Broch of Gurness

The Orcadian artist Robert Rendall identified the hill "Knap of Aikerness" as a broch in 1929. Archaeologists excavated the Iron Age site in the late 1930s.

With a diameter of 20 m, the Broch of Gurness is very large. It has been preserved up to a height of 3.5 m. The stone tower, that probably once reached a height of 10 - 13m., and settlement are surrounded by a triple wall of ditches and walls. Its interior is divided into sections by upright slabs. The tower features two skins of drystone walls, with stone-floored galleries in between. These are accessed by steps. Stone ledges suggest that there was once an upper storey with a timber floor. The roof would have been thatched, surrounded by a wall walk linked by stairs to the ground floor. The broch features two hearths and a subterranean stone cistern with steps leading down into it.

The broch continued to be inhabited while it began to collapse and the original structures were altered. The cistern was filled in and the interior was repartitioned. The remains of numerous small stone dwellings with small yards and sheds can be found between the inner ditch and the tower.

It is thought that settlement at the broch continued into the 5th century AD, the Pictish times. By that time the broch was not used anymore and some of its stones were reused to build smaller dwellings on top of the earlier buildings. In the 9th century, a Viking woman was buried at the site in a stone-lined grave with two bronze brooches and a sickle and knife made from iron. Other finds suggest that Viking men were buried here too.