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Ancient Village / Settlement / Misc. Earthwork
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| The souterrain was excavated in the winter of 1848-9 by a Captain and his men, aided by George Petrie. CANMAP looks in error as the 20-30' seacliff is up by the new pier rather than at where (Lower) Saverock farmhouse used to be. Petrie locates it at the sea cliff and close enough that he believed one arm once continued to the edge. In 1860 he found rude firebaked clay pottery fragments in the cliff debris (he may have visited other times as the published reports do not mention the bird's claw bronze fragment he found in the souterrain wall, or indeed any metal). His reasons for initially suspecting a broch were that the souterrain lay in a large mound bigger than any of such type he found as of 1860 and that there were "traces of a great mass of building above and around it" (Wilson says material had been used "for building a neighbouring farm-house and offices" before the Captain came - although the Name Book refers to a square ecclesiastical bell being found here this is surely an error for Saevar Howe). In the published article he amended this to "a burg or other superstructure" - one is reminded of the settlement suggested by Baillin-Smith for the area around the Grainbank earth-houses not far away [and those found in WWII building Hatston aerodrome].
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Posted by wideford
28th August 2005ce
Edited 24th November 2008ce
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