[Stones] Scilly Isles

[Andy Norfolk]

Alan S> wrote:
> I can't remember the exact number, but there are something like a
> dozen on St Mary's alone, including the complex at Porth Hellick
> Down. Most of the tombs are on the smaller uninhabited islands, such
> as Gugh and Samson featured in the program.  Who knows how many are
> submerged?
> 
I recommend Charles Thomas's book “Exploration of a Drowned Landscape”,
Batsford, 1985.

In it he puts forward some very interesting ideas. He points out that 
the most imposing tombs are in the most prominent locations and suggest 
that they are those of the first people to colonise Scilly. He also 
suggests that later  tombs included deposits of rich soils as a way of 
getting the ancestors to refertilise the landscape. The general picture 
that is presented by Thomas and Ashbee and others who have looked at 
Scilly carefully is that the tombs were on the high ground and that the 
people who built them lived on the fertile plain which is now under 
water between the islands.

Scilly is a wonderful place! I even got paid to go there recently :-)

Cheers

Andy N