The Stones
The island’s Neolithic, roughly 5,000 year old, heritage can be found among the stone circles, homes for the dead and villages for the living which include the World Heritage sites of Brodgar, Stenness, Maeshowe and Skarabrae.
Local lore tells us that John Gow took his young lady friend, Helen Gordon, to the ancient, Odin Stone which stood next to the Neolithic stone circle, Standing Stones of Stenness. The Stone of Odin stone was sought by local folk both for curing ailments and for making contractual promises. It had a rather large hole through its centre that an arm, a leg with some difficulty, head or even a sick baby could be passed through. However, John and Helen had made the journey there to pledge their troth to each other by linking hands through the stone. They swore the Oath of Odin which would bind them through life. To break the oath after Gow’s untimely death Helen, we are told, had to travel to London to touch her dead lover’s hand in order to redeem the pledge given so gladly one winter day on an Orkney moor.
Sir Walter Scott, who visited the islands in 1814, introduced this trysting stone in his novel “The Pirate”. Sir Walter drew the characters in his novel from local folk. His Captain Cleveland was our Gow, and his Nora of Fitful Head was Bessie Skebister a “dreamer of dreams” from the island of Hoy. She could assure fishermen’s wives their men were safe, but was branded a witch, strangled and burned for riding on the back of a certain James Sandieson, and flying through the air to Norway and Shetland!! Mmmm things have moved on a fair bit on the islands today.
Soon after Scott’s visit, the Stone of Odin was demolished, as was one of the Stones of Stenness. A third had been toppled by the perpetrator, a Captain Mackay, an incomer to the islands and tenant of the neighbouring farm, who was restrained from doing any more damage by the threat of action against him by the Sheriff Court. He had really upset the locals and subsequently, rumour had it, two attempts were made to set fire to his farm buildings.
Today three and two bits stones stand proudly by the loch of Stenness, remnants of the original twelve monster stones. Close by, and at one time connected by a ceremonial way, is the Ring of Brodgar. The Neolithic builders of this circle chose a dramatic site, on a gentle slope with views of water in every direction. We may never know the exact use of these circles, but while the boffins try to work it out I can tell you what I’m sure it all is. In Orkney, thousands of years ago, lived a family of giants. They loved music and they loved to dance the old reels. But, they could only come out of their hill dwellings by moonlight. Yes, you’ve guessed. They were out one full moon, dancing their reels, completely carried away when the sun came up, caught them at it and turned them all to stone. Some were heading for home in pairs and some alone. A couple of mysteries remain. Who shot the Odin Stone and with what?
If only the stones could speak to us. They would be able to tell us about the Bronze Age people who buried their dead all around them. They would be able to describe Bjorn, the Norseman, who came along with his Viking friends in the twelfth century and carved his name in runes there and, perhaps, gave the Odin Stone its name. And these stones would have stood, stalk still while John Gow and Helen Gordon made their promises.
