Eroding Archaeology - Volunteers at Newark Bay, Orkney

The team starting work at Newark Bay, Orkney

Newark Bay is the site of an early medieval chapel and extensive cemetery and was the focus of rescue excavations by the late Professor Brothwell between 1968 and 1972.

Due to various circumstances, the work never came to publication. ORCA Archaeology is part of an Historic Environment Scotland funded project to address this with the local community. Check out our earlier blog for more details on the project.

Like so many sites in Orkney, coastal erosion is a significant problem and has caused structural and human remains to have been lost over the years since Professor Brothwell's original excavation.

Volunteers placing sandbags in place at the Newark Bay site.

The local community, including the Friends of St Ninians, 12 volunteers, 1 tractor, 2 dogs and 250 already filled sandbags gathered at Newark over the last weekend to continue work on protecting the site, The team had an hour to put sandbags and rocks in place to protect the eroding archaeology at the site.
​
By 12 noon the team viewed the  250 sandbags and many large rocks that had been put in place through sheer hard work. The sandbags will protect the archaeology for a little while and will be monitored as the first phase of the project gets under way. 

The team taking a break after their back breaking work at the site.

​The team, including Mansie the black Labrador, were very pleased with their efforts and more than one member commented that it was, "Amazing what you can do in one hour on a fine day in Orkney."