Archaeologists have begun looking at the history of human settlement around the Bay o' Skaill in Orkney, Scotland.
     The excavation - on the west of the Mainland, the largest island in Orkney - is centred on the massive mound known as the Castle o' Snusgar to the north-east of the Bay o' Skaill, and was the site of the discovery of the Skaill viking treasure hoard in 1858.
    Geophysical surveys last year were so promising that a team of archaeologists, led by Dr David Griffiths of Oxford University, have returned to work on the site this year.
    A line of mounds follows the edge of the bay, and Dr Griffiths believes “This area could well be one of the biggest collections of untapped archaeology in the British Isles. All we can do is do a little bit of investigation and sampling and from that hopefully establish a framework of what the archaeology is,”

Source: Orkneyjar.com (11 August 2004)