Mapping the Edge of the World | RCAHMS Return to St Kilda

Today’s guest blogger is Mary Bones. Being the day of rest, some party members had an easier day in the village area while six went to the far north-west end, to the Cambir, to view Soay from the nearest point and to record a probable bothy site on the south side of the Cambir At 1.00, we were moving along the steep grassy slope on the eastern face of the Mullach Bi ridge, near the summit of Mullach Bi, and cautiously looking over the precipitous western face to the great boulder field of Carn Mor below, scene of intensive labours over the previous days.  As we crossed the steep slope we discussed a range of topics: from the variety of structures on Carn Mor through hut circles to conditions at our various places of work – health and safety, rules for working near cliff edges, provision of protective clothing provision, problems with loss of experience as people retire, age profiles . . . . meanwhile Boreray and its attendant stacs, Stac Li and Stac an Armin came into view from behind Conachair, with a curious cloud just hanging over the island, similar to the cloud caps on Mullach Mor and Conachair. Stac Li is so white on top and all its ledges are white, with gannets and their accumulated droppings. In the warm weather some of the plants have come into flower – on a rock where no sheep can reach woodrush and stitchwort were thriving; primroses and roseroot in sheltered places. The sheep were more anxious in this area, being much less used to people than those in the village area, and they moved away when we were still some distance from them. In the cool northerly wind and after a late breakfast we kept going until after 2.00, waiting to have our pieces once we found a sheltered site in the sun near the Cambir, with a view looking across to Soay.

Today should be our last day in Carn Mor. Carn Mor translates from the Gaelic as ‘big rocks’. Between 12.00 and 13.00 hours, todays dedicated blog hour, we spent on the very far west side of the boulder field and found more rock shelters and a an interesting building. I’m sure if certain members of the archaeological community saw the buildings they would snort down their noses at us/it. However, I will now describe the building, as it should be written in Commissionese. I hope that this will serve to illustrate how a site is found, mapped and then the description gets into the National Monuments Record of Scotland. NF89NE NEW SITENF8011 899305HarrisSt Kilda, Carn MorBuildingThere is a building at the NW end of Carn Mor, on a grassy shelf, to the S of the cliffs at the foot of Mullach Bi. This subrectangular building is aligned across the slope, NW to SE. The entrance is in the SE end. It measures 4.5m in length by 1.5m in breadth, within boulder walls, up to 1.3m in height. There are occasional edge set boulders within the inner wall face. The upslope, NE side wall is revetted into the slope and the downhill side wall measures 0.4m in height and includes a boulder 3.3m in length. The boulders in the interior of the building have fallen from the walls. Springing from the S corner of the building is a rough boulder wall that extends 4m SE. There is a cell immediately to the NE of the building that measures ….. I also hope that this helps to illustrate how we describe sites and but also what we could do with the data, if we sent it down the phone line and into the public domain within certain timescales, having been through editorial and quality control. Talking of timescales it’s 13.00. Tomorrows guest blogger will be Mary Harman.

Today should be our last day in Carn Mor. Carn Mor translates from the Gaelic as ‘big rocks’. Between 12.00 and 13.00 hours, todays dedicated blog hour, we spent on the very far west side of the boulder field and found more rock shelters and a an interesting building. I’m sure if certain members of the archaeological community saw the buildings they would snort down their noses at us/it. However, I will now describe the building, as it should be written in Commissionese. I hope that this will serve to illustrate how a site is found, mapped and then the description gets into the National Monuments Record of Scotland. NF89NE (NEW SITE)NF8011 899305HarrisSt Kilda, Carn MorBuildingThere is a building at the NW end of Carn Mor, on a grassy shelf, to the S of the cliffs at the foot of Mullach Bi. This subrectangular building is aligned across the slope, NW to SE. The entrance is in the SE end. It measures 4.5m in length by 1.5m in breadth, within boulder walls, up to 1.3m in height. There are occasional edge set boulders within the inner wall face. The upslope, NE side wall is revetted into the slope and the downhill side wall measures 0.4m in height and includes a boulder 3.3m in length. The boulders in the interior of the building have fallen from the walls. Springing from the S corner of the building is a rough boulder wall that extends 4m SE. There is a cell immediately to the NE of the building that measures ….. I hope that this helps to illustrate how we describe sites and but also what we could do with the data, if we sent it down the phone line and into the public domain within certain timescales, having been through editorial and quality control. Talking of timescales it’s 13.00. Tomorrows guest blogger will be Mary Harman.

PS Thank you for all the comments

Angela's bags turned up.

Anya's cake was fantastic

Puffin is definietly worse than strawberry bootlaces (I havent eaten it really)

Placebo is a young person pop band not a homeopathic tablet.

We carefully clamber up and down the grassy slopes and then climb around the vast boulder field that is called Carn Mor. Climbing down into Carn Mor takes a long time because it is very steep, and you have to avoid the odd Soay sheep. Sheep are good guides on these steep slopes as they tend to know how to climb around here. They live here, have their lambs here and die here. Most of them wander around on the smallest of ledges, which if you are careful, act as good pathfinders down to the boulder field.  Part of our job here is to find the smallest and perhaps most ephemeral of archaeological remains that are known as rock shelters. At best they comprise walls of loose rocks, about ‘head’ size, that block the entrances to low voids under boulders, about ‘Landrover’ sized. At worst they are nothing more than three stones leaning together and it takes a lot of chin rubbing and special pleading for it to be included. There are lots of them to be found and even more ‘possibles’ to be dismissed.  So far, with the help of a hero of mine called Mary Harman, we found, photographed, mapped to millimetre accuracy and wrote descriptions of over 50 rock shelters. These sites are not necessarily prehistoric in date, despite their name and the evocation of Mesolithic hunter-gatherers living in rock shelters. They are likely to be of relatively recent date and have been used by bird hunters. Did I mention the birds? Carn Mor is not only a geological phenomena, it is also a huge puffin, manx shearwater, Leach’s petrel and storm petrel colony. They nest in burrows and the voids amongst the boulders provide excellent burrows. We know that the St Kildans used to go down there and hunt the birds at night. They would catch the birds and then stash their catch in the shelters, some of which are not large enough for people to get into.