26/06/2023 - Off the ferry, the first place I wanted to visit in Unst was this stone. It looked big at first sight, up close it seemed massive. It stands all alone, the passing of time surely means little to it. It stands there as if it always has and always will. It's the most northerly standing stone I've been to and now one of my favourites. It's a 12ft loveable monster.
overwhelmingly huge. stunningly huge. arched outward, and inward; a head, or transmitter. I believe this is Britain's most northerly standing stone; a beacon. not vertical, but angled backward, facing upward. an overweight belly. a couple of large stones around its back. surrounded in part by a low raised earth structure (skirt?); another of which, almost complete, only a few yards over. the stone is visible from the sea, in what, for this island, is a tight valley, which peters into nothing, rising quickly, into an open plain of strange landscape, huge boulders layn about upon the gorse. the largest of which, stood on end. facing northeast-southwest (beside the road). pointing toward another such stone a little further down (or across) that possibly stood, now fallen (you can see space underneath part of it).
beautiful blue and green stones lie all around, the rubble left from building the road.
on closer inspection, the rabble of stones on the plain, mostly aren't a rabble atall but a large circle marked out and curves and a trail of them leading off to the lake; an exciting trail to follow and map out. there are other circular shapes on the sides of rising land around. maybe they're just fields.
massacred sheep everywhere.
I'm sure this has to be this stone - it's in the right area and is the right size. But Ms S gives names for it that I can't find elsewhere.
That [stone] of Succamires is a ... massive and lumpish one, being 12 feet high and about 24 feet in girth at the widest part, and may weigh from twenty to thirty tons. The stone is known, I believe, as the Berg of the Venastric, but I have heard it spoken of locally as "Mam" -- this endearing term being due to the fact that it can shelter the tender young sheep from every wind that may blow. Its situation is in a low-lying, rather marshy piece of ground near Lund in the Westing district.
It's quite concerning that the fieldnote from FlopsyPete mentions dead sheep - is Mam not doing her job??
From Elizabeth Stout's article "Some Shetland Brochs and Standing Stones" which is in PSAS volume 46 (1911-12).