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Author Topic: St Kilda; new stuff from an old island.  (Read 959 times)

Anchorman

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St Kilda; new stuff from an old island.
« on: February 09, 2021, 05:44:14 PM »
 The romantic story of the abandoning of the St Kilda archipelago has captured the imagination for decades - though the conditions which led to the islanders evacuating their home are less romantic. Now archaeology gives a tantalising glimpse of just how long these islands were occupied. https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/19076393.st-kilda-evidence-iron-age-settlement-remote-scottish-island/?fbclid=IwAR1drK04HDqwrsBOQMIWne7Bz9DC3mbNT9I4sPxgp1it8sIft8GK4NJR3wU
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"for, as long as but a hundred of us remain alive, never will we on any conditions be brought under English rule. It is in truth not for glory, nor riches, nor honours that we are fighting, but for freedom - for that alone, which no honest man gives up but with life itself."

torridon

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Re: St Kilda; new stuff from an old island.
« Reply #1 on: February 09, 2021, 07:31:33 PM »
Fascinating that people in the Iron Age would have made it to St Kilda, and settled there. No easy choice there.
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Anchorman

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Re: St Kilda; new stuff from an old island.
« Reply #2 on: February 09, 2021, 08:37:27 PM »
Quote from: torridon on February 09, 2021, 07:31:33 PM
Fascinating that people in the Iron Age would have made it to St Kilda, and settled there. No easy choice there.
       



      It seems that our ancestors thought islands were a 'des res'.
Lewis and other Hebridean islands are peppered with evidence of Mesolithic camp sites and Neolithic settlements.
The Orkneys are stuffed with bronze and Iron age 'broch' culture evidence, and the massive amounts of neolithic finds in Unst, Brodgar, etc, point to it as the precursor of the culture which built Stonehenge.
We see the seas and waters as a barrier; the ancients saw them as motorways!

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"for, as long as but a hundred of us remain alive, never will we on any conditions be brought under English rule. It is in truth not for glory, nor riches, nor honours that we are fighting, but for freedom - for that alone, which no honest man gives up but with life itself."

Gordon

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Re: St Kilda; new stuff from an old island.
« Reply #3 on: February 09, 2021, 08:44:59 PM »
I saw St Kilda once - from the air.

I can't remember exactly when, but probably late 90's, and I was on the morning flight from Glasgow to Stornoway (for work reasons). As we were going over Skye the pilot said that he'd been asked to take a westerly circuitous route in order to avoid military traffic (probably an exercise was going on) and that those of us on the left of the plane would get a good view of St Kilda in the distance.

That is as close as I ever got - from the air, it really is a remote speck.
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