The final season of excavation at the Ness of Brodgar will take place in 2024, after which the remains of the 5,000-year-old Neolithic complex will be covered over and backfilled.
The project is managed by the Ness of Brodgar Trust, in partnership with the UHI Archaeology Institute, and has uncovered a complex of monumental Neolithic buildings in Orkney. The size, quality, and architecture of the structures, together with evidence for tiled roofs, coloured walls, decorated stone and stunning artefacts has seen the Ness hit the headlines regularly over the past two decades.
But although on-site excavation is ending, research at the Ness of Brodgar continues. It is simply moving into a new and exciting phase of intensive work, with the focus on scientific analysis of all the recovered material – pottery, stone tools, bone and much more – found on site.
This must be fully catalogued and examined by specialists. The results, along with those from the environmental samples, will help unpick the story of the people who built, used and ultimately abandoned the site in the centuries around 2500BC.
The Ness of Brodgar excavations will be open to the public from July 5 to August 16, 2023, and next year from July 3, 2024, until the end of August 2024, funding permitting.
