Satellite Imagery
Satellite Imagery
HER: Shetland Amenity Trust 253 (None)
NMR: HU 16 SE 2 (253)
SM: None
NGR: HU 1883 6038
X: 418830 Y: 1160380 (OSGB36)
Tradition held that the small precipitous island of Brei Holm, off the E coast of Papa Stour's SE peninsular, was the site of a leper colony, but Raymond Lamb identified this as one of a number monastic sites with a cluster of eight rectangular buildings likely to be of Norse date (1973; 1976); more recent evaluation trenches amongst these buildings have recovered evidence of complex occupation, and two radiocarbon dates indicate it was occupied in at least the 5th-7th centuries AD (Brady and Batey 2008). While not obviously a promontory fort now, a noted feature of the island is the remains of a bank running the length of the landward facade opposite the mainland of Papa Stour, a distance of about 130m, with a possible entrance opening into a cleft in the cliff-line above the strand of beach that now links the island to the mainland at low water. The island is riven with through sea-caves, which accounts for the origin of the channel that now separates it from the mainland, though at what date it became detached is unknown. Though the bank was not trenched and may yet turn out to be a more recent agricultural boundary, it is possible that the occupation of this island originates as a fortified promontory; its interior covers an irregular area currently measuring 120m from N to S by 100m transversely (0.6ha), and was doubtless once rather larger. The grass-grown stone footings of a cluster of eight sub-rectangular buildings are visible on the top of the island.
Citizen Science: ✗
Reliability of Data: Confirmed
Reliability of Interpretation: Unconfirmed
X: -184881 Y: 8472947 (EPSG: 3857)
Longitude: -1.6608102928114634 Latitude: 60.32719411085378 (EPSG:4326)
Country: Scotland
Current County or Unitary Authority: Shetland Islands
Historic County: Shetland
Current Parish/Community/Council/Townland: Walls And Sandness
None
| Extant | ✓ |
| Cropmark | ✗ |
| Likely Destroyed | ✗ |
None
| Woodland | ✗ |
| Commercial Forestry Plantation | ✗ |
| Parkland | ✗ |
| Pasture (Grazing) | ✓ |
| Arable | ✗ |
| Scrub/Bracken | ✗ |
| Bare Outcrop | ✗ |
| Heather/Moorland | ✗ |
| Heath | ✗ |
| Built-up | ✗ |
| Coastal Grassland | ✓ |
| Other | ✗ |
Island
| Contour Fort | ✗ |
| Partial Contour Fort | ✗ |
| Promontory Fort | ✓ |
| Hillslope Fort | ✗ |
| Level Terrain Fort | ✗ |
| Marsh Fort | ✗ |
| Multiple Enclosure Fort | ✗ |
| Hilltop | ✗ |
| Coastal Promontory | ✓ |
| Inland Promontory | ✗ |
| Valley Bottom | ✗ |
| Knoll/Hillock/Outcrop | ✗ |
| Ridge | ✗ |
| Cliff/Plateau-edge/Scarp | ✗ |
| Hillslope | ✗ |
| Lowland | ✗ |
| Spur | ✗ |
Dominant Topographic Feature: None
| North | ✗ |
| Northeast | ✗ |
| East | ✗ |
| Southeast | ✗ |
| South | ✗ |
| Southwest | ✗ |
| West | ✗ |
| Northwest | ✗ |
| Level | ✓ |
Altitude: 15.0m
N/A
The dates clearly point to one period in a long and complex sequence of occupation, though the dates at which this began and ended are unknown. Nor are there any dates for the visible perimeter bank on the landward side.
Reliability: C - Low
| Pre 1200BC | ✗ |
| 1200BC - 800BC | ✗ |
| 800BC - 400BC | ✗ |
| 400BC - AD50 | ✗ |
| AD50 - AD400 | ✗ |
| AD400 - AD 800 | ✓ |
| Post AD800 | ✗ |
| Unknown | ✗ |
| Pre Hillfort: | None |
| Post Hillfort: | None |
| Artefactual: | Pottery probably of 'Pictish' date |
| C14: | Two radiocarbon dates from pot residues |
Photographed by RCAHMS Aerial Survey Programme
| 1st Identified Written Reference (1798): | Noted (Stat Acct, xx, 1798, 100-1) |
| Other (1930): | Description (RCAHMS 1946, iii, 156, no.1704) |
| 1st Identified Map Depiction (1968): | Surveyed at 1:2500 by the OS |
| Other (1973): | Noted by Raymond Lamb (1973, 89-91; 1976, 153; the absence of photographs from the RCAHMS collection suggests he was never able to visit) |
| Earthwork Survey (2000): | By Kevin Brady (Brady and Batey 2008, 5 fig 4) |
| Excavation (2000): | Evaluation (Brady 2000; 2002; Brady and Batey 2008; RCAHMS MS 1069/34 ) |
A cluster of eight stone-founded, sub-rectangular buildings
None
| None | ✓ |
| Spring | ✗ |
| Stream | ✗ |
| Pool | ✗ |
| Flush | ✗ |
| Well | ✗ |
| Other | ✗ |
None
| No Known Features | ✗ |
| Round Stone Structures | ✗ |
| Rectangular Stone Structures | ✓ |
| Curvilinear Platforms | ✗ |
| Other Roundhouse Evidence | ✗ |
| Pits | ✗ |
| Quarry Hollows | ✗ |
| Other | ✗ |
None
| No Known Excavation | ✗ |
| Pits | ✗ |
| Postholes | ✗ |
| Roundhouses | ✗ |
| Rectangular Structures | ✓ |
| Roads/Tracks | ✗ |
| Quarry Hollows | ✗ |
| Other | ✗ |
| Nothing Found | ✗ |
None
| No Known Geophysics | ✓ |
| Pits | ✗ |
| Roundhouses | ✗ |
| Rectangular Structures | ✗ |
| Roads/Tracks | ✗ |
| Quarry Hollows | ✗ |
| Other | ✗ |
| Nothing Found | ✗ |
223 sherds of pottery, worked pumice, cut whalebone, furnace lining and industrial waste, and whetstones
| No Known Finds | ✗ |
| Pottery | ✓ |
| Metal | ✗ |
| Metalworking | ✓ |
| Human Bones | ✗ |
| Animal Bones | ✓ |
| Lithics | ✗ |
| Environmental | ✓ |
| Other | ✓ |
NO APPARENT FEATURES
| APs Not Checked | ✗ |
| None | ✗ |
| Roundhouses | ✗ |
| Rectangular Structures | ✓ |
| Pits | ✗ |
| Postholes | ✗ |
| Roads/Tracks | ✗ |
| Other | ✗ |
See main summary
| 1: | None |
| 2: | None |
Guard Chambers: ✗
Chevaux de Frise: ✗
| 1. Simple Gap (West): | Cleft midway along the W side |
Single bank extending along what may once have been the landward edge of a promontory
| Area 1: | 0.6ha. |
| Total: | 0.6ha. |
Total Footprint Area: Noneha.
None
| ✗ | None |
| ✗ | None |
| NE Quadrant: | 0 |
| SE Quadrant: | 0 |
| SW Quadrant: | 1 |
| NW Quadrant: | 1 |
| Total: | 1 |
| Partial Univallate | ✓ |
| Univallate | ✗ |
| Partial Bivallate | ✗ |
| Bivallate | ✗ |
| Partial Multivallate | ✗ |
| Multivallate | ✗ |
| Unknown | ✗ |
| Partial Univallate | ✗ |
| Univallate | ✗ |
| Partial Bivallate | ✗ |
| Bivallate | ✗ |
| Partial Multivallate | ✗ |
| Multivallate | ✗ |
None
| None | ✗ |
| Earthen Bank | ✓ |
| Stone Wall | ✗ |
| Rubble | ✗ |
| Wall-walk | ✗ |
| Evidence of Timber | ✗ |
| Vitrification | ✗ |
| Other Burning | ✗ |
| Palisade | ✗ |
| Counter Scarp Bank | ✗ |
| Berm | ✗ |
| Unfinished | ✗ |
| Other | ✗ |
Excavations focused on structures within the interior
| None | ✗ |
| Earthen Bank | ✗ |
| Stone Wall | ✗ |
| Murus Duplex | ✗ |
| Timber-framed | ✗ |
| Timber-laced | ✗ |
| Vitrification | ✗ |
| Other Burning | ✗ |
| Palisade | ✗ |
| Counter Scarp Bank | ✗ |
| Berm | ✗ |
| Unfinished | ✗ |
| No Known Excavation | ✗ |
| Other | ✓ |
| ✗ | None |
| ✗ | None |
Number of Ditches: None
| ✗ | None |
Brady, K (2000) Brei Holm Survey and Excavations Papa Stour, Shetland (Data Structure Report). Department of Archaeology, University of Glasgow, Glasgow
Brady, K (2002) 'Brei Holm, Pap Stour: in the footsteps of the papar?'. 69-82 in Crawford, B E (ed) The Papar in the North Atlantic: environment and history. St. Andrews
Brady, K and Batey, C (2008) 'Excavations and Survey on Brei Holm and Maiden Stack, Papa Stour, Shetland'. Scottish Archaeol J 30.1/2 (2008), 1-64
Lamb, R G (1973) 'Coastal settlements of the north'. Scot Archaeol Forum 5 (1973), 76-98
Lamb, R G (1976) 'The Burri Stacks of Culswick, Shetland, and other paired stack-settlements'. Proc Soc Antiq Scot 107 (1975-6), 144-54
RCAHMS (1946) The Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland. Twelfth report with an inventory of the ancient monuments of Orkney and Shetland, 3v. HMSO: Edinburgh
Atlas of Hillforts:
Wikidata:
This work is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0
and should be cited as:
Lock, Gary and Ralston, Ian. 2024. Atlas of Hillforts of Britain and Ireland. Available at: https://hillforts.arch.ox.ac.uk
Document Version 1.1