Tomb of the Eagles: Death and Life in a Stone Age Tribe

by John W. Hedges, Colin Renfrew (Foreword)

Isbister in Orkney is one of those extraordinary archaeological sites where the remains of Neolithic man and his works have been so well preserved that they give us an amazingly clear picture of the life and people of 5000 years ago.

In Tomb of the Eagles John W. Hedges describes vividly the activities of a tribe which had as its totem the magnificent white-tailed sea eagle. For these people the building and use of the tomb was symbol and expression of their identity. It was here that the dead joined their ancestors–but only after the flesh had been stripped from their bones. It was here, too, that offerings were made. Here broken pots were piled; fish, eagles and joints of meat mouldered; and the hands of the living sorted the heaped bones of the dead.

Genres: Archaeology, History, Anthropology

270 pages, Paperback

First published March 26, 1987

Reviews

[Ginna · Rating 3 out of 5]

Extremely interesting, but I was ready to learn much more about the sea eagles found in the tomb-- unfortunately very little about that!

[Gavin White · Rating 3 out of 5]

From reading the previews and foreword I had high expectations for this book. It certainly starts well, giving a useful background to Neolithic Orkney. However, about half-way through it turns into a rather dry and technically overloaded text on archaeology.
The basic subject matter is fascinating, being the rather macabre practice of excarnation, where human bodies are left exposed for birds etc to devour the flesh before the bones are deposited into a cairn. The preservation and detailed excavation of this tomb afforded a vivid view of some of the ritual and cultural context of death in Neolithic times.
I would have preferred to have had rather more comparative data from other cultures and other Neolithic sites to help understand what was happening and the religious implications of this practice.

[Mark · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a good introduction to archeology and specifically the neolithic monuments of Orkney (far north of Scotland). I recommend it though I have some issues with the writing. Hedges tells the fascinating story of this particular archeological discovery, the "tomb of the eagles," so named because of the bones of white-tailed sea eagles found entombed with the human remains and artifacts. Not only is the Isbister chambered cairn tomb, perched near the edge of sheer cliffs at the southern tip of the most southerly island of the Orkney archipelago, a highly significant discovery in terms of size, location, and contents. Its manner of excavation is also unusual and dramatic. After neither government nor university funding enabled the site's development in the two decades following its initial discovery in 1958, the farmer who first found it on his land, Ronald Simison, decided he'd excavate it himself. He read a great deal and taught himself the scientific methodology, then single-handedly carried out the work of the dig—extremely laborious, meticulous, time-consuming—in what free time he could take from his farm work. Hedges, who is a professional archeologist and journalist, gives Simison a great deal of credit for his care and methods where many other scientists would have opposed such amateur involvement. This book could certainly have been stronger, though; it tries too hard for acceptance from the discipline at the expense of a more entertaining tale in a popular account of the science of archeology and the story of stone-age Britain it reconstructs. In other words, Hedges gets too technical and gets away from his narrative—given that the main audience of the book, a separate project from the scientific report that was published in the trade journals, is most likely going to be interested lay readers like me rather than real archeologists.

[Rhiannon Grant · Rating 4 out of 5]

A useful and readable description of the excavations at Isbister, followed by helpful analyses of what the information implies about the people who lived there. It's now slightly out dated - new finds have changed some of the picture, carbon-dating has improved, genetic techniques are changing perspectives, ethnography is usually handled differently (i.e. just because people seem 'primitive' to posh white men doesn't mean they've been doing the same thing for 6000 years), and some of what was new and plausible when this was written is now regarded as highly dubious (see for example Thom and his 'megalithic yard'). However, it's well written and clear enough that even as a non-expert reader I can begin to see these gaps and potentially fill them. It's also still the most detailed book around about the fascinating finds at the so-called 'Tomb of the Eagles'.

[Arlene · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent research for novel

[Pritam · Rating 4 out of 5]

nice book