SKARA BRAE:
ECHOES ACROSS TIME ©
by Dale Carlyon
The Orkney Islands are filled with wonder and magic for all who have a love of history, modern or ancient. Situated ten miles north of the Scottish mainland between the North Channel, the Norwegian Sea, and the North Sea, the Orkneys (or Orkneyjar as it is called by the people who dwell there today) have seen more than their share of invaders, settlers, and those simply passing through. Aside from its rich Iron Age and Medieval history, during which time the island was settled at various times by the Scots and the Norse, the islands are a treasure trove of archaeological material from the Neolithic period. Among these sites are stone circles such as the Ring of Brodgar and the Standing Stones of Stenness, passage graves such as Maes Howe, and the partially stone-hewn village of Skara Brae. The people who built these structures are known as the “grooved ware people” and predated the arrival of Celtic-speaking tribes in the British Isles by thousands of years. Interestingly enough, the raising of the oldest Orcadian megalithic sites date to around 3100 BCE; this corresponds roughly with the earliest phase of Stonehenge's development in the south of England, making the two cultures in each region fairly contemporary.[1]
As we know today, many if not all of the megalithic structures in the British Isles held a spiritual significance to the Celts who came much later, but how much did they know about these places and the people who once dwelt there? Skara Brae was abandoned in 2500 BCE due to climate changes, and we have no written record of the grooved ware people otherwise. So where did these people go? Did Celtic-speaking tribes ever encounter them, or were they gone long before then? This remains a mystery, but even as science continues to uncover the facts, it is the question of how different cultural elements have blended and acted upon one another that will probably continue to engage most spiritual seekers who study Celtic and other European traditions, including myself.
What kinds of stories did our Celtic ancestors in Scotland tell their children about monuments such as the Ring of Brodgar and the Stones of Stenness—places where they themselves still practiced their own rituals? Was the Odin Stone, a massive monolith with a natural hole (a beloved item of magic for the insular Celts which allowed those who looked through the hole to see faeries) ever called by any other name, such as that of a Celtic God? Did our ancestors tell stories about magical cities underneath the great faery mounds because one of their forefathers had once seen a Neolithic village made of carved stone and had passed it down in tribal memory?
Upon reading that Skara Brae had toilets and a very basic system of plumbing, I immediately thought of civilizations far away, such as the Bronze Age inhabitants on the islands of Santorini and Crete in Greece. Most people think of plumbing as having begun with the Romans, but it is actually much older. The height of Minoan civilization occurred later than the Neolithic period, so it is not likely that these two cultures were in contact. But then there is the Irish tradition of the Tuatha de Danann having travelled from Greece to Spain and then to Ireland. Does some element of the grooved ware people's history and culture remain in this mythic detail about the Tuatha de Danann? Even if such questions are way off the beaten path of existing scholarship, they are important to ask in light of modern genetics, particularly the research of Brian Sykes and Stephen Oppenheimer. We now know that the Celtic-speaking people of Ireland and Scotland very likely came from the Pyrenees and the surrounding areas in Spain and southern France, loosely confirming the Irish tradition of invaders coming from Spain. But how did those people end up in southwestern Europe to begin with? The evidence suggests that they migrated from central Asia and perhaps even as far east as Siberia.[2] Their settlement in the region of the Pyrenees, however, just as with the forced abandonment of Skara Brae by the grooved ware people, may have been imposed by the climate. The harsh climate conditions that the first Europeans faced were far more substantial and began tens of thousands of years before Skara Brae was built. This would have been the most recent Ice Age, which lasted roughly from 70,000 to 10,000 BCE. The Pyrenees region was close enough to the equator to be inhabitable during this time. As far as we know, these people did not extend into the British Isles until well after the decline of the late Neolithic culture or cultures that had been there. Whether or not there was ever contact between these two peoples, we can see what they certainly did have in common—their lives, their ability to create lasting structures, and their patterns of settlement were largely decided by their interactions with nature.
It is an obvious fact that history has been a long account of the rise and subsequent fall of one kingdom, empire, or country after another. While the continuum of imperial Rome gradually wore away in response to a combination of cultural trends and numerous invasions, it is a rather shocking comparison to consider that a settlement like Skara Brae was completely abandoned due to a conflict between man and nature. We know from several historical accounts that Celtic tribes fought bitterly to keep their land, notably rebellions such as those led by Vercingetorix and Boudicca. What the grooved ware people were forced to do—to leave their home forever to the elements that suddenly frowned on them – is a mentality that is on a whole different level. They were made painfully aware, assuming they had not been aware already, that there is no fighting nature. Nature is change, the battle and the flow between life and death. It was a stark, and likely bitter, acceptance of necessity, of survival, that these people had to face in order to continue their lives elsewhere. I believe the idea of this situation is something that would have moved the Celts who came later deeply if they were aware of it; such is the love they have of their land even into the modern day. The more I am aware of how the values and beliefs of different populations have influenced each other throughout history, the more I see how the root of every people's most treasured traditions reaches out to a shining, precious fragment of eternity, a profound and deep respect for the innate sacredness of all life. It is this vital element that seems missing from the lives of so many today.
The dwellings in Skara Brae were made primarily of mounds formed of pre-existing domestic waste—in other words, the city was built with the garbage of previous occupants. Every civilization has looked back with wonder, and sometimes with horror, at previous civilizations. Imagine what kinds of structures future civilizations on this planet may have with the kinds of garbage we've dreamed up! It is ironic and tragic that modern city-dwellers, many of whom have precious little direct experience with nature, are wreaking havoc on the natural world by their indirect, everyday actions. More than ever before, all of us have a collective and urgent responsibility to maintain our planet's climate and natural resources. All things change and flux, but, as we are in the process of re-learning, it is absolutely vital to be nature's friend. The alternative is both physical and spiritual ruin.
The lessons that Orkney has to teach us today are manifold. Nature and the land impose their will upon human civilization, and human civilization in turn directs a great deal of its energy towards taming and controlling nature. This ongoing cycle is one of the Giant’s Dances of this world. The land and the people who occupy it become one, whether those people live on that land for a year or for multiple generations. It is a relationship in which nature clearly has the upper hand, but the effort that humans have made to consistently overcome the challenges posed by nature has resulted in endless opportunities for gaining strength and knowledge. This process leaves a stamp in the land forever, and nowhere is this more true than at Orkneyjar.
ENDNOTES:
- “Ring of Brodgar.” from Wikipedia. Online, internet. Last accessed 10/27/07. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ring_of_Brodgar [Return to Article]
- “R1b.” from Wikipedia. Online, internet. Last accessed 10/27/07.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/r1b [Return to Article]
Dale Carlyon lives near the Gulf of Mexico in Texas. He is currently a member of the Oak Grove, and has been practicing shamanism and studying Celtic lore since his teens. A graduate of Loyola University New Orleans, where he earned a degree in English, he is now in the process of beginning graduate work in Celtic and Irish Studies. His hobbies include a great deal of reading and writing, making and performing both traditional Celtic as well as goth/industrial music, DJ-ing, and karate. Contact Dale at carlyond@gmail.com or visit him at http://awenyddion.zaadz.com.
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