The island of Unst has a large number of recorded longhouses of apparently Viking or Norse date (Dyer et al. 2013). Unst is unique in that sites like this are found in a density and state of preservation unseen elsewhere in Britain, and it was this that led Shetland Amenity Trust to propose the ‘Viking Unst Project’ to investigate some of these sites and display them as a means of encouraging archaeological tourism to the island (Turner et al. 2013). In research terms, the unusual nature of the Unst settlement pattern demanded investigation. Previous survey and excavation (for example, Stumman-Hansen 1995, 2000) had suggested the sites were largely single-period with no evidence of earlier occupation. Many are on or above the 30m contour, which at this northern extremity of the British Isles today makes for environmentally precarious conditions. Just 20m above the site of Hamar House 2, for example, is the Keen of Hamar, where solifluction stripes caused by freeze-thaw action, and subarctic plant species, can be seen.

A settlement pattern of Viking-period farms with no pre-Viking activity, such as the Unst data suggested, is largely absent elsewhere in the Northern Isles, where Norse settlement is usually identified as a phase within multi-period sites located on good agricultural land (Dockrill and Bond, this volume). These deeply stratified sites, such as Jarlshof and Old Scatness in southern Shetland, often represent several millennia of occupation, of which the Viking-Age/Late Norse periods are late in the sequence (Hamilton 1956; Dockrill et al. 2010).

The main aim of the excavations at Hamar and Underhoull was to investigate this unusual settlement pattern, to test the presumed date of the houses and the theory that they were single-period settlements. Hamar was chosen as one of the sites because previous investigation had suggested it was early in date (Stummann-Hansen 2000) and it appeared remarkably well preserved with defined wall lines. Upper House, Underhoull, with its proximity to both Underhoull broch and Small’s excavations at the Norse site nearby, seemed likely to increase our understanding of the settlement pattern there (Small 1966).

Hamar

The site of Hamar consists of two single longhouses on the south-facing slope below the Keen of Hamar above Baltasound, Unst (Figure 6.1).