Cairns from Camster

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Long hill

The Cairns of Camster are heel-shaped Cairns and are located in Caithness in the Scottish Highlands north of Lybster and consist of the round and the long cairn , which are 200 m apart (ND24SE 1 2601 4420). The grounds known as “gray cairns” stood out more clearly against the brown moorland before today's forest was planted.

The round hill

Round hill

The round hill is about 18 m in diameter and 3.7 m high. It covers an intact chamber of the type of the Scottish passage tombs , the entrance of which is in the flattened facade on the east side. The almost six meter long corridor leads into the polygonal antechamber. A portal marks the entrance to the main chamber, which consists of two areas. The short end area is divided into a narrower part by a pair of side stones, and a single large panel forms the end wall. Apart from the installation of a modern skylight, the roof is intact.

Anderson and Shearer found human bones, pottery and flint tools on the chamber floor during excavations in 1886 . The facility had been filled with earth and stones when it was no longer used.

The long hill

Long hill, northern chamber

The long hill of the Orkney-Cromarty (OC) type is a two-period monument, a subsequent, slightly trapezoidal superstructure over two round hills. One of them has stone chambers, one of which comes close to the structural design of the complex in the round hill. The other is much smaller and not structured. Both are located in the wider northeast part of the 69.5 m long and 16.8 m wide stone hill, which is vaulted in the former round hill area. At both ends there are forecourts, similar to those of the "Horned or Lobster Cairns". This construction method was discovered and reconstructed through the excavations of Corcoran 1971–1973 and Masters 1976–1980. The chambers are entered from the long eastern side and are illuminated by modern skylights.

The plants are around 3500 BC. Was built. At the southern end of the burial mound, fire areas of different sizes were discovered, which lay in the extension of the hill axis and contained ceramics . The C-14 data shows that the activity occurred in the first centuries of the 4th millennium (around 2950 BC).

literature

  • Joseph Anderson: On the horned cairns of Caithness. In: Memoirs Anthropological Society London. Volume 3, 1869, ZDB -ID 206771-7 , pp. 221-225.
  • James L. Davidson, Audrey S. Henshall: The chambered cairns of Caithness. An inventory of the structures and their contents. Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh 1991, ISBN 0-7486-0256-9 .
  • Lionel Masters: The excavation and restoration of the Camster Long chambered cairn, Caithness, Highland, 1967-80. In: Proceedings of the Society Antiquaries of Scotland. Volume 127, 1997, ISSN  0081-1564 , pp. 123-183, ( digital version (PDF; 5.85 MB) ).
  • Lionel J. Masters: Camster, Caithness District, Highland Region. ND 260 442, Long chamber cairn . In: Proceedings Prehistoric Society. NS 44, 1978, ISSN  0079-497X , pp. 453 f., 459, doi : 10.1017 / S0079497X00010197 .
  • Lionel J. Masters: Camster (Wick p) Long chamber cairn. In: Discovery Excavation Scotland. 1980, ISSN  0419-411X , p. 17, doi : 10.5284 / 1000284 .
  • Robert Gourlay: Sutherland. An Historical guide. Birlinn, Edinburgh 1996, ISBN 1-874744-44-0 .

Web links

Commons : Cairns by Camster  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Entry on Cairns from Camster  in Canmore, the database of Historic Environment Scotland (English)

Coordinates: 58 ° 22 ′ 48.4 "  N , 3 ° 15 ′ 51.5"  W.