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The Foula Landscape Project Final Report

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The Foula Landscape Project Da Heights Stones Survey and Investigation 6th – 20 th June 2007 Conducted By The Bath and Camerton Archaeological Society for Foula Heritage Final Report A recumbent stone on Da Heights The Foula Landscape Project Da Heights Stones Survey and Investigation 6th – 20 th June 2007 Conducted By The Bath and Camerton Archaeological Society for Foula Heritage Final Report This report was prepared by Dr John Oswin MA PhD CSci, Jayne Lawes MA MIFA and Keith Turner Graphic images and editing by Keith Turner i ii Summary In June 2007, at the request of John Holbourn and Foula Heritage, a small team of Bath & Camerton Archaeological Society (BACAS) members went to Foula. The aim of the team was to investigate a sub-circular feature discovered in 2006 on Da Heights at the northern end of the island. The team located buried stones by probing the peat and recorded the location and shape of both these and the visible stones. In all 290 stones were recorded. These were individually identified and detailed photographs were taken of the site. The resulting drawings clearly showed the elliptical nature of the feature and the alignment towards the southeast. Some peat was removed, leaving the underlying archaeology intact, in six small-scale evaluation trenches. These clearly confirm that the feature is deliberate and therefore man-made. It is elliptical in shape, with the axis pointing towards the mid-winter solstice. Some very small fragments of pottery were recovered from the lower layers of peat but these were undiagnostic in nature. Peat samples were taken which, when analysed, showed a record of human activity on the site. The lower layers of peat contained samples of Birch and Willow, which might suggest that the site is more than 3,000 years old. iii iv Table of Contents Page No. List of Figures.....................................................................................................vi Preface and Acknowledgments..................................................................... viiviii Introduction ........................................................................................................ 1 Location.......................................................................................................... 1 Previous Work ................................................................................................ 3 Aims and Dates of this work ........................................................................... 6 Weather.......................................................................................................... 6 The Scope of this report ................................................................................. 6 Survey Methodology .......................................................................................... 7 Grids............................................................................................................... 7 EDM Survey ................................................................................................... 8 Peat Depth Survey ......................................................................................... 8 Planning and Drawing .................................................................................... 9 Evaluation Trenches..................................................................................... 10 Photography ................................................................................................. 10 Peat Core Samples ...................................................................................... 11 Survey Results................................................................................................. 12 Site Plans ..................................................................................................... 12 Trenches....................................................................................................... 17 The Peat Samples........................................................................................ 23 The Geophysics Reappraised.......................................................................... 25 The Geology of Foula....................................................................................... 28 The Wider Context ........................................................................................... 29 The Hilltop .................................................................................................... 29 The surrounding area ................................................................................... 30 Astronomy .................................................................................................... 32 The Farming year on Foula .......................................................................... 34 The island..................................................................................................... 35 Shetland ....................................................................................................... 36 Further afield ................................................................................................ 38 Conclusions...................................................................................................... 40 Appendix A – Positional Photographs.............................................................. 41 Appendix B - Context Descriptions................................................................... 41 Appendix C – Peat Samples Analysis .............................................................. 42 Bibliography ..................................................................................................... 45 Glossary........................................................................................................... 46 v List of Figures Figure Page No. A recumbant stone on Da Heights............................................................Cover 1 Map showing the location of the Island of Foula.............................................. 1 2 Map of Foula showing the location of Da Heights and North Harrier............... 1 3 A view of the site looking north-west with Soberlie Hill (centre) and the Da Heights ridge marked. ..................................................................................... 2 4 A view of the site looking east from Soberlie Hill. The stone structure (just left of centre) is Tamson’s Crub. The green water tank is approximately in the centre of the feature and the extent of the inner section of the feature is marked. ........................................................................................................... 2 5 Harrier geophysics results showing the Resistivity results in red and the Magnetometry in green (2006). ....................................................................... 3 6 Da Heights geophysics results showing the Resistivity results in red and the Magnetometry in green (2006). ....................................................................... 4 7 EDM survey of Da Heights showing the position of stones which were visible above the surface of the peat (2006)............................................................... 4 8 Diagram showing the double stone ring and the orientation of the structure (2006).............................................................................................................. 4 9 View of the midwinter sunrise taken from the northwest corner of Tamson’s Crub, Da Heights on 21 st December 2006 at 9:10 am..................................... 5 10 One stone which appears on the surface to be two small stones.................... 5 11 Diagram showing the grids which were surveyed in 2007............................... 7 12 A Peat Prodder................................................................................................ 9 13 How the Peat Prodders were used.................................................................. 9 14 The six-metre camera platform that was used to get the overhead views of the trenches......................................................................................................... 11 15 A plan of the surface and buried stones found during the 2007 Survey. ....... 12 16 A plan of the stones showing the identification numbers assigned to them and the position of the identification photographs (in red). ................................... 13 17 A plan showing the contours of the current surface of the peat..................... 14 18 A plan showing the bedrock contours............................................................ 14 19 A plan showing the peat depths. ................................................................... 15 20 A plan of the stones showing points of astronomical significance. ................ 16 21 A diagram showing how the mountains restrict the view of the horizon. ....... 16 22 A plan of the site showing how the ridge of the hill restricts the view of midwinter sunrise (Blue Area) and midsummer sunset (Pink Area). ............. 17 23 A plan showing where the evaluation trenches were located. ....................... 18 24 The site of Trench A before the evaluation trenches were opened. .............. 18 25 A view of Trench A showing the footing wall and how stone 38 would have fitted into it..................................................................................................... 19 26 Trench A. Overhead photographic view and drawing. See Appendix B for the context descriptions......................................................................................
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