The Zenith of Iron Age Shetland is a combination of three sites in

Shetland Shetland, also called the Shetland Islands and formerly Zetland, is a subarctic archipelago in Scotland lying between Orkney, the Faroe Islands and Norway. It is the northernmost region of the United Kingdom. The islands lie about to the n ...

that have applied to be on the United Kingdom "Tentative List" of possible nominations for the

UNESCO The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) aimed at promoting world peace and security through international coope ...

World Heritage Programme list of sites of outstanding

cultural Culture () is an umbrella term which encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and norms found in human societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, customs, capabilities, and habits of the individuals in these groups.T ...

natural Nature, in the broadest sense, is the physical world or universe. "Nature" can refer to the phenomena of the physical world, and also to life in general. The study of nature is a large, if not the only, part of science. Although humans ar ...

importance to the common

heritage Heritage may refer to: History and society * A heritage asset is a preexisting thing of value today ** Cultural heritage is created by humans ** Natural heritage is not * Heritage language Biology * Heredity, biological inheritance of physical c ...

humankind Humans (''Homo sapiens'') are the most abundant and widespread species of primate, characterized by bipedalism and exceptional cognitive skills due to a large and complex brain. This has enabled the development of advanced tools, culture, ...

. The application was made by the Shetland Amenity Trust in 2010, and in 2011 the site became one of 11 successful UK applications to join the Tentative List, three of them from Scotland."Sites make Unesco world heritage status bid shortlist"
(22 Mar 2011) BBC Scotland. Retrieved 22 Mar 2011.

Application

The application for consideration of "Mousa, Old Scatness and Jarlshof: The Zenith of Iron Age Shetland" as a future

World Heritage Site A World Heritage Site is a landmark or area with legal protection by an international convention administered by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). World Heritage Sites are designated by UNESCO for ...

was made after the UK government called for nominations for entries to form the UK's new Tentative List of sites. The Tentative List is used as the candidate list by

(United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) when considering new sites for inscription. A list of 38 applications in total was announced in July 2010, after which an independent panel of experts was to assess them, with a view to paring it down and submitting it as the UK's new Tentative List to UNESCO in 2011. Other Scottish sites on the application list included

Arbroath Abbey Arbroath Abbey, in the Scottish town of Arbroath, was founded in 1178 by King William the Lion for a group of Tironensian Benedictine monks from Kelso Abbey. It was consecrated in 1197 with a dedication to the deceased Saint Thomas Becket, who ...

; Buildings of

Charles Rennie Mackintosh Charles Rennie Mackintosh (7 June 1868 – 10 December 1928) was a Scottish architect, designer, water colourist and artist. His artistic approach had much in common with European Symbolism. His work, alongside that of his wife Margaret Macdo ...

Glasgow Glasgow ( ; sco, Glesca or ; gd, Glaschu ) is the most populous city in Scotland and the fourth-most populous city in the United Kingdom, as well as being the 27th largest city by population in Europe. In 2020, it had an estimated popu ...

; and

St Andrews St Andrews ( la, S. Andrea(s); sco, Saunt Aundraes; gd, Cill Rìmhinn) is a town on the east coast of Fife in Scotland, southeast of Dundee and northeast of Edinburgh. St Andrews had a recorded population of 16,800 , making it Fife's fourt ...

, Medieval Burgh and Links, but only the

Forth Bridge The Forth Bridge is a cantilever railway bridge across the Firth of Forth in the east of Scotland, west of central Edinburgh. Completed in 1890, it is considered a symbol of Scotland (having been voted Scotland's greatest man-made wonder in ...

and the Flow Country of

Caithness Caithness ( gd, Gallaibh ; sco, Caitnes; non, Katanes) is a historic county, registration county and lieutenancy area of Scotland. Caithness has a land boundary with the historic county of Sutherland to the west and is otherwise bounded ...

and

Sutherland Sutherland ( gd, Cataibh) is a historic county, registration county and lieutenancy area in the Highlands of Scotland. Its county town is Dornoch. Sutherland borders Caithness and Moray Firth to the east, Ross-shire and Cromartyshire (later c ...

joined Shetland in the short list for future application.

Secretary of State for Scotland The secretary of state for Scotland ( gd, Rùnaire Stàite na h-Alba; sco, Secretar o State fir Scotland), also referred to as the Scottish secretary, is a Secretary of State (United Kingdom), secretary of state in the Government of the Unit ...

Michael Moore Michael Francis Moore (born April 23, 1954) is an American filmmaker, author and left-wing activist. His works frequently address the topics of globalization and capitalism. Moore won the 2002 Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature for ' ...

said: "All these sites have something special that draws people to them and they are recognisable across the world. I am delighted that so many of Scotland’s attractions have stepped forward and answered the UK government’s call for world heritage status. John Penrose, the Minister for Tourism & Heritage at the

Department for Culture, Media and Sport , type = Department , logo = Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport logo.svg , logo_width = , logo_caption = , seal = , seal_width = , seal_caption = , picture = Gove ...

also said: "what all 38 sites have in common is a wow factor and a cultural resonance that makes them real contenders...". The Shetland Amenity Trust is the formal applicant for the Zenith application. "UK Tentative List of Potential Sites for World Heritage Nomination: Application form"
(pdf) Department for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport. Retrieved 27 Dec 2010. Val Turner, a Trust archaeologist said: "Our sites are truly amazing. If we get World Heritage site status it will increase the numbers of visitors and help the island community value what it has. We are often seen as a peripheral and neglected area on the edge of the mainland, but we are in the heart of Iron Age and Viking history." The Shetland site falls under the UNESCO definition of a "serial property" that includes component parts related because they belong to "the same historico – cultural group". Assistance to the council is available from LAWHF - Local Authorities Working Together for World Heritage. Established in 1996, this organisation represents communities across the UK "which have existing or potential World Heritage Sites within their areas."

Sites

A variety of different archaeological phenomena have been found at the sites, and all three include the remains of round towers known as

broch A broch is an Iron Age drystone hollow-walled structure found in Scotland. Brochs belong to the classification "complex Atlantic roundhouse" devised by Scottish archaeologists in the 1980s. Their origin is a matter of some controversy. Origin ...

Mousa

The island of Mousa has been uninhabited since the 19th century and is best known for the Broch of Mousa, an

Iron Age The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity. It was preceded by the Stone Age ( Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic) and the Bronze Age ( Chalcolithic). The concept has been mostly ...

round tower which is the tallest still standing in the world and amongst the best-preserved

prehistoric Prehistory, also known as pre-literary history, is the period of human history between the use of the first stone tools by hominins 3.3 million years ago and the beginning of recorded history with the invention of writing systems. The us ...

buildings in

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...

. One of over 500 brochs built throughout Scotland, it is thought to have been constructed circa 100 BC. The site is managed by

Historic Scotland Historic Scotland ( gd, Alba Aosmhor) was an executive agency of the Scottish Office and later the Scottish Government from 1991 to 2015, responsible for safeguarding Scotland's built heritage, and promoting its understanding and enjoyment ...

. Mousa lies about off the east coast of the Mainland some north of Old Scatness. According to the tentative list application the broch and environs hosts the world's largest colony of storm petrels and "nowhere else in the world are petrels so accessible to visitors".

Old Scatness

Old Scatness Old Scatness is an archeological site on the Ness of Burgi, near the village of Scatness, parish of Dunrossness in the south end of Mainland, Shetland, near Sumburgh Airport and consists of medieval, Viking, Pictish, and Iron Age remains. It ha ...

is an

archeological site An archaeological site is a place (or group of physical sites) in which evidence of past activity is preserved (either prehistoric or historic or contemporary), and which has been, or may be, investigated using the discipline of archaeology an ...

in the south of the

Shetland Mainland The Mainland is the main island of Shetland, Scotland. The island contains Shetland's only burgh, Lerwick, and is the centre of Shetland's ferry and air connections. Geography It has an area of , making it the third-largest Scottish island ...

, near

Sumburgh Airport Sumburgh Airport is the main airport serving Shetland in Scotland. It is located on the southern tip of the mainland, in the parish of Dunrossness, south of Lerwick. The airport is owned by Highlands and Islands Airports Limited (HIAL) and ...

consisting of

mediaeval In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire a ...

Viking Vikings ; non, víkingr is the modern name given to seafaring people originally from Scandinavia (present-day Denmark, Norway and Sweden), who from the late 8th to the late 11th centuries raided, pirated, traded and se ...

Pictish Pictish is the extinct Brittonic language spoken by the Picts, the people of eastern and northern Scotland from Late Antiquity to the Early Middle Ages. Virtually no direct attestations of Pictish remain, short of a limited number of geographica ...

, and

Bronze Bronze is an alloy consisting primarily of copper, commonly with about 12–12.5% tin and often with the addition of other metals (including aluminium, manganese, nickel, or zinc) and sometimes non-metals, such as phosphorus, or metalloids suc ...

and Iron Age remains. It has been a settlement for thousands of years, each new generation adding buildings, and leveling off old ones. A broch was discovered in 1975, which has been dated to 300 BC. The site was first unearthed during construction work for airport improvements in the late 1970s. The site is managed by the

Shetland Amenity Trust The Shetland Amenity Trust is a charitable trust based in Shetland, Scotland. It was formed in 1983. Among the Trust's aims are to preserve and protect the architectural heritage of Shetland and it owns and operates many historical buildings. I ...

Jarlshof

Jarlshof Jarlshof ( ) is the best-known prehistoric archaeological site in Shetland, Scotland. It lies in Sumburgh, Mainland, Shetland and has been described as "one of the most remarkable archaeological sites ever excavated in the British Isles". It co ...

lies close to Old Scatness near the southern tip of the Shetland mainland and has been described as "one of the most remarkable archaeological sites ever excavated in the British Isles". It contains remains dating from 2500 BC up to the 17th century. The

Bronze Age The Bronze Age is a historic period, lasting approximately from 3300 BC to 1200 BC, characterized by the use of bronze, the presence of writing in some areas, and other early features of urban civilization. The Bronze Age is the second pri ...

settlers left evidence of several small oval houses with thick stone walls and various artefacts including a decorated bone object. The Iron Age ruins include several different types of structure including a broch and a defensive wall around the site. The Pictish period provides various works of art including a painted pebble and a symbol stone. The Viking-age ruins make up the largest such site visible anywhere in Britain and include a

longhouse A longhouse or long house is a type of long, proportionately narrow, single-room building for communal dwelling. It has been built in various parts of the world including Asia, Europe, and North America. Many were built from timber and often re ...

; excavations provided numerous tools and a detailed insight into life in Shetland at this time. The most visible structures on the site are the walls of the Scottish period fortified manor house, which inspired the name "Jarlshof" that first appears in '' The Pirate'', an 1821 novel by

Walter Scott Sir Walter Scott, 1st Baronet (15 August 1771 – 21 September 1832), was a Scottish novelist, poet, playwright and historian. Many of his works remain classics of European and Scottish literature, notably the novels '' Ivanhoe'', '' Rob Roy ...

. The site is in the care of Historic Scotland. Old scatness 2

References

* Armit, I. (2003) ''Towers in the North: The Brochs of Scotland''. Stroud. Tempus. *

Ordnance Survey Ordnance Survey (OS) is the national mapping agency for Great Britain. The agency's name indicates its original military purpose (see ordnance and surveying), which was to map Scotland in the wake of the Jacobite rising of 1745. There was a ...

(2010
"Get-a-map"
Retrieved August 2010.

Notes

{{World Heritage Sites in the United Kingdom Protected areas of Shetland History of Shetland 2011 establishments in Scotland Iron Age sites in Scotland Buildings and structures in Shetland