8th century Pictish carved stone discovered in Orkney cliff

A rare Pictish stone has been found in an eroding cliff face in Orkney.

Orkney Research Centre for Archaeology (ORCA), with support from Historic Environment Scotland, have completed a delicate rescue mission to recover a rare Pictish carved stone.

Erosion by the stormy sea surrounding Orkney is always seen as a tangible threat to coastal archaeological sites.

This situation is brought home especially during the winter months when high tides and powerful winds combine to batter the coastline of these beautiful islands.

However, sometimes these same waves, can reveal unique and important finds that have been lost to view for hundreds if not thousands of years.

Following one of these storms, Dr Hugo Anderson-Whymark, an archaeologist based in Orkney, was examining an area of the East Mainland coast that had been particularly hit during a south westerly gale and discovered something amazing - a stone that had been unearthed by the sea, projecting precariously out of the soft, cliff face.

This stone, on closer examination, was different to the other rocks at the site - it had obviously been worked and designs were visible and clearly ancient.

A dragon motif tantalizingly peered out from the emerging stone slab and pointed to a possible Pictish (3rd-8th centuries AD) origin, but further examination was difficult due to the location.

This carved stone was clearly significant and needed to be quickly recovered before the next forecast storms that were due to hit the following weekend.

The race was on. Nick Card, Senior Projects Manager at ORCA (University of the Highlands and Islands Archaeology Institute), contacted Historic Environment Scotland, who realising the significance of the find offered funding support to investigate, remove and conserve the precious object.

When the carved stone was carefully lifted, the significance of the find was clear - a Pictish cross slab, probably dating from the enigmatic 8th Century, emerged as the soft sand fell away from the front face.

The exquisite design had been weathered, but an intricately carved cross flanked by the dragon or beast was clear to see.

On the reverse side another Pictish beast design stared out from the stone face - beak open grasping what looked like the remains of a staff.

Nick Card said: “Carved Pictish Cross Slabs are rare across Scotland with only 2 having been discovered in Orkney. This is therefore a significant find and allows us to examine a piece of art from a period when Orkney society was beginning to embrace Christianity.

Now that the piece is recorded and removed from site, we can concentrate on conserving the delicate stone carving and perhaps re-evaluate the site itself.

Kirsty Owen, HES Senior Archaeology Manager, added: “The Orcadian coastline is an extremely dynamic environment, and it was clear that we needed to act quickly.

“Because the stone has been properly excavated, we have a better chance of understanding how it relates to the development of the site.”

The excavation of the Pictish stone was undertaken with funding from the Historic Environment Scotland Archaeology Programme, which is primarily intended to rescue archaeological information in the face of unavoidable threats.

The stone is now removed from the site and is scheduled for conservation and possible display at a future date. The site may be re-evaluated with funding being sought for further work

8th century Pictish carved stone discovered in Orkney cliff

Cave of Melody (Fingal’s Cave) in Scotland

The great explorer and botanist Joseph banks wrote that the best cathedral developed by men, Fingal’s Cave or also known as the Cave of Melody, located at the southern part of the Staffa Island in Scotland is a place you must visit.

This so called “church” is the cave of melody of Scotland situated at the southern part of the Staffa Island in Scotland. This remarkable island is situated in the Inner Hebrides. The entire island of Staffa is basaltic and has similar features as the cave located in Ireland – the Giants Causeway.  The top of the Cave of Melody is made of volcanic crust slag. On the other side of the cave, guests can way into indistinct interior wherein they can witness the yellow stalactites glisten opposing the fluted walls.

This cave is also called Fingal’s Cave by the locals of Scotland and Uamh Binn in Gaelic that signifies Melodious Cave or Cave of melody. This name was accredited to its pleasant and melodic acoustic. According to research, in year 1829, the great German composer Felix Mendelssohn came to Staffa by boat. As he moved towards the cave, the echo generated by the smashing waves opposed the cave gave him an idea to write down a melody. It is also said that this concise melody turned out to be the tune of his proposition, The Hebrides, also called as the Fingal’s Cave. Visitors can try what Mendelssohn did if they want to write a proposition.

The Victorian Statesman Sir Robert Peel was told that he becomes a poetic person when moving toward the cave. Robert Peel wrote he had seen the cathedral not developed with hands, had felt the regal and a splendid swell of the ocean, the beat and throb of the great Atlantic, throbbing in its deepest and private sanctuary.

Sir Walter Scott, a Scottish novelist, described the Cave of Melody as the best place he visited. This remarkable place remained in his mind, every description he had heard of it. The whole interior is composed of basaltic pillars as soaring as the covering of a church, running deep in the rock, perpetually swept in a swelling in a deep sea. With a lot of compliments from these great people, the magnificent and awesome cave is definitely worth a visit once you go to Scotland.

Cave of Melody in Scotland consists of wonderful geometric columns which make up the interior that was formed by crust from volcanic slag. The sound created by smashing of the wave makes a remarkable melody once they bounce on the arched roof.

History

Little is known of the early history of Staffa, although the Swiss town of Stäfa on Lake Zurich was named after the island by a monk from nearby Iona.[6] Part of the Ulva estate of the Clan MacQuarrie from an early date until 1777, the cave was brought to the attention of the English-speaking world by 18th-century naturalist Sir Joseph Banks in 1772.

Engraving of Fingal's Cave by James Fittler in Scotia Depicta, 1804.

It became known as Fingal's Cave after the eponymous hero of an epic poem by 18th century Scots poet-historian James Macpherson. It formed part of his Ossian cycle of poems claimed to have been based on old Scottish Gaelic poems. In Irish mythology, the hero Fingal is known as Fionn mac Cumhaill, and it is suggested that Macpherson rendered the name as Fingal (meaning "white stranger") through a misapprehension of the name which in old Gaelic would appear as Finn. The legend of the Giant's Causeway has Fionn or Finn building the causeway between Ireland and Scotland

Sources / Bibliography / Photos

National Trust for Scotland: Fingal's Cave
Haswell-Smith, Hamish (2004). The Scottish Islands. Edinburgh: Canongate. ISBN 978-1-84195-454-7.
Bell, B.R. and Jolley, D.W. (1997) "Application of palynological data to the chronology of the Palaeogene lava fields of the British Province: implications for magmatic stratigraphy". Journal of the Geological Society. London. Vol. 154, pp. 701–708.
http://traveleering.com/
Atilla Aydin and James M. Degraff (1988) "Evolution of Polygonal Fracture Patterns in Lava Flows," Science 29 January 1988: 239 (4839), 471-476. [1]
Lucas Goehring, L. Mahadevan, and Stephen W. Morris (2009) "Nonequilibrium scale selection mechanism for columnar jointing". PNAS 2009 106 (2) 387-392 [2]
Staffa (Fingal's Cave) and the Treshnish Islands The Internet Guide to Scotland
Haswell-Smith (2004) p. 124
Show Caves of the World
Caves and Caving in the UK
Behind the Name: View Name: Fingal
https://en.wikipedia.org
Notes to the first edition
Formation of basalt columns / pseudocrystals
Gordon Grant Tours: Fingal's Cave
Galveston Symphony Program Notes: Mendelssohn
The Art Archive, JM Turner
"Unreleased Pink Floyd material" The Pink Floyd Hyperbase. Retrieved 3 August 2008.
Lloyd House alley list. Retrieved 19 October 2009.
Wood-Nuttall Encyclopaedia, 1907
National Public Radio

Cave of Melody (Fingal’s Cave) in Scotland

The Jarlshof prehistoric archaeological site in Shetland, Scotland

Viking ring fort and settlement, the Shetland Islands, Jarlshof, Scotland. It has been described as "one of the most remarkable archaeological sites ever excavated in the British Isles".

Jarlshof - near Sumburgh, Shetland Islands, Great Britain; the Viking settlement of the Jarlshof site was hidden until a storm in the late 1800s exposed some of the remains from late Iron Age buildings (before 800 AD); built in a circular fashion around a central hub with small rooms and storage areas leading off of it.

The remains at Jarlshof represent thousands of years of human occupation, and can be seen as a microcosm of Shetland history. Other than the Old House of Sumburgh (see below) the site remained largely hidden until a storm in the late 19th century washed away part of the shore, and revealed evidence of these ancient buildings. Formal archaeological excavation started in 1925 and Jarlshof was one of two broch sites which were the first to be excavated using modern scientific techniques between 1949–52.Although the deposits within the broch had been badly disturbed by earlier attempts, this work revealed a complex sequence of construction from different periods. Buildings on the site include the remains of a Bronze Age smithy, an Iron Age broch and roundhouses, a complex of Pictish wheelhouses, a Viking longhouse, and a mediaeval farmhouse. No further excavations have been undertaken since the early 1950s and no radiocarbon dating has been attempted.

Jarlshof (/ˈjɑːrlzhɒf/ yarlz-hoff) is the best known prehistoric archaeological site in Shetland, Scotland. It lies near the southern tip of the Shetland Mainland and has been described as "one of the most remarkable archaeological sites ever excavated in the British Isles". It contains remains dating from 2500 BC up to the 17th century AD.

The Bronze Age settlers left evidence of several small oval houses with thick stone walls and various artefacts including a decorated bone object. The Iron Age ruins include several different types of structure including a broch and a defensive wall around the site. The Pictish period provides various works of art including a painted pebble and a symbol stone. The Viking age ruins make up the largest such site visible anywhere in Britain and include a longhouse; excavations provided numerous tools and a detailed insight into life in Shetland at this time. The most visible structures on the site are the walls of the Scottish period fortified manor house, which inspired the name "Jarlshof" that first appears in an 1821 novel by Walter Scott.

The site is in the care of Historic Scotland and is open from April to September. In 2010 "The Crucible of Iron Age Shetland" including Mousa, Old Scatness and Jarlshof was added to those seeking to be on the "tentative list" of World Heritage Sites.

The Jarlshof prehistoric archaeological site in Shetland, Scotland