Sun-Stone.....
by Bernie Bell - 09:07 on 04 February 2025
Sun-Stone…..
Orkney featured in the most recent series of ‘Digging for Britain’, which we’re recording and watched the Orkney episode a few days ago.
The first Orkney dig visited by Alice Roberts was the recently discovered tomb at Blomuir, Holm which I mentioned in my review of the Orkney Archaeology Review 2024 (which is still available from the Orkney Archaeology Society on-line shop..…https://shop.orkneyarchaeologysociety.org.uk/product/oas-2024-review-issue-9/ ) ..…
“Hugo Anderson-Whymark and Vicki Cummings ‘Blomuir: A lost passage tomb found - preliminary results from the first season of excavation at the Neolithic chambered tomb at Blomuir, Holm Orkney 2023’ tells the reader of the initial excavation at a newly discovered site…..
This site provides another link in the network of settlements in South Ronaldsay, and Orkney, in the Neolithic. Pieces of the puzzle, fitting together to make a more complete picture.”
I also included a link to a talk given by Hugo Anderson-Whymark…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIUYajvT1Fo
The second Orkney site featured was The Cairns, South Ronaldsay. I’ve visited and written of The Cairns many times, but the ‘Digging for Britain’ episode included something which was new to me. Site Director Martin Carruthers explained how sunrise on the Autumn Equinox would send a beam of light across the sea, down the entrance passage of the Broch, would ‘clip’ an upright stone in the central chamber, go through the hole in the Standing Stone, and illuminate the stone slab behind it.
What struck me about this is…..in the Neolithic, evidence suggests that people looked to the skies – by the Iron Age, they tended to look into the earth. And yet, if that is what happened at The Cairns at the Equinox, they were bringing the sun into the Broch – right into the heart of their dwelling place and their community.
For me, this presents a whole new aspect of how the Iron Age folk were seeing their connection with LIFE - with all that IS – they were still bringing light into dark places.
When we visit The Cairns this year, if I possibly can, I’ll try to somehow stand approximately along a line equivalent to the line of light and take a picture of the Holy Stone, from that angle.
I’ve photographed it previously, and mentioned the alignment with the opening of the souterrain…
http://www.spanglefish.com/berniesblog/blog.asp?blogid=16370
….but this idea of the line of light, opens up new possibilities.
A sun-circle, on a stone, in the heart of the Broch – ‘Oh and it makes me wonder’.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m0026rg9/digging-for-britain-series-12-3-island-treasures
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