Standing stones remain among Scotland's most mysterious sights

Some dating back more than 5000 years, the stones remain a mystery because, quite simply, no-one can say why most of them were erected. Historians, palaeontologists and archaeologists agree to disagree on their meaning and significance, but the fact is that no-one can say with certainty what purpose the stones were created for, not least because they were erected at different eras in Scotland’s long history and, most importantly, by different peoples across the centuries. As VisitScotland describes them, the stones are mysterious.

In my latest column on Scottish mysteries – the first of a two-part series on standing stones – I am not going to give a comprehensive account of every standing stone or stone circle in Scotland because there are just too many.

Indeed, Scotland holds the British, European and possibly world record for the number of stones dating from the Neolithic era to the Bronze Age, the period which I am covering this week, with later stones, such as those created by the Picts, to follow  next week.

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Once again, and as always, I will be sticking to known facts, though such is the mystery surrounding Scotland’s standing stones that I have to include some speculation. According to the archaeologist Aubrey Burl, who died in 2020 at the age of 93 and who spent his lifetime researching megaliths and stone circles, there are 1303 stone circles in Britain, Ireland and France, the latter all located in Brittany.

Scotland has by far the largest number, with 508 sites recorded  by Burl. He found 343 sites in Ireland, 316 in England, 81 in Wales, 49 in Brittany and six in  the Channel Islands.

Today, I’ll concentrate on the earliest Scottish sites, hopefully giving examples that readers may already know about but which can all be visited – I would encourage all National readers to check out our Scottish stones. You never know, such a visit might put you in touch with the soul of Scotland and it will certainly educate you about the ancient peoples of this land.

Many stones and stone circles are now described as “recumbent”, having been toppled many centuries ago either for religious reasons – incoming Christians were not impressed with pagan monuments – or by the weather eroding the soil around the stones.

It is important to note that standing stones and stone circles occur over the entire length and breadth of Scotland from Shetland to Dumfries and Galloway, from the Outer Hebrides to Aberdeenshire. We know there were more in central Scotland but they have disappeared from view, possibly because their stones were used as building materials.

The best known of Scotland’s standing stones are located at Calanais (Callanish) on the Isle of Lewis. Erected 5000 years ago, long before England’s Stonehenge, Callanais continues to baffle scientists. It was first fully described by the antiquarian Colin Mackenzie in 1792: “Calernish [sic] is on the side of an arm of the sea on the west side of Lewis. On a rising ground above the village, there is a circle of stones with a remarkable high stone in the centre.

“From this circle a double range extends down the hill to the northward and at the end there is a higher stone which at some distance resembles a small obelisk. From the other three sides of the circle stretches a range composed of three stones, so that the whole forms  a cross.”

The biggest survey of Calanais took place from 1979-88 and found there was much more to the site than some kind of ancient observatory, although that usage may have inspired its creation.

IT is now in the care of Historic Environment Scotland (HES) and its website states: “We don’t know why the standing stones at Calanais were erected but our best guess is that it was a kind of astronomical observatory.”

Patrick Ashmore, who excavated at Calanais in the early 1980s stated: “The most attractive explanation … is that every 18.6 years, the moon skims especially low over the southern hills. It seems to dance along them, like a great god visiting the Earth. Knowledge and prediction of this heavenly event gave earthly authority to those who watched  the skies.”

Ashmore and his colleagues gave a comprehensive overview of the layout of Calanais. They recorded: “The main stone setting at Calanais has been known to antiquarians since the end of the 17th century.

“In plan it is like a prone ring cross, its shaft formed by an avenue of standing stones running roughly north from the ring and its arms by stone rows pointing south and roughly east and west. When first recorded in the late 17th century, most of it was covered in peat to a depth of about 1.5m, and in 1857 the last of the peat was cleared away at the behest of the then proprietor.

The Ring of Brodgar is part of the Neolithic heart of Orkney Unesco World Heritage Sitet (Image: Getty Images)

“The resistivity survey at Calanais in 1979 and the excavations in 1980 and 1981 were needed to allow repairs to the ground surface and cairn and improvements to drainage. In 1982 pollen samples were retrieved and the fallen stone at the end of the east row was re-erected. In 1988 the northwest quadrant of the ring was excavated to a limited depth prior to the laying down of new turf.

“The main excavations revealed complex remains. They included a ditch which was probably part of an early enclosure, cultivation beds dating to about 3000 BC and other remains of agriculture. The central monolith succeeded these. It and the ring were probably set up within a century or so of 3000 BC.

“Soil and clay were imported. Light timber structures were built between the monolith and the eastern side of the ring and the chambered cairn itself was built at some date after 2500 BC when early Beakers were in use in the western seaways.

“A burial with a later insular Beaker and two barbed and tangled arrowheads was found a couple of metres southeast of the passage entrance. Token deposits of soil including charcoal and potsherds were placed in and to the east of the southeast quadrant of the ring; the later ones were associated with ground working and dilapidation of the chambered cairn.”

So Calanais thousands of years ago was a community centre with buildings that have long since been swallowed by the island’s peat. What remains now is hugely impressive and while the reason for their erection remains a mystery, the Calanais stones do appear to date from the Neolithic obsession  with astronomy.

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Also on Lewis, some 20 miles distant from Callanish, is a single standing stone, Clach an Trushal, the only survivor of a stone circle. Said to be 5000 years old and standing  25ft tall, some 19ft of it is above the ground. The reason why it is a solitary stone is simple – local people removed others from the stone circle to use for their houses, the  second-last standing stone being taken in 1914 to form the lintel of a house.

Another mystery is what inspired the creation of the Ring of Brodgar on Orkney Mainland. Now part of the Neolithic Heart of Orkney Unesco World Heritage Site which also includes Skara Brae, Maeshowe and the Standing Stones of Stenness, the ring is the third-largest stone circle or henge in Britain and the only one which is a near-perfect circle, measuring 104 metres (341ft) around with 27 stones still extant though it is known there were once 60 in the ring.

THE ring is also in the care of Historic Environment Scotland which states:  “The monuments at the heart of Neolithic Orkney and Skara Brae proclaim the triumphs of the human spirit in early ages and isolated places.

“They were approximately contemporary with the mastabas of the archaic period of Egypt (first and second dynasties), the brick temples of Sumeria, and the first cities of the Harappa culture in India, and a century or two earlier than the Golden Age of China.

“Unusually fine for their early date, and with a remarkably rich survival of evidence, these sites stand as a visible symbol of the achievements of early peoples away from the traditional centres of civilisation ... The Ring of Brodgar is the finest known truly circular late Neolithic or early Bronze Age stone ring and a later expression of the spirit which gave rise to Maeshowe, Stenness and Skara Brae.”

The only mystery is why the Ring of Brodgar was built but it may have had religious significance or been associated with some sort of  fertility rites.

The Standing Stones of Stenness, are worthy of mention in themselves as probably the oldest stone circle of them all, with radiocarbon dating showing that work began on the site around 3100 BC. To put that date  in context, the Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt wasn’t built until  500 years later.

Historic Environment Scotland’s Statement of National Importance explains why Stenness should mean so much to Scots: “The monument is of national importance, indeed international importance, as part of the core of a mainly third and second millennium BC (although including elements which may be of late fourth millennium BC date) ritual landscape.

“The stone circle and henge, in an area within which other remains may be expected to survive, give the monument importance both as a field monument and because the area contains important information about religious, ceremonial and funerary practices of late fourth and third millennium societies. The monument is also important because other monuments within a broader area extending to the horizons may have been sited in relationship to it.”

Aubrey Burl was in no doubt that the Stenness stones were erected for an ancient fertility rite associated with given periods of the year. He wrote: “Let us imagine, then, families approaching Stenness at the appointed time of year, men, women and children, carrying bundles of bones collected together from the skeletons of disinterred corpses – skulls, mandibles, long bones – carrying also the skulls of totem animals, herding a beast that was one of several to be slaughtered for the feasting that would accompany the ceremonies.”

A vivid imagination perhaps, but in the absence of proof of why the mysterious ring was built, it seems as good an explanation as any other.

Stenness used to contain one famous stone, the Odin Stone, which has a circular hole in it through which lovers would plight their troth. It was smashed by a proprietor who was concerned at the number of people visiting the stone.

Another surviving stone has been singled out for special protection as a Listed Monument in itself – the Barn Stone or Barnhouse Stone.

HES states: “The monument consists of a standing stone and associated remains relating to its setting up and use which may survive in the area around it. The stone was originally scheduled as part of a larger group of stones, including the Stones of Stenness, but is now to be protected, in an expanded area, in its own right.

“The Barnhouse Stone, also occasionally called the Barn Stone stands some 3.2m high and is about 0.2m thick.  “It expands upwards, from 1.1m wide at ground level to 1.8m wide at about 2.4m up. The stone stands on the projected line of the passage of the nearby chambered tomb of Maeshowe.”

Next week I will be writing about the Picts and their standing stones, very much a mystery because we know so little about the Pictish peoples.