Skara Brae in brief
Skara Brae lies on the Bay of Skaill, on the west coast of Mainland, the largest of the Orkney islands, off the north coast of Scotland. It is a village of eight stone houses, occupied from about 3180 BC to 2500 BC, which makes it one of the oldest and best preserved Neolithic settlements in Europe. The houses were covered by sand dunes, which protected them. Skara Brae is part of the Heart of Neolithic Orkney World Heritage Site, listed in 1999.
Discovery
In the winter of 1850 a huge storm stripped the grass from a large mound, called Skerrabra, on the land of the laird of Skaill, William Watt. It showed the outline of a group of stone buildings. Watt began digging, but the work stopped. In 1924 another storm damaged the site, and a sea wall was built. The Australian-born archaeologist V. Gordon Childe excavated it from 1928 to 1930, and showed that it was Neolithic.
The houses
- Stone furniture. Because Orkney has little wood, the people built their furniture of flagstones, split from the local sandstone. Each house has a stone dresser opposite the door, box beds on either side of a central hearth, and stone boxes in the floor, perhaps for storing fish bait or limpets.
- Passages and drains. The houses are linked by low, covered passages, and have a simple drainage system, with a drain that may have been used as a toilet.
- Earth walls. The houses were sunk into a mound of waste, midden, which gave insulation against the wind and cold.
Each house is about 40 square metres. Objects found include pottery in a style called Grooved Ware, beads and pendants made from animal teeth and bone, and mysterious carved stone balls, whose purpose is unknown.
Life at Skara Brae
The people farmed cattle and sheep, grew barley and wheat, and gathered shellfish and fish. They also hunted seals and collected whale bones, and used bone and stone tools. The village was probably home to about 50 to 100 people. Why it was abandoned is unknown. The old story of a sudden storm and flight has been replaced by the idea that people left over a period of time.
Neighbours
Close by are other Neolithic sites in the Heart of Neolithic Orkney: the chambered tomb of Maeshowe, with a passage that lines up with the winter sunset, and the stone circles of Brodgar and Stenness. The Ness of Brodgar, a large temple complex dug between 2003 and 2024, shows that Orkney was a centre of innovation in the Neolithic. Some archaeologists think that Orkney may have influenced the building of monuments elsewhere in Britain, such as Stonehenge.
Why it matters
Skara Brae offers a rare view of the domestic life of Neolithic people, because the houses, and the furniture inside them, survive. It shows that people on the edge of Europe had skill, organisation and a rich material culture, 5,000 years ago.
Visiting
Historic Environment Scotland looks after the site, which has a visitor centre, a replica of a house and a path around the village. Skaill House, nearby, has a collection. See also Stonehenge and Newgrange.
Sources
- Childe, V. G. (1931). Skara Brae: A Pictish Village in Orkney. Kegan Paul.
- Clarke, D. V. and Sharples, N. (1985). Settlements and subsistence in the third millennium BC. In Renfrew, C. (ed.), The Prehistory of Orkney. Edinburgh University Press.
- Historic Environment Scotland. historicenvironment.scot, entry for Skara Brae Prehistoric Village.