Orcadian round house
The Iron Age Orkadische roundhouse ( English Orcadian Roundhouse ) was built on Orkney from about 700 BC. BC as a subgroup of the " Atlantic Roundhouse " widespread on the Scottish mainland and the Hebrides ( Dun Vulan ) and is a forerunner of the Brochs . The round buildings, divided by I. Armit into “simple” and “complex”, were built from dry stone . They are typically between 6 and 15 meters in diameter and are associated with middens in the Hebrides .
The oldest Orcadian round house was from 700 to 200 BC. In use and was discovered next to the megalithic complex of Quanterness at the base of Wideford Hill . Another early round house with an outer wall about five meters thick dates from about 600 BC. And was excavated in Bu, near Stromness . Architecturally, this structure already offers a connection to the radially divided wheelhouses and the later Brochs. Another round house was excavated in Howe, on the hill between Stromness and the Loch of Stenness . It was surrounded with walls and ditches.
literature
- Gordon Barclay: Farmers, Temples and Tombs (Birlinn 2005); ISBN 1-84158-380-4
- Euan W. Mackie: The Roundhouses, Brochs and Wheelhouses of Atlantic Scotland C.700 BC-AD 500: Architecture and Material Culture: Orkney and Shetland Isles 2002 ISBN 978-1-84171-459-2