The Watchstone

By Sigurd Towrie

The Watchstone is one of Orkney’s most imposing standing stones, dominating the south-eastern end of the Brig o’ Brodgar – the place where the Harray and Stenness lochs meet.

Standing sentinel between the Ness excavation site and the Stones of Stenness, the Watchstone measures 5.6 metres high, is 1.5 metres wide and 0.46m thick.

Although it has attracted the attention of historians and antiquarians for centuries, there is little we can be say about the monolith with any certainty. We don’t, for example, have a date for its erection.

Given its location and geology, however, there is little reason to doubt it belongs to the Neolithic – probably raised in the final centuries of the fourth millennium BC or the first of the third.

While in no way conclusive proof of a Neolithic origin, in May 1892, members of the Orkney Natural History Society heard an account of the megalithic quarry at Vestrafiold, Sandwick, by the Orcadian George Marwick.

There he had encountered:

He added:

From excavation, we know that Vestrafiold was one of the sources of megaliths in the Ring of Brodgar and Stones of Stenness, and, given the size and shape, may well have produced the Watchstone too.

Incidentally, to Marwick, the Watchstone and the Dyke o’ Sean, to the north-west, bounded an area of the Ness of Brodgar isthmus, separating “the more consecrated place from the outer world.”

One of a pair?

What we can also say is that the Watchstone did not stand alone. During roadwork in 1930, the stump of a megalith was discovered around 13 metres to its south-west. The find led to the two megaliths being declared a pair.

While this is indeed possible – particularly given the presence of other stone pairs in the area – we cannot say this was definitely the case. That there was another standing stone in the vicinity of the Watchstone is beyond doubt. What we don’t know, however, is whether the two were contemporary.

The stump of the second stone measured 1.45 metres wide, 12.7cm thick and 90cm high, the second stone was aligned exactly north-east to south-west, at an obtuse angle to the Watchstone.

Based on the dimensions of its stump, the lost megalith was much thinner than the Watchstone, but almost as broad. The stone had been raised in a socket “cut into the shaly rock to receive it and was packed at the base with small stones.”

Obviously we can’t tell the original height of the stone but the fact the socket contained the 90cm stump beneath the ground places the depth of the socket hole on par with those investigated at the Stones of Stenness. Compared to the shallow sockets encountered at the Ring of Brodgar, this suggests the stone was meant to endure – it was put up and meant to stay up.

Unfortunately, the stump was removed, and presumably destroyed, in 1930 so we don’t know if the megalith came from the same quarry as the Watchstone nor how far it travelled.

The date and circumstances of the stone’s destruction are also unknown. All we can say for certain is that the megalith was gone by 1693, when the first detailed account of the area was penned by an Orkney minister:

The holed stone mentioned by Wallace was the Stone of Odin, which was destroyed in 1814,  and the other, unnamed, megalith is clearly the Watchstone.

The Watchstone’s companion may have been a handy source of stone in the early historic period. The fact it was a third of the thickness of the Watchstone might have made it a good candidate for toppling and breaking up. On the other hand, its destruction may have been much earlier.

Excavation of two socket-holes beside the Odin Stone in the 1990s showed that not only were there two megaliths close to the site of the renowned perforated stone, but that both were taken down in prehistory – either the Late Neolithic or Early Bronze Age.

In both these cases, however, the megaliths were completely removed, leaving no stumps in place.

A third stone circle?

The presence of a second stone by the Watchstone, and its angle, led to the suggestion that:

As yet, there is no evidence to back up this theory, but that is perhaps not surprising – if the theoretical stone circle existed, any traces will lie beneath the water of the Loch of Stenness.

A second theory to explain the role of the Watchstone is much older and proposed it was part of a grand, stone-flanked avenue between the Stones of Stenness and the Ring of Brodgar.

The avenue explanation was repeated from the late 18th century until the end of the 20th, when geophysical surveys produced no evidence for a stone-lined route along the Ness of Brodgar.

Instead, based on present archaeological evidence, it seems that pairs (or groups) of standing stones may have been the order of the day – much like the two visible outside Ness dig HQ, a short distance to the south-east of the site entrance.

Not only did the Watchstone perhaps have a twin, but, as we’ve seen, the Odin Stone was also one of a pair (or perhaps three).

These megalithic pairs have been likened to the door jambs of Neolithic structures and therefore may have represented symbolic doorways – perhaps marking, or controlling movement, through the landscape around the Ness.

With the Watchstone, it has been suggested that it – and its companion – may have marked a formalised route between the entrance to the Stones of Stenness and the lochside area, or perhaps controlled movement in the area outside the stone circle:

Antiquarian alignments

That the Watchstone was an integral part of the landscape around the Ness of Brodgar is beyond doubt, but to the antiquarians of yesteryear, it was also directly linked with the Ring of Brodgar and the Barnhouse Stone, approximately half a mile to the south-east of the Stones of Stenness.

The evidence of this link was an apparent alignment:

The meritorious astronomical theory mentioned above was probably that proposed by the Orcadian Magnus Spence, who, in 1893, suggested a number of solar alignments for the Stenness megaliths and Maeshowe.

To Spence, the Ring of Brodgar – Watchstone – Barnhouse Stone line marked the midwinter sunrise and midwinter sunsets, while a line drawn between the Watchstone and the entrance to Maeshowe related to the equinox sunrise and sunset.

Writing in 1906, the astronomer and physicist Sir Norman Lockyer wasn’t convinced by Spence’s arguments although he appropriated his suggested alignment line.

To Lockyer, the significant times represented by the Brodgar-Watchstone-Barnhouse line were sunset at Beltane (May 1) and sunrise at Hallowmas (November 1).

More recently, a connection between the Watchstone and the midwinter sunset was proposed.

According to Charles Tait, ten days before and after the winter solstice, the sun disappears behind Hoy’s Ward Hill before briefly reappearing off its northern side. To Tait, the stone marked a viewpoint for measuring the shortening days gauge the approach of the solstice.

The megalith’s name

A common question is why the lochside megalith is called the Watchstone.

When it comes to the stone names around the Ness of Brodgar we have a  major problem – we can’t assume that any are genuine and not fanciful antiquarian creations, e.g. “Temple of the Sun“, “Stone of Power” and “Comet Stone“.

And when it comes to the Watchstone, the earliest surviving account giving it that name dates to 1823.

In it, Samuel Hibbert, the secretary to the Scottish Society of Antiquaries, categorically states:

Hibbert’s uncertainly regarding the state of the stone undoubtedly relates to the destruction wrought at the Odin Stone and Stones of Stenness nine years previously.

He then goes on to wax lyrical about the Temples of the Sun and Moon – terms that became widely repeated in academia in the 18th and 19th centuries.

Hibbert’s account of the Watchstone differs, however, to that of Sir Joseph Banks, who visied in 1772. In its map of the area, the Banks expedition proclaimed it the “Stone of Power” while Hibbert was adamant it was called the “Watch-stone”.

This is made clear when Hibbert reproduced a “rude woodcut” of the area around the Stones of Stenness. The illustration was produced by Rev Dr Robert Henry in 1784.

But in Hibbert’s version of the drawing’s key, he changed the monolith’s name from Henry’s “Pillar Stone” to “Watch-stone”.

Most accounts after Hibbert’s refer to the Watchstone name, but the majority of these were penned by visitors to Orkney, who may – like the Temples of the Sun and Moon – have been repeating the terms used by their contemporaries and predecessors.

However, at the end of the 19th century, the Orcadian George Marwick, who lived in neighbouring parish of Sandwick, repeatedly referred to the Watchstone by name in his papers and lectures.

Although it is possible Marwick was also copying previous academic accounts, in other papers he was keen to point out the “old names” for both the Ring of Brodgar and the Comet Stone.

If the Watchstone had a different name, why didn’t Marwick document it?

So, is it a traditional name? I tend to think it was, or at least an attempt to anglicise its Orcadian pronunciation.

Returning to Hibbert, the name meant one thing:

He wasn’t the only writer over the centuries to take the name literally and suggest an origin involving viewing or watching. The probable answer, though, is far simpler and, like most of Orkney’s placenames, simply describes the stone’s location.

Hibbert even highlights one proposed possible root: “situated on the brink of the ford…“

A recent suggestion from Orkney’s Gregor Lamb is that the name relates to the monolith’s position at the crossing point between the lochs and stems from the Old Norse vaðs-steinn, meaning ford stone.

This is particularly interesting because the same root is found at another crossing point, the Brig o’Waithe, across the Stenness loch to the south-west. There, before the construction of the bridge, the site was simply Waithe, from vaðs – ford or wading place.

Although the Waithe placename closely followed the original, other ford names from the same root survive as Waa or Va, e.g. Waaswick, and in the dialect term for ford, Waddies.

However, although the vaðs idea is interesting – particularly when we bear in mind Waithe nearby – one can’t help but wonder why two placenames deriving from the same root and mere miles apart, would a) develop such a different pronunciation and b) have developed differently (the Brig o’ Waithe not only retained the ð but is pronounced Wayth and not Wath).

Instead of the stone’s position by a crossing point, it seems more likely that its name derives from its loch-side location. And in this case, the Orcadian historian Hugh Marwick had it covered.

To Marwick, the answer was clear. “Watchstone” derived from the Old Norse vatz-steinn, meaning loch stone.

This suggestion certainly fits the location and the Orcadian pronunciation of the name.

And until a better suggestion comes along, it’s the one for me.