Broch from Gurness

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Broch of Gurness - looking west.

The Broch of Gurness (also: Broch o 'Gurness) is an Iron Age tower around which a settlement developed. The facility was built in the 2nd or 1st century BC and was used again in the Pictish times.

location

Gurness ( English Aikerness - corrupted) is located near Tingwall on the Scottish Orkney island Mainland on the Aikerness peninsula on the Eynhallow Sound .

Research history

The Orcadian artist Robert Rendall (1898-1967) identified the Knap of Aikerness as Broch in 1929 . Archaeologists from the Ministry of Public Buildings and Works (MOPBW) excavated the facility in the late 1930s.

  • Broch of Gurness

  • Access

  • Broch detail

  • Broch detail

During excavations in 1931, the Gurness knife was discovered, which is dated between 400 and 800 AD. Under control from the bones of a whale are Ogham characters engraved.

construction

With a diameter of 20 m, the Broch of Gurness is one of the largest of its kind. It has been preserved up to a height of 3.5 m. There is a triple wall of trenches and walls around the tower and settlement. During the excavations in 1930, an underground chamber was discovered in which, similar to the system in Minehowe , spring water collects. A steep stone staircase found during the excavation in the 1930s leads under the Broch.

Reuse

Just outside of Wall and Ditch is Shamrock House , an oval stone building with four rooms that open up to a larger interior. Inside the house stone fixtures and niches have been preserved. It was built on the ruins by the Picts after the older complex fell into disrepair. During the excavations, the house was moved to the outer area of ​​the settlement, where it can be seen today.

The Vikings also settled on Aikerness. In their time the Broch and the settlement were already dilapidated and probably covered by a mound of earth. In 1939 the shallow grave of a Viking woman (archaeological gender determination) was found in the Graben des Broch. The dead woman was buried in a stone box facing east-west . Of grave goods , two found brooches , a necklace of shells and a small iron sickle. The fibulae date the grave to the 10th century.

literature

  • Noel Fojut: The brochs of Gurness & Midhowe. Historic Scotland, Edinburgh 1993, ISBN 0-7480-0466-1 , pp. 8-15.
  • John W. Hedges: Bu, Gurness and the brochs of Orkney (= British Archaeological Reports. British series. 163-165). 3 volumes. Oxford, BAR 1987.
  • Andrew Hollinrake: Broch of Gurness, Orkney (Evie and Rendall parish), watching brief. In: Discovery and Excavation in Scotland. New Series Vol. 8, 2007, ISSN  0419-411X , p. 140.
  • W. Norman Robertson: A Viking grave found at the Broch of Gurness, Aikerness, Orkney . In: Proceedings of the Society Antiquaries of Scotland. Vol. 101, 1968/1969, ISSN  0081-1564 , pp. 289-290 .
  • JNG Ritchie: Brochs of Scotland . Princes Risborough, Shire Archeology secund edition 1998, ISBN 0-7478-0389-7 pp. 30-32, 43, 50

Web links

Commons : Broch of Gurness  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ OSGB Grid ref. - NGR HY 38179 26850, Canmore ID 2201, Site Number HY32NE 5.00.
  2. ^ W. Norman Robertson: A Viking grave found at the Broch of Gurness, Aikerness, Orkney. In: Proceedings of the Society Antiquaries of Scotland. Vol. 101, 1968/1969, pp. 289-290, here p. 290.

Coordinates: 59 ° 7 '24.7 "  N , 3 ° 4' 58"  W.