wideford

In the bottom left corner of the field containing the Rim of Bookan there is a sheep gap under the barbed wire fence against the ‘standing stone’ which I used as a shortcut. One of few sites that actually look better in summer, needs vegetation to bring the shapes out. Stll not photogenic, and now some big rabbit holes have appeared in the large southern exposure of material. Coming from this direction there appeared to be a slight lip at the base of the downhill side of the mound maybe a metre across. Perhaps this was a smaller version of the Ring of Bookan itself I thought – presently it is thought to be a natural mound, but antiquarians noticed the soil had been brought in from elsewhere. A natural assumption is that it is a satellite rather than of a piece with the mounds that used to lie nearer the loch. I wonder if it could be the other way about ; three burials were found around the outside of Skae Frue but not the expected one in the centre, and the Ring of Bookan had a central ‘chamber’ of some kind. From the way the burials were arranged the excavators also expected another to square the circle. What if a fourth individual had been due to take that place only they achieved so much in their life that they were able to have the Ring of Bookan built instead ? Of course even if there is still datable material deeper in the mound the rabbit activity could critically disturb the stratigraphy here. Skae Frue as presently exposed stands a mound of mostly earth with very few stones, mostly debris. It struck me as possible that after the excavators finished they chose to replace their diggings – there are likely signs of digging on the top, surely they would have dug straight down the middle for their expected central burial. I took the long route out, which entailed going through an ‘Orkney gate’ and a pair of disparate gates held together with rope that were leaning against the fence. Scraped through one (beware barbed wire round gateposts) and muscled the other.

Looking down from the Wideford Hill Tomb to the straightened watercourse below (the line of the parish boundary) I saw just the other side cropmarks occupying this end of a field and extending slightly into the next. After carefully picking my way down to a fence I saw through my binoculars that the cropmarks were actually curvilinear banks. Not being able to cross that ‘drain’ from this side I went no further. Instead I decided to go along the hill, parallel to the modern boundary, after some large erect stones seen on previous occasions below the old Wideford track. It rapidly became apparent that I was walking precariously along the top of an ancient dyke, which turned out to be mostly earth with a ‘top dressing’ of earthfast and other small slabs revealed here and there. The O.S. shows short lengths of field fence at varying angles where the old map shows nothing, as is true of all this side of the hill then. It is difficult to tell whether these strictly follow the hill-dyke or not as I was unaware of any divergences myself in following it. The modern fence is mostly fading away, and along the top of the dyke are many stumps of old posts. I think there have been two attempts in modern times to use this ancient feature as an aid to modern enclosure, one using the ‘standing stones’ that I was after. The first indication of the dyke’s height was a grind/slap in it, a gap with tall stones either side, some erect and others fallen. The dyke exposed here is a metre or so in height, possibly more in places, generally with a steeper drop on the downhill side. Watch your every step. There are a few more prehistoric ‘gates’ on the way and regions where waters seem to have swept through the earthwork later. Even mediaeval ‘gateposts’ only have pairs of ‘standing stones’, here are clusters of tall stones high and mighty guardians of portals into places long gone. Some have been seduced into bondage with barbed wire. One of the fallen becoming embedded in the earth is 2m or more, against another leans a small rectangular flag with a well-rounded piercing. After a while the dyke ends where a farmtrack starts. But there is another dyke here at right angles to the first. Looking downhill a thin rectangle of gorse extends and another large stone stoops near one end. I can see no stones on the hill below it. From here this, apparently slighter (and scooped out in several places not too long ago, dark dry earth in the hollow scars), dyke strikes up the hill to peter out just before reaching the old track from Haughhead to the cairn. Uphill the line continues as a plain drystane wall.