Exploring the archaeology of Newark at the Orkney Museum

A Pictish cross-slab goes on display for the first time this weekend (Saturday, May 14) as part of an Orkney Museum exhibition exploring the archaeology of Newark, Deerness.

Discovered in 2016, the carved stone is one element of an exhibition outlining a site with a history spanning millennia, but which is under constant threat from coastal erosion.

Funded by Historic Environment Scotland and involving institute staff and community volunteers, an Archaeology Institute UHI project has been drawing together the threads of the Newark story, based on past excavations, surveys and modern scientific analysis of the human remains. And what a remarkable story it is – of Bronze Age burials, of Picts, Vikings, Norse and the descendants of kings and Orkney's merchant lairds.

Newark is a complex multi-period site with around 4,000 years of activity.

A Bronze Age burial is the earliest evidence so far with several suspected burial mounds also detected in a recent geophysical survey. In the Iron Age, two underground structures were built, one of which had human remains deposited within.

The 8th-century AD cross-slab may have marked the site of an early chapel, which was replaced by a stone-built church. Although used from around AD600 until 1400, most of the cemetery burials date to the Norse period. These are a source of much information and some are surrounded by shells carefully placed around the dead – something unknown from other contemporary cemeteries.

Newark eventually appears on maps as the site of a Late Medieval manor house owned by Lord Lindores, son-in-law of Robert Stewart, earl of Orkney. Although some of the ground plan was uncovered during excavations in the 1960s, not enough was explored to fully establish its size and style. By the late 1790s, one of Orkney's leading merchant laird families, the Balfours, owned the dilapidated building. At some point after, it was demolished.

The Newark Project: the story so far runs at the Orkney Museum from May 14 until October 29, 2022. The opening hours are Monday-Saturday, 10.30am – 5.00pm from May-September and 10.30am-12.30pm and 1.30pm-5pm in October. Admission is free.