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Quanterness, radiocarbon and the Orkney cairns

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 September 2016

Colin Renfrew ,
Douglas Harkness  and
Roy Switsur
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Extract

The chambered cairns of Orkney are among the most sophisticated architectural products of prehistoric Europe. Maes Howe, since the chamber was re-entered a century ago (Petrie, 1861) has excited the admiration of all who have visited it. In Stuart Piggott’s words (1954, 244): ‘The assured competence and mastery over the building material shown at Maes Howe mark it out as a monument comparable in prehistoric Britain only to Stonehenge in its individual handling of an architectural problem. In both a contemporary existing conception—that of a chambered tomb or that of a stone circle—has been used to produce a superlative monument that by its originality of execution is lifted out of its class into a unique position.’

Quanterness has proved to be one of the best preserved of the Orcadian monuments, with four of the six side chambers still standing, very much as they were built some five thousand years ago. Much of the importance of the excavation comes from the detailed examination of the deposits within the chamber which have offered an unusual insight into neolithic burial practice, and these are fully discussed in the forthcoming final publication (Renfrew et al., in press).

Type
Research Article
Information
Antiquity , Volume 50 , Issue 199-200 , September 1976 , pp. 194 - 204
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd 1976

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