The Cairns dig diary - day six - Archaeology Orkney

Out at the front of the broch today, with a group of students learning hpw to draw plans in the foreground. (📷 Martin Carruthers) — A group of UHI Archaeology Institute students learning how to plan at the front of The Cairns broch today.
(📷 Martin Carruthers)

Great progress today after work on Friday was scuppered by appalling weather

Thankfully, today was much improved in terms of the weather experienced last week and especially on Friday – when the rain, and especially the wind, made work on site pretty much impossible. By contrast, today’s blue skies and some genuine June heat have launched us into good progress on site.

Here are just a few words by way of an update…

The broch

In the broch the two main areas currently being examined, the north room and the south-east room are moving on very nicely.

In the south-east room the excavation of the main hearth is going very well, and the quadrants are rapidly producing nice sections through the vivid ashy fills.

In one of the quadrants, we may well be coming down on to the clay floor of the surrounding room, so we appear to be reaching the origin point of this hearth. If so then, in essence, it was originally very simply laid out on the beaten clay floor and the heat of the ensuing fire stained the zone in contact with heat.

It also appears that the hearth may be dipping down towards its centre and that it was originally a scooped, bowl-like feature in form.

In the broch’s north room, Chris, Jan, and Alannah are excavating a variety of quite localised, discrete deposits across the floor. A few pottery sherds, stone tools and animal bones have emerged in the process.

The central room has also been seeing attention as Jean is just getting into her rhythm excavating using the sample grid we established last Thursday.

And even I (!) have been finding nice pottery while tidying things up a bit in quiet corners of the broch, such as in the south room.

Trimmed red deer antler excavated from Structure B2. (📷 Martin Carruthers)

Structure O

Outside the broch, on the East side, almost all of the paving that accompanied the revetment wall has now gone and Holly, who is supervising here, is beginning to discern stonework which may well turn out to be surviving elements of Structure O – the Middle Iron Age village building whose overall plan and form we are seeking here.

I think it’ll not be long before we start to confirm the fuller shape of the building.

Looking south along the length of the subrectangular 'Wag'-like building structure B2. (📷 Martin Carruthers) — Looking south along the length of the subrectangular ‘Wag’-like building structure B2. (📷 Martin Carruthers)

The upper part of the broch's outer wall face just beginning to appear in the Northern part of the site. (📷 Martin Carruthers) — The upper part of the broch’s outer wall face just beginning to appear in the Northern part of the site. (📷 Martin Carruthers)

The northern zone

In the overburden zone on the north side of the broch, Ross, Joanne, and Kate have also been making strides in identifying the outer broch wall in this last area of the outer circumference to be investigated.

In the process, they’ve also been finding many pot-boilers – seriously heat-affected cobbles that have, at one time, been baked on a fire before being plunged into water to heat it up.

The cells

In this zone, led by Ole, the team that began to track the new emergent wall on Thursday have now very much established the substance and pretty good quality of this wall. Lots of animal bone and nice stone tools have also been forthcoming.

Overall, the site is settling into a nice pace and rhythm, with some nice finds coming to light. Probably more importantly, detail of the features and buildings are starting to come into sharper focus.

Martin Carruthers
Site director