One of the things that really bugged Rupert and I while we were filming ‘Standing with Stones’ was the absence of evidence of activity that we could relate to as ordinary human beings. Stone circles, standing stones, henges and even burials don’t tell us what people were doing with these places. We have to bend our imagination to create reasonable interpretations that have actual people inhabit them in a way we can relate to. It was only when we got to Orkney that we had the feeling we maybe had access to something in common with our ancestors from 5,000 years ago.
We were very lucky to be granted access to film in the ‘houses’ of Skara Brae, the famous Neolithic stone built village that was revealed in 1850 after a storm stripped away the grass that had been hiding it for thousands of years. Visitors are kept to the defined walkways and although this affords splendid views down into the dwellings with their fireplaces, beds, cupboards and shelves, no one is allowed to descend into the rooms themselves. Which is why it was such a privilege to be able to actually enter one of the dwellings and for a few minutes inhabit a 5,000 year-old living space.
In fact, even then, I should not have been able to do what I’m doing in the picture. When Rupert and I were granted permission to film, we asked if would be OK to descend into the room we had been told we could film to do a quick recce to work out moves for Rupert and camera angles. It turned out there was a misunderstanding and only Rupert had been given permission to go into the room and I and the camera would have to stay on the walkway to film down. But by then it was too late and I’d had my moment!
However, the point is that it is very, very rarely that we are afforded real glimpses into the lives of our distant ancestors but it seems that now more opportunity for real contact with that ancient world has been discovered – again on Orkney.
Well, not exactly on Orkney but on one of Orkney’s northern isles, Westray. Excavation of a settlement at the Links of Noitland points to a people that farmed and fished together and probably had their own village hall.
From an article in the Times Online, September 19, 2009:
Graeme Wilson, who is leading the excavation of the site, said that he hoped to learn how “ordinary, run-of-the-mill people” lived 5,000 years ago. It is thought that up to six extended families lived in Links of Noltland in three to four buildings and that they farmed crops such as barley, and kept livestock, including cattle and sheep.
“The most unusual thing about the site is that everything is in context,” he said. “We have the field systems, the houses, and everything in between. Everything seems to have been sealed and preserved by the sand dunes. Now they are being stripped away, leaving a fragment of a landscape.”
Mr Wilson’s team has been focusing on a building that sits on an escarpment overlooking the settlement. It would have been about 20 metres wide and had walls that were about three metres thick.
“We don’t know what it is for but we don’t think it is anything to do with conflict,” Mr Wilson said. “It is much more likely to be a communal building, like a village hall, where people could come together.”
Isn’t it strange that these remote islands are throwing up the most complete picture of European Neolithic life that we have. Also consider that the stone circle of Brodgar is the third largest stone circle in the British Isles and that the 200ft diameter circle of Stennes is barely a quarter of a mile away from that. And three quarters of a mile away from that we have one of the finest architectural achievements of prehistoric Europe – the Chambered Cairn of Maes Howe. All the products of a compact fishing community? Somehow I can’t get my head round that!
