Neolithic Orkney - The Ring of Brodgar

Orkney is rich in Neolithic sites, and the area between the Ring of Brodgar, the Standing Stones of Stenness, and Maes Howe in particular so. On the landbridge separating Loch Stenness and Loch Harray, the Ness of Brodgar, a Neolithic settlement is being excavated, with cool new finds popping up almost daily. Those guys and gals must love playing in the mud right now. *grin*

Partial view of the Ring of Brodgar
The Ring of Brodgar is the most visible and iconic of those Neolithic sites. It makes for splendid photo motives, too; I got too many to cover by one post. So I'll give you some general information about the ring here, with another post about the role of the site in Neolithic Orkney to follow.

Part of the ring seen from outside
The interior of the ring was disturbed by peat harvesting and has never been excavated. Therefore the monument was not scientifically dated, though it is generally assumed the Ring of Brodgar was built between 2500 and 2000 BC, which puts it in the later period of Neolithic activities on the site. The Standing Stones of Stenness on the other side of the causeway are much older: 5400-4500 BC).

Another view
The Ring of Brodgar has a diametre of about 104 metres (340 ft). Only 36 stones remain today, but there may have been as many as sixty stones once. Several of them had fallen and were re-erected in the 19th century. They vary in heigth from 7 feet (2 metres) to 15 feet (15ft 3 in - 4.7 metres) and are thus smaller than the Stones of Stenness. But the ring itself is pretty large and comes third in the British Isles, after Avebury and Stanton Drew. The famous Stonehenge site is actually a bit smaller than the Ring of Brodgar.

The two largest stones
The Ring of Brodgar is enclosed by a rock-cut ditch (10 metres wide and 3.4 m deep) that brings the diametre to 130 metres. It is crossed by two causeways; a smaller on in the south-east, and a 3.4 metres wide one in the north-west. Interestingly, there is no outer bank made of the material from the trench like at other rings. Some of the material may instead have gone into the several mounds that surround the Ring of Brodgar.

Seen from the ditch
(That path in the foreground is not one of the causeways)
As mentioned above, some fallen stones in the Ring of Brodgar had been re-erected by the Edwardian archaeologists who first researched the monument, though some stones still can be found where they fell at some point in time. One of the standing stones was hit by lightning in 1980. It split and part of it crashed to the ground.

The fallen stone
The name of the ring was recorded as 'Broager' in 1563, but the local Orcadian pronounciation always added a 'd' in the middle which has become part of the official spelling in 2004.

Next time we'll look at the Neolithic landscape and culture of the place.