What is a broch? Brochs are perhaps the most exotic and mysterious features of British Archaeology, tall towers dating from the Iron Age and existing only in the North and West of Scotland. In this issue we provide some new answers to this hoary old question. Mike Parker Pearson is one of the leading theoretical archaeologists, and in his excavations at Dun Vulan he not only looks at the broch itself, but also looks to see how it fits into the landscape.
This is the second issue of Current Archaeology devoted to the Western Isles (The Outer Hebrides). In CA147 we looked at discoveries in the north, on Lewis and North Uist. Here we discuss the work in the south on South Uist and on Barra, mostly the work of Sheffield University.
We begin by looking at Barra, the southernmost isle where Keith Branigan describes the attraction of Island Archaeology and the different types of neolithic monuments found in the various Isles.
Going to the other end of the chronological range we look at the newly launched Flora MacDonald Project. Flora MacDonald was the young lady who, following the battle of Culloden in 1746, sailed Bonny Prince Charlie ‘over the sea to Skye’. Her village in South Uist is well known and the project aims to find the house where she lived.
This leads on to our first article on Canadian Archaeology, for, following the Highland Clearances, many of the inhabitants of the Hebrides emigrated to New Scotland (Nova Scotia) in Canada and the project seeks to follow the fortunes of the emigrants in the New World.
Even more exotic is the story of the ‘curse’ of the Howmore Stone.
This is a seventeenth century armorial carved stone which disappeared from its home in South Uist and was discovered several years later in a bedsit near Euston Station in London, and we see how the myth of the curse has sprung up.
Finally, for something completely different, we end by returning to Southern England and to the Romans, with news of the latest work at the Fishbourne Roman Palace. Was there or was there not a Roman Fort that preceded the palace? We present the evidence for and against. . .