited) The “ knowe of Unstan “ is situated in a piece of land jutting into the Loch of Stennis, a few hundred yards to the north-east of the Bridge of Waithe. To the north of the knowe, and within about 20 yards of it, the cape in which it stands is traversed by a moat from shore to shore. This moat, at a point nearly opposite the knowe, is crossed by a narrow passage of filled-in earth. Digging was begun in the east side of the knowe, as there appeared to be a slight sink in the formation of the cairn at this part. A few feet brought us to several large stones, some placed edgewise, others laid flat. These we found to be the roofing of the passage by which the interior is entered. At the inner end of the passage, and built partly over the last of the roofing stones, were two walls...

  'Dem Bones, Dem Bones   A study of the bones and consequently, of the people who owned the bones has been carried out by David Lawrence, in his thesis, ”Orkneys First Farmers, Reconstructing biographies from osteological analysis to gain Insights into life and society in a Neolithic community on the Edge of Atlantic Europe”. At Isbister, he studied a group of skeletons who represented a group of 85 people, half of whom were younger than 25 years old, and half older. In those that he could establish a gender, 15 were probably female, and 28 probably male.  The most striking feature of David’s and other studies of Orkney skeletons is the high prevalence of evidence of violence, as 20% of those skulls that survived at Isbister Cairn carried evidence of injuries that might have been caused by direct blows to the head using various types of weapon. Both sexes and all ages were affected.  Another fracture wound which was present in 10% of little finger bones that were fo...

  Aurochs  The following commentary is from:- "Excavation of a Neolithic farmstead at Knap of Howar, Papa Westray, Orkney" by Anna Ritchie And is in :- "APPENDIX 4: ANIMAL BONE FROM KNAP OF HOWAR, B A NODDLE, Department of Anatomy, University College, Cardiff" There, the author discusses the dimensions and probable sizes of cattle bones found on the site, suggesting that they are close to aurochs in size. "As Watson stated in his Skara Brae report, the cattle are indeed large. The measurements set outin fig 20 are considerably larger than the writer has encountered at other periods, being roughly similar toa collection of Friesian beef cattle in her collection (these were not fully grown animals). Fig 20 also contains an estimate of body weight reduced from various measurements on the astragalus which originallyderived from these same Friesian cattle in part (Noddle 1973). The lightest of these animals overlap theheaviest weights found for later animals (Saxon,...

  The Bizarre Idea This is a view of the Pentland Firth from a settlement called Skarfskerry, on the North Coast of Caithness in Scotland. The low headland across the water is a neighbouring piece of Scottish coast and beyond that, at the horizon left of view, and almost invisible, is Orkney, an archipelago that sits beyond the northernmost coast of the Scotland. It is part of the Northern Isles group, and consists of more than 70, mostly low-lying, islands and islets of which only about 20 are inhabited. Orkney is renowned as the home of a Unesco World Heritage site. The islands were occupied over 5000 years ago by Neolithic people who created a group of settlements and monuments of a complexity and quality not surviving anywhere else in Britain at such an early date. The Pentland Firth here that separates Scotland from Orkney is a strait of water about 8 miles wide, and is famously dangerous. The average speed of water running through the Firth can reach 4 nautical miles per...

  Limited list of Sources :- I have used the evidence published in the sources I have quoted. The interpretation that I draw from their evidence is entirely my own, and I apologise to any authors whose work has been reinterpreted in this way.  Most of the other sources are mentionedin the text. (Bayliss) Alex Bayliss, Peter Marshall, Colin Richards & Alasdair Whittle. Settlement duration and materiality: formal chronological models for the development of Barnhouse, a Grooved Ware settlement in Orkney (BGS) British Geological Survey, North Sea Memoirs (Callander) A Stalled Chambered Cairn , the Knowe of Ramsay, at Hullion, Rousay, Orkney “. By J. Graham Callander, and Walter G. Grant (Callander) “A long, stalled cairn , the Knowe of Yarso, In Rousay, Orkney “ by J. Graham Callander,, and Walter G. Grant, (Callander) Long Stalled Chambered Cairn or Mausoleum (Rousay TYPE) near Midhowe, Rousay, Orkney . By J. Graham Callander, , and Walter G. Grant” (Callander) Long Stalled ...