Satellite Imagery
Satellite Imagery
HER: Shetland Amenity Trust 44 (None)
NMR: HU 69 SE 1 (1421)
SM: 3870
NGR: HU 6715 9315
X: 467156 Y: 1193153 (OSGB36)
The Outer Brough of Strandburgh Ness, is an island separated from the mainland of Fetlar by a yawning chasm some 12m wide at its narrowest and 30m deep. Now it is accessible only from the sea, but in times past it must have been connected by a neck towards its WNW end, where the remains of a wall have been recorded along the edge of the cliff. Although not recorded as antiquities, OS surveyors preparing the 1st edition OS 6-inch map (Shetland 1878, sheet 13) evidently landed on the island and depicted a cluster of buildings on its summit and upper E slope, and these were subsequently resurveyed in more detail with a series of other buildings lower down on the E by the OS in 1970. The island measures some 200m in length from E to W by 55m in breadth, sloping down to E and W to either side of a central summit, but whereas the W end and N and S flanks are entirely cliff-girt, on the E the rock outcrops descend more gradually into the sea. Upwards of seventeen stone-founded buildings are shown on the OS plan, forming a series of conjoined clusters. As at Brei Holm, Papa Stour (Atlas No.4197) the Outer Brough was identified by Raymond Lamb as one of a number monastic sites with a cluster of rectangular buildings likely to be of Norse date (1973; 1976), though the rather earlier chronology established there and the possibility that it was once an enclosed promontory should also be borne in mind here, where there is also a wall along the cliff-edge facing the mainland. If a promontory enclosure, the grass-grown upper slopes of its interior currently extend to about 0.74ha, and including the outcrops descending to the sea on the increases it to 0.87ha. Here, however, there are similar buildings on the Inner Brough (Atlas No.4196), a much larger peninsular to which access at the neck is barred by a substantial bank.
Citizen Science: ✗
Reliability of Data: Confirmed
Reliability of Interpretation: Unconfirmed
X: -86258 Y: 8538241 (EPSG: 3857)
Longitude: -0.7748652054129908 Latitude: 60.616271099166525 (EPSG:4326)
Country: Scotland
Current County or Unitary Authority: Shetland Islands
Historic County: Shetland
Current Parish/Community/Council/Townland: Fetlar
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 | ✗ |
This is an offshore island bit must omce have been attached to the mainland
| 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: 37.0m
N/A
In the absence of excavation, there are neither stratified artefacts nor radiocarbon dates to provide a chronology for the wall at the W end
Reliability: D - None
| Pre 1200BC | ✗ |
| 1200BC - 800BC | ✗ |
| 800BC - 400BC | ✗ |
| 400BC - AD50 | ✗ |
| AD50 - AD400 | ✗ |
| AD400 - AD 800 | ✗ |
| Post AD800 | ✗ |
| Unknown | ✓ |
| Pre Hillfort: | None |
| Post Hillfort: | None |
| Morphology/Earthwork/Typology: | The form of the buildings has led to an interpretation that this is a monastic site of Norse date (Lamb 1973; 1976) |
Photographed by RCAHMS Aerial Survey Programme in 2014
| 1st Identified Map Depiction (1878): | Cluster of buildings shown without annotation on the 1st edition OS 6-inch map (Shetland 1878, sheet 13), but recorded in the Name Book as 'Pictish Houses' (Shetland No.12, p 13) |
| Other (1930): | Noted but inaccessible (RCAHMS 1946, iii, 62-3, no.1240) |
| Earthwork Survey (1970): | Plan at 1:1250 by the OS |
| Other (1970): | Inaccessible to Raymond Lamb (1973, 87-93, fig 4; 1976, 152) |
| Other (1976): | Scheduled |
The grass-grown footings of upwards of seventeen sub-rectangular buildings, mainly disposed in conjoined clusters across the E slope
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 | ✗ |
None
| 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
| 0: | None |
| 2: | Unknown: either across a land-bridge at the W end, or by sea from the E |
Guard Chambers: ✗
Chevaux de Frise: ✗
A wall extends along the landward edge of the island, where it is now separated from the mainland by a chasm 12m wide and 30m deep
| Area 1: | 0.74ha. |
| Total: | 0.74ha. |
Total Footprint Area: 0.87ha.
None
| ✗ | None |
| ✗ | None |
| NE Quadrant: | 0 |
| SE Quadrant: | 0 |
| SW Quadrant: | 1 |
| NW Quadrant: | 0 |
| Total: | 1 |
| Partial Univallate | ✓ |
| Univallate | ✗ |
| Partial Bivallate | ✗ |
| Bivallate | ✗ |
| Partial Multivallate | ✗ |
| Multivallate | ✗ |
| Unknown | ✗ |
| Partial Univallate | ✗ |
| Univallate | ✗ |
| Partial Bivallate | ✗ |
| Bivallate | ✗ |
| Partial Multivallate | ✗ |
| Multivallate | ✗ |
Thickness unknown
| None | ✗ |
| Earthen Bank | ✗ |
| Stone Wall | ✗ |
| Rubble | ✓ |
| Wall-walk | ✗ |
| Evidence of Timber | ✗ |
| Vitrification | ✗ |
| Other Burning | ✗ |
| Palisade | ✗ |
| Counter Scarp Bank | ✗ |
| Berm | ✗ |
| Unfinished | ✗ |
| Other | ✗ |
None
| 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 |
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
Name Book, Ordnance Survey Object Name Books (6 inch and 1/2500 scale); available https://www.scotlandsplaces.gov.uk/
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