Barnhouse Stone forum 1 room
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Barnhouse Stone

Big upright slabs

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wideford W
wideford Jun 24, 2004 11:25:27
Replying to Rhiannon

The ancients didn't skimp - if the stone were excavated they would find it deeply rooted. A few weeks back I thought I had found an immense standing stone (HY444087) in an area cleared for new ?housing behind the Scapa Coastguard Station (county archaeologist said that if it had been uprooted the context was lost i.e. I'm not interested, go away [similarly she lost interest in an urgent look at the Via Mound cist because the revelation was fairly recent only in an archaeological sense, whereas to my way of thinking information on the contents is lost all the time now even though it is no longer precisely pristine] ). But upon examination it incorporated black flecks that showed it to be of 'modern' material and so quite unlike our stones in Orkney. However the rusty iron hinge still attached showed it to have been used as a gatepost. And this three or so metre long tapering stone looked, going by the hinge's position, to have been about 2/3 buried. So the Barnhouse Stone is perhaps only 'the tip of an iceberg'.

H Hob
Hob Jun 24, 2004 12:37:17
Replying to wideford

"So the Barnhouse Stone is perhaps only 'the tip of an iceberg'."

Aye, I couldn't help but wonder how far it goes down. 3.5m above ground, and still pretty much totally vertical, pretty impressive engineering, there must be some whopping packing stones at it's base.
I was surprised at the thickness of these slabs, they are thicker than I thought they would be, as they are taller than I imagined. The stresses on them whilst they were being shifted must have been substantial though. I would have been a bit worried if I was the dude who had to drive the posts for the sheep fence. Worried that the movement could have dislodged a packing stone or something, leading to lethal stone toppling.

For my money, Barnhouse has more 'oompf' than any of the single stones at Stenness and Brogar, mostly because the vegetation on it seemed to hammer home the fact that it hasn't moved in a long long time. It's almost Tolkeinesque.

Kammer's fieldnotes make a good point, it's sadly neglected cos of the others nearby, especially as from the road it looks small, but maybe that's why it's kept it's integrity, 'cos it's been largely overlooked.

We managed to catch a couple of tombs too, courtesy of M&J, I think I'm a convert. They're ace. Only 2 days on the island, and it's given me so much to think about.

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