Chambered Cairn On Island Of Sanday On History Visit To The Orkney Islands Of Scotland

Tour Scotland short travel video clip, with Scottish music, of Quoyness chambered cairn on the Island Of Sanday, one of the inhabited islands, on ancestry, genealogy, history to the Orkney Islands. This cairn was once a tomb for the dead, but its form bears some resemblance to the houses of the living. Perhaps this reflects Neolithic beliefs in the afterlife. The Neolithic cairn is about 13 feet high and can be accessed by crawling through the entrance passage, itself 30 feet long. Only half the entrance passage is roofed. The Picts were the pre Norse inhabitants of Sanday but very few placenames remain from this period. The Norse named the island Sandey or Sand-øy because of the predominance of sandy beaches and this became " Sanday " during the Scots and English speaking periods. The similarly named Sandoy is in the Faroe Islands. Sanday lies south of North Ronaldsay and east of Eday and Westray. It is divided naturally into two roughly equal halves by Otterswick, a bay which runs in from the north, and Kettletoft Bay in the south. All photographs are copyright of Sandy Stevenson, Tour Scotland, and may not be used without permission.

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