Sandhills settlement, Feall Bay

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FEALL BAY (TRAIGH A TUATH), COLL
NM 144544. Large sandhills settlement exposed by erosion.
Several structures outlined by large stones. Numerous shells and bones. Finds include quartzite hammerstones and flakes accidentally struck off from hammerstones in use; very many pieces of iron slag; flint cores and flakes (none showing any secondary trimming) and flint beach pebbles; large fragments of garnetiferous mica-schist almost certainly from a rotary quern; and many sherds. E. W. MacKie of the Hunterian Museum, Glasgow, reports on the sherds as follows: ‘A selection of hard-fired, grey and buff sherds of standard Iron Age type. Only one has diagnostic features, a rim sherd of hard, light grey clay mixed with white sand and one large piece of shell (?). Its flat, thickened ‘ hammerhead ‘ rim with punctuated design on the fiat surface is similar to some of the Iron Age A carinated pots from the second pre-broch village at Jarlshof, Shetland and to a few scattered examples from the Hebrides. The Coll sherd has a neck below the flat rim which is descending at an outward angle and beginning to curve out further, just as if it was approaching the carinated shoulder found on the Iron Age A vessels mentioned. This rim sherd clearly dates from a considerable time before the broch period, perhaps to the 5th or 4th centuries B.C. Parallels in J. R. C. Hamilton, Excavations at Jarlshof, Shetland (1956) H.M.S.O. Chap. 111. Larger hammerstones, schist fragments and most of iron slag left, rest deposited in Kelvingrove Museum, Glasgow.

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