This, the second volume on settlement in mainland Orkney, is a well-crafted monograph recording a decade of fieldwork, but also uniting social theory and archaeological practice. As such, it is far from a descriptive account of methodology and excavation results. Professor Richards team’s first volume on fieldwork was on the excavations of Barnhouse, Maes Howe and the Stennes area (Richards Reference Richards2005). The Barnhouse volume attempted to marry the high quality excavated evidence with the notion of ‘thick description’ by Clifford Geertz (Reference Geertz1973) and the social theory of dwelling in the later Neolithic village communities of mainland Orkney (Richards Reference Richards2005, ch 4). Dwelling and habitual routines were reconstructed at Barnhouse (Richards Reference Richards2005, 57) and Claude Lévi-Strauss’ concept of ‘house-based’ societies was evoked (Reference Lévi-Strauss1983, 163). This established a mould, a new way of reporting excavation and writing about Neolithic communities and societies in Orkney.
This volume focuses on central mainland Orkney and its east coast in the Bay of Firth. Richards and Jones appear to have deployed the previously used field methodologies: locating sites by reviewing previously known artefact scatter sites (for example, Wideford Hill and Brae of Smerquoy: figs 2.3, 2.5, 2.6, 4.2, 4.3 and 4.6); the application of geophysics; excavation of evaluation trenches and more open-area excavations. Emphasis is on reporting and interpreting in full the excavations at eight locations: Wideford Hill (ch 2); Knowes of Trotty barrow cemetery, Harray (ch 3); Brae of Smerquoy (ch 4); Stonehall Knoll, Stonehall Meadow and Stonehall Farm (chs 5 and 6); Crossiecrown (ch 7); Ramberry Head Ring Cairn (ch 8); Varme Dale and Muckquoy, Redland (ch 9). Except for Griffiths’ chapter on radiocarbon dates and Bayesian statistical modelling (ch 10), the remaining chapters focus on specialist artefact or environmental reports: pottery (ch 11); flaked lithics (ch 12); coarse stone (ch 13); animal remains (ch 14); environmental reconstruction (ch 15); soils (ch 16). The presentation of the excavation results, often mixed with colour illustrations of landscape, sites and excavated strata, is striking and important, offering a keen sense of these unique places under investigation and their relationship to other sites excavated or key landscape features. For example, the authors’ knowledge of the land informs a consideration of people’s movement and their living (for example, Varme Dale and Muckquoy, pp 225–6, fig 9.1). Drawings of plans and excavated sections are often given in colour, and provide a sense of the texture and colours of the excavated sequences, soil, stone and material culture (for example, figs 2.10–2.16, 2.24–2.29 and 5.23–5.25). This richly illustrated approach greatly enhances understanding.
To return to the marrying of social theory and archaeological practice, Richards and Jones set out explicitly to use Lévi-Strauss’ ideas of a social unit, a house, or sociétés á maisons, as applied to Neolithic societies in Orkney (2016, 7–8). This is an interesting interpretive device, which is carried throughout the volume and does help combine excavated deposit, artefact and the idea of a community as a social constructed entity (for example, pp 124–5, 225–30 and 239–346). Throughout the volume, parts of the landscape from site and trench to Neolithic house or burial cairn are all interpreted as places where people lived, ate, slept and where groups buried their dead. Sadly, although the volume is strong on the later Neolithic, the origins of this tradition of house building remain difficult to isolate and date (pp 296–9, figs 10.2, 10.13 and 10.16). This is, however, an excellent volume, and an example of how to write an engaging narrative and analysis of important excavations of Neolithic settlement. All who are interested in the European Neolithic and in writing about the past should read this volume, which succeeds in bringing to life places, daily routines and a sense of belonging in the unique landscape of mainland Orkney.
