The Birsay Bay Project Volume 3: The Brough of Birsay, Orkney: Investigations 1954-2014

The Brough of Birsay was the power-centre of the Viking earldom of Orkney and is one of Historic Environment Scotland’s key monuments and visitor attractions on the islands. This publication is the culmination of 60 years of investigations that took place on the site between 1954 and 2014.This new volume incorporates comprehensive accounts of work undertaken by Dr Ralegh Radford and Mr Stewart Cruden between 1954 and 1964, excavations by the Viking and Early Settlement Research Project under the direction of the author on site between 1974 and 1981, a rescue excavation in 1993, a geophysical survey in 2007 and archival research up to 2014.Specialist artefactual and palaeobiological studies of metallurgical material, ogham inscriptions and a gilt-bronze mount of Insular origin are included, together with re-analysis of the radiocarbon dates from all sites in Birsay Bay, and a re-assessment of the architecture and dating of the church and related buildings on the Brough itself.The final two chapters put the Brough, as both a Pictish power-centre and the hub of the Viking earldom, in the overall context of Birsay Bay and Viking and late Norse Orkney, and the wider world between the Pictish and late Norse/Medieval periods.As well as being the author’s third and final volume reporting on work for the Birsay Bay Project, this volume completes a trilogy of studies of the Brough itself, alongside Mrs Cecil Curle’s and Prof John Hunter’s earlier monographs.

Table of Contents:
List of illustrations List of tables Preface Acknowledgements   Part I. Background and context for investigations 1946–2014 1. Background by Christopher D Morris 2. The Birsay Bay Project and the Brough of Birsay by Christopher D Morris   Part II. Area I: The church and churchyard 3. Historical background to the 1950s–1960s investigations at the church, associated buildings and churchyard on the Brough of Birsay by C A Ralegh Radford 4. Investigations by Ralegh Radford and Stewart Cruden on the church compiled by Christopher D Morris 5. Investigations by Ralegh Radford and Stewart Cruden on the buildings north of the church compiled by Christopher D Morris 6. An architectural analysis of the church and related buildings on the Brough of Birsay by Richard Fawcett 7. The graves, churchyard enclosures and notable stone monuments compiled by Christopher D Morris 8. Reassessment of the ‘Celtic Enclosure’ in 1981 by Christopher D Morris   Part III. Area II: The buildings east of the churchyard 9. Investigations by Radford and Cruden on the area to the east of the churchyard (‘The Viking House’) and excavations in ‘Room 5’ of the ‘Small buildings’ in 1973/4 10. Explorations in 1993 on the cliff-side to the south-east of the churchyard by Christopher D Morris   Part IV. Area III: The buildings west of the churchyard 11. Investigations by Radford and Cruden on the buildings to the south-west of the churchyard by Christopher D Morris 12. Area excavations 1974–80 in and around Structure N by Christopher D Morris 13. Area excavations in 1974–5 in and around Structure L and trial excavations in 1977 on features around Structure M by Christopher D Morris 14. Area excavations in 1976–80 in and around Structure E to the west of the churchyardby Christopher D Morris 15. Area excavations in 1977–81 in and around Structures ‘S’ and B to the west and north-west of the churchyard and re-assessment of the dating of Structures F, P and R to the north 16.  Specialist studies relating to Area III   Part V. The south-western cliff-side area 17. Survey and trial investigations 1979 and re-assessment of the dating of Sites VIII and IXby Christopher D Morris 18.  Investigations on the Peerie Brough 1979–81 by Christopher D Morris   Part VI. Economy, landscape and analysis 19.  The artefactual assemblage by Colleen E Batey 20.  The biological assemblage by Christopher D Morris based on work by D James Rackham with others 21. Geophysical prospection 2007 on the Brough of Birsay by Susan Ovenden and David W Griffiths 22. Overall re-assessment of radiocarbon dates from Birsay by Zoe Outram 23. Birsay Bay landscape geophysical surveys, 2003–6 by David W Griffiths with Susan Ovenden   Part VII. Drawing the threads together 24. The Brough of Birsay and Birsay Bay in retrospect by Christopher D Morris 25. An overview and final assessment by Christopher D Morris   Appendices Bibliography Index

About the Author :
Christopher D. Morris is Emeritus Professor of Archaeology at the University of Glasgow, having previously been Reader in Viking Archaeology at the University of Durham. His lifelong research interests have been in the Early Medieval period, especially post-Roman, Anglo-Scandinavian, Pictish, Viking and Late Norse. He has carried out archaeological fieldwork in Orkney, Shetland, Caithness, Sutherland, the Isle of Man, northern England and Cornwall, and his many publications include four major site monographs together with two edited volumes on the Viking Age and Late Norse settlements across the North Atlantic region. Rachel Barrowman is a research associate at the University of Glasgow. She worked with colleagues on the Viking and Early Settlement Archaeological Research Project in the 1990s, when she was involved in excavations at Tintagel in Cornwall. She has since published work on the chapel and burial ground on St Ninian’s Isle, Shetland, the late medieval clan stronghold of Dùn Èistean, and the chapel-sites of Lewis. She lives and works with her husband and family in Ness at the north end of Lewis.