The Ness of Brodgar excavation has produced tens of thousands of finds – pot, worked stone, flint, decorated stone, pumice, charcoal, not to mention vast quantities of bone and samples.
All of this material holds the story of the Neolithic complex.
We must curate it all to the highest standards, not just for current archaeological science but also for the future, when new techniques will allow more questions to be answered.
Although all of this is under way, we need more funds to complete this mammoth task and this is where Sponsor a Find comes in.
- Periodically we will post details of finds and invite you to sponsor them.
- No limit on the number of people sponsoring each find.
- Sponsor the find just once or make regular donations towards its care.
- Give your sponsorship as a gift to someone else.
- “Collect” types of finds or from the different trenches and structures.
- We’ll send you a sponsorship certificate.
The finds
(Objects from batch 1, batch 2, batch 3 and batch 4 are still available to sponsor)
Fragment of decorated clay cylinder
- Small Find no 47554
- Structure Ten, Trench P
- Found August 1, 2024
This little cylindrical ceramic piece came from beneath Structure Ten and cleaned up very nicely under the tender care of pot specialist, Roy Towers, a few days later.
What was it? That we don’t know. We’re stumped.
Its decoration is fine and varied, and, of course, it’s aggravatingly incomplete, so lots of research to be done to see if any parallels exist on other sites.
Decorated pot sherd
- Small Find no 20483
- Structure One, Trench P
- Found 2014
A beautiful example of decorated pottery, with incised angular motifs within an encircling band and well as impressed circular depressions.
Fragments of polished stone artefact
- Small Find no 48482
- Structure Twenty-Eight (underneath Structure Twelve), Trench P
- Found August 7, 2024
Described by finds hut supervisor Anne as one of great “might-have-beens” of the Ness.
The fragments came from Structure Twenty-Eight and were probably from a beautiful artefact that had badly disintegrated over the millennia. But it had the potential to rival our most beautiful axe, found in 2012.
How we preserve and conserve this lovely thing will be a challenge both technically and financially.
Clay ‘thumb pots’
- Small Find no: multiple
- Mutiple structures across the site
- Found: varied
We have quite a collection of tiny “thumb pots”. What were they for? We’re not sure. Were they to hold paint or pigment?
Whatever their role, many had not been casually discarded but carefully placed and then covered in midden.
Decorated stone slab
- Small Find no 48808
- Structure Thirty-Four, Trench P
- Found August 14, 2024
Stones featuring bands of incised, geometric motifs were a fairly regular occurrence during fieldwork at the Ness. This one, however, stands out because it was decorated on both sides.
As well as the bands pictured, the other side featured an incised “chessboard” pattern of irregular squares covering the entire face.
