Quoygrew - a settlement of farmers and fishers on the island of Westray in Orkney - was continuously occupied from the tenth century until 1937. Focusing on the archaeology of its first 700 years, this volume explores how 'small worlds' both reflected and impacted the fundamental pan-European watersheds of the Middle Ages: the growth of population, economic production and trade from the tenth to the thirteenth centuries and the subsequent economic and demographic retrenchment of the fourteenth to fifteenth centuries. Concurrently, it addresses the nature of island societies, with distinctive identities shaped by the interplay of isolation and interconnectedness.
1. Introduction: the Study of Island Societies (J.H. Barrett)
2. Viking Age and Medieval Orkney (J.H. Barrett)
3. Quoygrew and its Landscape Context (J.H. Barrett, L.R. Farr, D. Redhouse, S. Richer, J. Zimmermann, L. Sharpe, S. Ovenden, J. Moore, T. Poller, K.B. Milek, I.A. Simpson, M. Smith, B. Gourley & T. O’Connor)
4. The Quoygrew Sequence (J.H. Barrett & J.F. Gerrard)
5. Ecofact Recovery and Patterns of Deposition (J.H. Barrett & J.F. Harland)
6. The Maritime Economy: Mollusc Shell (N. Milner & J.H. Barrett)
7. The Maritime Economy: Fish Bone (J.F. Harland & J.H. Barrett)
8. Animal Husbandry: the Mammal Bone (J.F. Harland)
9. Fowling: the Bird Bone (J.F. Harland, R.A. Bennett, J.I. Andrews, T. O’Connor & J.H. Barrett)
10. Arable Agriculture and Gathering: the Botanical Evidence (C.T. Adams, S.L. Poaps & J.P. Huntley)
11. Feeding the Livestock: the Stable Isotope Evidence (J.H. Barrett & M.P. Richards)
12. Local Availability and Long-range Trade: the Worked Stone Assemblage (C.E. Batey, A.K. Forster, R.E. Jones, G. Gaunt, F.J. Breckenridge, J. Bunbury & J.H. Barrett)
13. Evidence of Exchange Networks: the Combs and other Worked Skeletal Material (S.P. Ashby with a contribution by C.E. Batey)
14. The Metal Finds and their Implications (N.S.H. Rogers, C.E. Batey, N.M.McQ. Holmes & J.H. Barrett)
15. Interpreting the Ceramics and Glass (D.W. Hall, L. Blackmore, G. Haggarty, S. Chenery, D. Gallagher, C.E. Batey & J.H. Barrett)
16. Being an Islander (J.H. Barrett)
