Barra, Western Isles
First screened 20 January 2008

What they found

The cist burials
Time Team excavated three cist burials on Barra, in addition to the four on the site that were investigated as part of the Historic Scotland-funded rescue project the previous year (see Background). These represent a number of different burial practices taking place here during the Bronze Age.

One of those excavated by Time Team was a crouched burial of a woman laid on her right-hand side. One appeared to be a small mass grave containing foetuses and young infants. Another had teeth from one burial mixed in with the remains of another individual. And another had cremated remains placed in the grave with bones from an earlier inhumation moved aside to make room in the cist.

The wheelhouse
As well as the Bronze-Age burials on the Allasdale sand dunes, Time Team found the remains of two later Iron-Age roundhouses on the site. One of them had two sheep buried beneath the floor. It is thought that the earlier of the two dates from around 500 BC, and that it was cut into by a later roundhouse dating from around 400 BC.

The Team also investigated a large circular structure, with what appeared to be a possible entrance, nearby. Clearly visible on the geophysics survey and also evident on the ground, it turned out to be the remains of an Iron-Age wheelhouse.

These impressive, relatively uncommon drystone structures (there are only a few known in the whole of the Shetlands) are roughly contemporary with the brochs of northern and western Scotland, in this case around 100 AD. Wheelhouses get their name from their internal piers that protrude from the outer wall, dividing the inner space like the spokes of a wheel. They have a single entrance and a large open space in the centre (25-30 square metres in the case of the one excavated by Time Team), where the internal piers don't meet.

Some wheelhouses have a gap between the dividing piers and the outer wall, for which reason they are sometimes known as 'aisled round houses'. The gap between the piers and the wall were topped by huge lintels, while the gaps between the piers often had corbelled stone roofs. The central space of wheelhouses was too big for a stone roof, so timber would have had to be used. It is also thought that large whalebones, such as the whale rib found by Time Team among the wheelhouse remains on Barra, may have been used in construction.

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