The Ness of Brodgar Project

The riddle of the red deer – the research continues…

Wednesday, November 19, 2025 (3:32 PM)

By Kath Page
UHI Archaeology Institute PhD Student

In February 2022, I wrote two blogs for the Ness of Brodgar Trust which outlined my masters dissertation exploring the significance of red deer during the Orcadian Neolithic.

Fig 1: Sampling a left-sided red deer metacarpal from Structure Ten for radiocarbon dating.

The focus of this research was the red deer bone and antler deposits uncovered at the Ness and how they compared with other deposits found across Orkney dating to the same period. The conclusions of this research suggested that the location and meaning of the purposeful deposition of red deer changed over time, implying there was a fundamental shift in the cultural significance of these animals that was tied to societal changes.

Initially red deer were deposited in mortuary sites, coinciding with the rise of “big house” settlements, but this changed around 2500BC, at a time when monumentality was in decline and Beaker pottery begins to be appear in the archipelago.

In October 2022, I started a PhD, funded by the Scottish Graduate School for Arts and Humanities (SGSAH), which widened the scope of my original research. My PhD aims to explore the relationship between red deer and people across Scotland during the prehistoric period, from 10,000BC to AD900, and uses a social zooarchaeological approach to understanding the changing relationships between red deer and people.

Social zooarchaeology is a methodology that looks beyond the economic role that animals played in providing meat, milk, and materials, and focuses on how animals influenced society and identity in prehistory. To achieve this, I created a database of all sites in Scotland dating from this time period that had preserved animal remains. By analysing this data, I identified three research questions that became my case studies. These topics are:

  1. The exploitation and extinction of red deer during the long Scottish Iron Age, focusing on sites in Orkney, the Western Isles, and the North of Scotland.
  2. How contemporary attitudes towards red deer and venison consumption compare with the relationships between red deer and Mesolithic and Iron Age communities in the Wester Ross UNESCO Biosphere.
  3. My final case study sees me return to the Ness and explore the red deer deposits associated with the late Neolithic, Chalcolithic phases of Structure Ten. I am undertaking detailed analysis of these deposits and how they compare with the Links of Noltland, Westray, the Point of Buckquoy, Birsay, and The Bay of Skaill, Sandwick, deer assemblages. As part of this, I am investigating whether there was a “deer heap” phenomenon associated with the Neolithic Bronze Age transition in Orkney and how representative this is with other parts of Scotland at the same time.

In April this year, I was awarded a grant from the Orkney Archaeology Society, to take red deer bone samples from Structure Ten, and from the Neolithic cairns of Blackhammer, and Yarso in Rousay, for radiocarbon dating. It is hoped that the results will extend our understanding of the chronology of red deer introduction to the islands and confirm the date of 2205-2025cal BC for the red deer deposit in Structure Ten (see figs 1 and 2).

Fig 2: Sampling of a left-sided red deer metacarpal from Structure Ten for radiocarbon dating.
Fig 2: Sampling of a left-sided red deer metacarpal from Structure Ten for radiocarbon dating.

Isotope analysis of these bone samples will also be done to further the research undertaken by Dr Magdelena Blanz [1]. Her research demonstrated there were no seaweed signatures in the diet of the Structure Ten red deer, suggesting that they were not free roaming and had restricted access to the shore. This study will compare carbon, sulphur, and nitrogen signatures from the Structure Ten deer with deer from Blackhammer and Yarso. It is hoped this will help inform us whether red deer were managed in the same way across all the islands at the same time or whether this changed temporally as well.

Throughout October and November, Professor Ingrid Mainland, from the UHI Archaeology Institute, and Ness volunteer Lindsay Bailey, and I, have been assessing the red deer assemblage from Structure Ten. While Lindsay has been photographing all the bones for a comprehensive image catalogue, Ingrid and I have been identifying the bones to element and side, and reassembling bone groups to establish whether certain deposits were articulated – where intact sections or a whole individual animal was deposited.

Each individual bone has also been measured and its dimensions recorded onto a database. This data will provide information such as whether certain elements, or certain elements from a particular side was favoured for deposition, the age of the animal at death, the size of the animal and whether this changed over time and how it compares with modern deer, and if there is any pathology on the bones. Through this process we can also identify postmortem practices, such as butchery and consumption prior to deposition.

Figs 3 and 4: Red deer bones from Context 1239 (SF 3987) at the Ness of Brodgar prior to excavation in 2009 (Card 2009)

Figs 5 and 6: The Ness deer bone reassembled at the UHI Archaeology Institute (Page and Bailey 2025)

Analysing the red deer remains from Structure Ten will help us to understand not just their meaning to people in Neolithic Orkney but provides further insight into the meaning and purpose of the building too. The spatial and temporal data gathered from the deer bones can give us clues as to why they were deposited in Structure Ten. Were they commemorating the end of the building’s life? Or do they represent a new phase in the life of Structure Ten, the Ness or Orkney in general? Were the bones placed there as feasting remnants or for something else entirely?

Fig 7: A QGIS schematic of which skeletal elements were present in the Ness deer deposit (After Le Goff 2023 [2]).

This case study will therefore shed new light on late Neolithic activity at the Ness and enhance our understanding of red deer management practices and changing cultural traditions leading up to the eventual abandonment of the site.

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