The last weekend in June I’m participating in a #HolidayEscape.
A read/discuss the pictured book
Orkney by Amy Sackville
while listening to favorite vacation tunes,
and looking up facts and pictures of
Orkney in Scotland.
What made me want to join was this description I read of the book-
“What begins as a familiar, almost fairytale–like narrative ends as something more fragmented, unsettling, and odd . . . Providing a brooding, bruised, ever–changing backdrop to all this is Orkney, the book’s most compelling character of all. In a tribute to Virginia Woolf’s experimental masterpiece, The Waves, the sea in Orkney functions as a kind of rhythmic talisman, its ebb and flow mirrored in the actions, ideas, and themes of the book. More than anything, Sackville’s Orkney is a breathtaking place in the most literal of senses.”
Should be a great escape.
I ordered this book used and it came with this wonderful write up review newspaper clipping about the book tucked inside the front cover!
So fun!
This is also an old New York City Public Library book, so bonus!
The rapid spread of Neolithic culture up the western seaways brought early Megalithic culture and farming settlements such as Knap of Howar from 3500 BC and the slightly later village at Skara Brae. Numerous chambered cairns include the magnificent Maeshowe passage grave, near the Ring of Brodgar and other standing stones. The Iron age inhabitants were Picts, evidence of whose occupation still exists in “weems” or underground houses, and “brochs” or round towers. Vikings having made the islands the headquarters of their expeditions against Norway and the Scottish Islands. Harold Hårfagre (“Fair Hair”) subdued the rovers in 875 and annexed both Orkney and Shetland to Norway. The martyrdom of Earl Magnus resulted in the building of St Magnus Cathedral, Kirkwall. The islands remained under the rule of Norse earls until 1231.
In 1564, Lord Robert Stewart was made sheriff of Orkney and Shetland, and received possession of the estates of the udallers; in 1581, he was created earl of Orkney by James VI of Scotland. The islands were the rendezvous of Montrose’s expedition in 1650 which culminated in his imprisonment and death. During the Protectorate, they were visited by a detachment of Cromwell’s troops, who initiated the inhabitants into various industrial arts and new methods of agriculture. In 1707, the islands were granted to the earl of Morton in mortgage but in 1766, his estates were sold to Sir Lawrence Dundas, ancestor of the Earls of Zetland. During World War I and World War II, the Royal Navy had a major base at Scapa Flow. The base was closed in 1956. In the Arthurian legend, Orkney is the home to King Lot, Sir Gareth, Sir Gaheris, Sir Gawaine and Sir Agravain.
Located in West Mainland is the ‘Heart of Neolithic Orkney’, a designated UNESCO World Heritage Site. This comprises a group of Neolithic monuments which consist of a large chambered tomb (Maes Howe), two ceremonial stone circles (the Stones of Stenness and the Ring of Brodgar) and a settlement (Skara Brae), together with a number of unexcavated burial, ceremonial and settlement sites. The group constitutes a major prehistoric cultural landscape which gives a graphic depiction of life in this remote archipelago in the far north of Scotland some 5,000 years ago.
