After one final dig, Ness of Brodgar is to be covered up to protect it for future generations
Robin McKie Science editor
Sat 11 May 2024 10.00 EDT
Last modified on Sun 12 May 2024 05.34 EDT
In a few weeks, archaeologists will gather at the Ness of Brodgar in Orkney and for the next two months excavate at one of Europe’s greatest prehistoric sites. For the last 20 summers, scientists and volunteers have dug here, revealing wonders that include 5,000-year-old remains of temples, hearths, a ceramic figurine, and elegant pottery.
Then, on 16 August, the team will down their trowels and brushes for the last time. Soil will be tipped over the ancient walls they have striven to uncover over the past two decades, the ground across the Ness will be returfed and the site returned, in perpetuity, to its former status: an anonymous green field.
It seems an extraordinary decision, one akin to tipping mounds of earth over Stonehenge to hide it from future generations. Nevertheless, archaeologists are adamant that this year’s dig at the Ness should be their final excavation there for the foreseeable future.
“What we have discovered is just the tip of a huge archaeological iceberg,” said Nick Card, who has directed excavations at the Ness since the site was revealed in 2003. “There are more than 100 buildings here. Underneath the most recent ones lie countless older edifices.
“We want to leave these later buildings intact. We want to avoid destroying them in order to get at those that lie underneath. So we are going to leave that task to future archaeologists who will have the benefit, we hope, of new technologies. As it is, we have amassed a vast collection of finds from the Ness that we must now study in laboratories and museums.”
More:
https://www.theguardian.com/science/article/2024/may/11/orkney-ness-of-brodgar-neolithic-site-reburied-after-excavation
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