More than 5,000 years ago, during the New Stone Age, Neolithic farmers and herders reached a group of islands to the north of Scotland-the Orkneys. They found the islands a great place to settle; there was open grassland for grazing; stones that could be used for building houses and monuments( there were no trees so they couldn’t build from wood); no dangerous animals that would kill the livestock and peat that could be burned as fuel, like coal today.

One small band of settlers ,perhaps 20 people, established a village on the west coast of the island. Together they owned a flock of sheep, a small herd of cattle and a few pigs. Straightaway they found flat stones that they could split and lay flat on top of each other, projecting a little in wards as the walls got higher. We don’t know yet what they used to support the

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