Old Scatness 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 ...

on Scat Ness, near the village of Scatness, in the parish of Dunrossness in the south end of Mainland,

Shetland Shetland (until 1975 spelled Zetland), also called the Shetland Islands, is an archipelago in Scotland lying between Orkney, the Faroe Islands, and Norway, marking the northernmost region of the United Kingdom. The islands lie about to the ...

Scotland Scotland is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It contains nearly one-third of the United Kingdom's land area, consisting of the northern part of the island of Great Britain and more than 790 adjac ...

, near Sumburgh Airport. It consists of

medieval In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the 5th to the late 15th centuries, similarly to the post-classical period of World history (field), global history. It began with the fall of the West ...

Viking Vikings were 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 settled throughout parts of Europe.Roesdahl, pp. 9� ...

Pictish Pictish is an extinct Brittonic Celtic 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 geog ...

, and

Iron Age The Iron Age () is the final epoch of the three historical Metal Ages, after the Chalcolithic and Bronze Age. It has also been considered as the final age of the three-age division starting with prehistory (before recorded history) and progre ...

remains and has been a settlement for thousands of years, each new generation adding buildings, and levelling off old ones. Among the discoveries is an

broch In archaeology, a broch is an British Iron Age, Iron Age drystone hollow-walled structure found in Scotland. Brochs belong to the classification "complex Atlantic roundhouse" devised by Scottish archaeologists in the 1980s. Brochs are round ...

, the Ness of Burgi fort.

Discovery and excavation

The site was first unearthed during construction work for airport improvements in the late 1970s. An arc of the broch wall was exposed in one side of a green mound during the building of the perimeter road at the airport at Sumburgh Head. Since 1995,

University of Bradford The University of Bradford is a public research university located in the city of Bradford, West Yorkshire, England. A plate glass university, it received its royal charter in 1966, making it the 40th university to be created in Britain, but ...

staff and students, professional archaeologists and local volunteers have been excavating the site and cataloging the finds. Excavations have uncovered a multi-period settlement with

, wheelhouses and later dwellings. The site is managed by the Shetland Amenity Trust. In the summer, costumed guides provide tours of the site and the replica Iron Age and Pictish buildings. The visitor centre also includes exhibits, and there are demonstrations of ancient crafts.

The broch

The broch still stands several metres high with a battered outer wall face. It stands at the centre of the settlement and seems to have at least three major phases of use. The first phase saw the building of the primary tower. The second phase saw a rebuilding of the broch interior which involved the addition of a secondary skin to the south and east part of the inner broch wall, and a set of radial piers to form a new interior structure. In the third phase another building was constructed inside the broch, consisting of six or more curvilinear cells clustered around a central area, with a corridor leading out towards the broch wall to the east.

Structures west of the broch

To the western (seaward) side of the broch the limits of the settlement have been established. The dominant feature was a large circular aisled roundhouse (Structure 12) around 10 metres in diameter. The walls of this building stand over 2 metres high in places. West of this was a second building, which is less well preserved. South of Structure 12 was another roundhouse (Structure 14) of a similar size but oval in shape. North of Structure 12 was another range of buildings, including one with a set of seven (possibly originally eight or more) small 'cupboards' let into the interior wall. East of this building and closer to the broch, a circular inward-tilting arrangement of stones appeared to be the partially collapsed top of the roof of a corbelled cell.

Structures east of the broch

A slightly later roundhouse (Structure 21), east of the broch, had the greatest diameter of any of the buildings on site: approximately 12 metres internally. It seems originally to have had short piers, later rebuilt as long thin ones. There was also a later wheelhouse to the southeast of the broch (Structure 11). A multi-cellular semi-subterranean building (Structure 5) was inserted into the fill of Structure 21, and is considered to be characteristic of '

' architecture.

Later use

The later Iron Age buildings have yielded

-period artefacts suggesting Norse reuse of the buildings. The site was also used in post-medieval times with a 17th-century barn and corn-drier having been discovered. On the north side of the site was a crofthouse of mid-19th-century construction.

References

External links

Old Scatness
at Shetland Heritage
Old Scatness
Shetland Amenity Trust * {{authority control 1st-millennium BC architecture in Scotland Celtic archaeological sites History of Shetland Archaeological sites in Shetland Bronze Age sites in Scotland Brochs in Shetland Picts Viking Age populated places Viking Age sites in Scotland University of Bradford Former populated places in Scotland Archaeological museums in Scotland Museums in Shetland Scheduled monuments in Shetland Mainland, Shetland