Archaeological find – discovered then gone

In mid-May, a land slip at Thompson’s Sannox sand quarry uncovered an ancient kist when the ‘door’ stone fell away. Inside it were a burial urn or food vessel of a recognisable type and a flint knife.

Clearly, this was an important find. Historic Scotland were called in, but had to recover the pot from landowner Charles Fforde, who had taken charge of it, but in whose hands the ancient artefact had apparently broken in two. Historic Scotland removed the flint knife and most of the stones, but left one in the debris. A member of the press arrived and was told to leave by a Historic Scotland person. Then the mechanical digging went on.

A photo ( above) taken by John Inglis of Corrie shows the debris after the destruction. He commented, ‘The whole thing is a scandal. Historic Scotland seem to have acted like high handed vandals. Why were locals and school children not brought to see the goods in situ?’  John wanted to know, too, why the press (not the Voice on this occasion) should have been prevented from photographing it. Most fundamentally, he asked, ‘Is it coming back to the island?’ And, of course, ‘How can we stop this happening again?’ 

Good questions.