It is a strength of the University of the Highlands and Islands Archaeology Institute that students are given the opportunity to dig at sites such as the Ness of Brodgar.
Studying archaeology at the UHI Archaeology Institute means that, not only can you study at one of the colleges across Northern Scotland, but you also are given the opportunity to work on some of the most exciting archaeology projects in Northern Europe – be that The Ness of Brodgar, The Cairns, Swandro, Kirkwall THI, Smerquoy or innovative collaborations such as the Yesnaby Art and Archaeology Research Project. That means getting your hands dirty, getting some on site experience and putting it all into context….
Kyle Roscoe, a BA Archaeology and Scottish History undergraduate studying through The University of the Highlands and Islands Perth Campus takes up the story:
“In the beginning, studying to become an archaeologist seemed like a perilous journey and, to us first years, the end goal can sometimes seem unobtainable. So far, the path seemed paved only with jargon-filled textbooks cemented to the ground with sleep rubbed from the tired eyes of last-minute essay writers.
However, as our time here at the Ness draws to close, that goal appears so much closer.
It has reminded us who study on the Scottish mainland of the benefits of studying archaeology through UHI. The Ness is unrivalled in its importance to understanding prehistory, but more so in the perseverance of its outstanding team of professionals and volunteers. I have never seen so many people smiling while being battered with icy cold rain as I have in this past fortnight.
These past two weeks have brought life and personalities to those characters we see over VC every Wednesday, brought understanding to the diagrams in Renfrew and Bahn and most of all inspired us to shrug off any doubts we maybe had about a future in archaeology.
Through field school we have absorbed so many skills, from excavation to flotation, from planning to recording and from living with complete strangers to entering a beer-drinking competition with them and still making it in on time in the morning!
When you come to the Ness, you immediately get a sense of the overwhelming capabilities of what prehistoric peoples could achieve, and I think being thrown into the deep end quite like we have, has given us the ability to picture the possibilities of what we could achieve and has set our bars pretty high for the future. While this fortnight has truly been an enlightening experience, unfortunately as quickly as we stuck our trowels in the ground for the first time we’re hanging them up for another year of studies.
I’d like to thank everyone at the Ness for making this experience one to remember and I really hope we can all come back and do it all again.”
For more information on archaeology courses available at the University of the Highlands and Islands Archaeology Institute click through to https://www.uhi.ac.uk/en/archaeology-institute/study-here
