Cuween--Dr. Seuss-ville

On the heights directly across the Burn of Rossmyre from Wideford Hill is Cuween cairn.  Cuween enjoys a more substantial car park at its trailhead on the base of Cuween hill.  It is fenced, graveled (room for four or maybe five vehicles) and within sight of Old Finstown Road with directional signage featured on the road. 

Grimister & Damsay from Cuween car park April 11, 2022

As to visitors, Cuween cairn probably receives  significantly more visitor traffic than does Wideford cairn, since Wideford is a bit more difficult to reach over a longer and more difficult walk.  During our tour of Cuween, two other groups pulled up from the highway.  That same number was true for Wideford too; so any conclusions about which site you would most likely have to yourself are uncertain.

Before starting the walk, we checked the informational sign posted just north of Cuween car park. It points out two islets in the Bay of Firth--the Holm of Grimbister and Damsay.  Having read the Orkney Sagas prior to our 2022 Easter trip, Darla was surprised at the location of the islets...one of them is featured in the sagas. 

Holm of Grimbister & Damsay, Bay of Firth April 11, 2022

Present day, a causeway exists from Holm Point linking Mainland to the Holm of Grimbister (population 3 on 40 acres of farmed ground).  We did not go down to Holm Point to cross the causeway to the islet.  From the OS maps, it may be a tidal islet.  In retrospect, it probably would have been worth exploring.

The Holm of Grimbister's companion islet in the Bay of Firth is Damsay.  Slightly larger at 44 acres, Damsay is however unoccupied, although it is currently farmed.  Damsay is not connected to Mainland.  Underwater archaeologists claim that a causeway of uncertain date did once link Damsay in current day shallow water and over skerries (partly submerged rocks) to Mainland Orkney. 

While the Holm of Grimbister (Grim's farm) had a less eventful history, Damsay's was turbulent.  Recorded in the Orkney Sagas, Damsay was the scene of the killing of Erlend Haraldsson, Earl of Orkney in 1154 AD. 

Passageway into Cuween cairn--April 11, 2022

Competing Viking co-rulers, Earl Rögnvald Kali Kolsson and Earl Harald Maddadsson, had been warring with Erlend over claims and control in Orkney and Caithness.  Trimuvirate rule is generally a risky affair...as Pompey, Crassus and Caesar discovered at the end of the Roman Republic (60 BC - 53 BC), which resulted in the rise of the Roman Empire.  

Back in the days of the Vikings (a thousand years after Caesar was "e tu'd" by Brutus) one dare not let down his guard then either, not even momentarily as Earl Erlend would discover.  

Cuween cairn by flashlight

According to the sagas on the night of December 21, 1154, Erlend, who apparently was too deep into Yuletide drink, retired to his longship on Damsay's beach to sleep it off.  Damsay at the time had a Norse hall on it...a combination of a drinking establishment and a stronghold of sorts.  

Erlend met his fate on Damsay, killed in a surprise nighttime raid by Earl Rögnvald and Earl Harald's forces allegedly under a full moon...or so saith the Sagas.  

A check on the Moon phase for that date in 1154 puts it at waxing crescent.  So, a slight discrepancy in the telling of the tale.  Waxing crescents normally set before midnight.  That would've been more conducive to a nighttime surprise attack than a full moon anyhow.  

For those more "zodiac minded" than I, it may be worth noting that on December 21, 1154 AD the Moon was in the sign of Gemini--two.  So, third man (i.e. Erland) out.  

Cuween cairn, the way out--April 11, 2022

If stones are sentient, and I do not presume them to be (but neither am I new-age wiccan), Erlend's death was witnessed by Cuween cairn from its heights above the Bay of Firth.  The cairn had seen many moons ere the deadly winter solstice in 1154 that claimed Earl Erlend.  Cuween had also seen much violence over the millennia.  We'll get to that violence here in a bit.  

Cuween cairn, by the time of Earl Erlend, was already some 4,000 years old, having been built at least by 3100 BC.  Locally called "Fairy Knowe," Cuween was once assigned by folklore to the realm of the fairies.  The cairn's passageway was the door to the fairy kingdom underground, or at least according to those more pagan or more hocus-pocus minded than I.  

Something for everyone, it seems.  

For the more irreverent among us (and admittedly I may belong in this distinguished group), Cuween has recently been referred to, tongue-in-cheek, as the "Tomb of the Beagles"...a satirical play upon the "Tomb of the Eagles" cairn which is located on South Ronaldsay and currently attached to Mainland Ornkey via the Churchill Barriers causeway.  

Curbed side cell inside Cuween--April 11, 2022

Tomb of the Eagles is a privately owned site.  We did not visit it, and not because a fee is apparently charged, nor the fact that many cairns in Orkney are simply free to access.  We did not want to drive down to South Ronaldsay when we were uncertain whether they still permitted visitors at the site, what with the Covid restrictions still being in place at that time.

Cuween cairn profile--April 11, 2022

To enter Cuween, the Tomb of the Beagles, one must do so on all four.  That said, Cuween's passageway is a good bit roomier than others found in some of Orkney's cairns.  We didn't have to belly crawl at least.  While it was still wet, thankfully the passageway was not overly muddy.

As to the "beagles" part of the pun, that alludes to the many (24 identified) canine skulls and skeletal remains discovered in Cuween cairn.  

Some speculate that the dog was the totem of these local Neolithic people.  Indeed, it is even said to be so as if it were established fact.  And in other cairns, remains of deer are more prevalent; hence, deer must've been that local people's totem.  Elsewhere, sea eagles; thus theirs and so on.  

Perhaps.  Personally, I am skeptical in assigning religiosity here, if only because the canine remains were evidently put in the cairn about 2500 BC, late Neolithic time in Orkney, which is to say canine remains were introduced long after (many centuries after) the local Neolithic people built Cuween cairn. 

Those builders likely were from the Neolithic settlement just below Cuween cairn at Stoneyhall.  That too is speculative, but more ascertainable in fact than presuming too much regarding Stone Age religious beliefs. Point in case, several Neolithic "figurines" have been discovered in various sites in Orkney--at Skara Brae, Westray and so on.  These invariably are considered "goddess" totems.  Perhaps they are; but they could just as easily be a toy doll made for the stone age daughter and not a religious item at all.  Again, ascribing "religion" to this prehistoric age is...speculative at best.       

Holm of Grimbister and Damsay--April 11, 2022

Stoneyhall was excavated over a six year project beginning 1994 AD.  It was then recovered with earth to protect the site.  Stoneyhall settlement established around 3100 BC was continuously occupied throughout the Neolithic.  Thus, these are the likely builders of Cuween. 

Animal remains were put into Cuween, infilled from the top apparently, prior to the deliberate closure of the tomb in the early Bronze Age perhaps about 2000 BC.  This pattern of infilling and closing cairns is seen across the Orkney islands.  Rock debris was first dumped into Cuween cairn.  The top most layer was infilled with animal bones.  These proved poorly preserved in the cairn's environment.  Then Cuween was sealed.  A first class midden.  

Rather than totem worship, given the speculation here, it is possible that a Bronze Age group took control, and in a final act of subjugation of the local population, these new people desecrated the cairns of ancestors by dumping in rocks and filling the rest with animal parts and sealing it...thereby putting an end to what was, to the local Neolithic rituals and ancestors.  A forced new regime perhaps. 

In any case, speculate is a mighty big word.  Too big it seems.  

As for Cuween cairn and the violence it has witnessed, evidence exists of "ritualistic" killings there.  The problem is much has been lost to archaeological context by how Cuween has been "investigated".  The cairn was "casually explored" by Orkney antiquarians in June of 1888.  They reported skeletal human remains in side cells, as well as worked stone tools and animal bones.  But the condition of human remains was not recorded in detail.  Neither was the 1888 breach the first at Cuween.  Apparently, the original roof to the cairn's main chamber was already removed sometime prior to the 1888 "exploration".  

Cuween cairn side chamber--April 11, 2022

The cairn was then more "formally" excavated in July 1901, which found the main chamber filled with stony debris and animal bones.  Over the course of the excavations at Cuween, a total of 8 human crania were discovered.  5 human skulls were notated in 1901 in such a poor state of preservation that 3 of them crumbled when touched.  

Two crania bore tell-tale signs of ritual execution, which paleo anthropologist Elizabeth Crozier (University of Aberdeen) calls "very significant injuries" which she speculates "based on the consistent position that they may have been inflicted as part of a, possibly ritual, execution. I do think that if you have two crania, both with injuries in the same place, in the same tomb, from the same time period, that this is more than simply interpersonal violence."    

The "Stone Men" of Cuween--April 11, 2022

Without more archaeological evidence, however, the nature of this Neolithic violence remains unclear.  Evidence may exist in the waters of the Bay of Firth, oddly enough around the islet of Damsay with its turbulent history.  

Underwater explorations (2008) in these shallow waters identified Neolithic stone features, including courses of stones, apparent entrances, circular feature that is possibly a cairn and a massive stone slab "table" on upright columns of rock.  These are well-preserved, and the only examples of Neolithic structures found anywhere in the waters of the U.K.

During Mesolithic and Neolithic ages, the Bay of Firth was dry land, thus Holm of Grimbister and Damsay were part of Mainland Orkney until the low lying area was inundated roughly in 2000 BC...in the Bronze Age.  How much may be hidden in these shallow waters below Cuween must await future investigation and...funding.

The Dr. Seuss thinga-ma-jigs--April 11, 2022

Walking up to Cuween from the car park, the most striking feature is not the cairn.  The cairn is far more inconspicuous.  It is almost a part of the heath landscape.  More striking are the curious shapes on the ridge line.  

These are rock cairns, that more properly should be called sculptures, or thinga-ma-jigs?  They have been built in modern times (and very likely continue to be built as we speak).  Stones for their construction, incidentally, are everywhere about.  They are being taken from ancient sandstone quarry pits, or scalps, on Cuween's hilltop. 

These features are now referred to as the "Stone Men" of Cuween.  Actually, if one wishes to keep with the lore of the place, perhaps they should be styled as the "Fairy Stone Men".  If we were to spin the yarn, they could be men turned into stone by the fairies beyond that passageway at Cuweeen cairn.   I leave the invention of tales to the more artful. 

For my own part these, whatever they are, certainly take on the look of a Dr. Seuss invention, something extracted from The Lorax or similar tale. To what end they were built, or by whom, is also a mystery beyond the obvious...these are simply peevish constructions driven into existence from boredom, likely by young'uns with too much time on their hands.