A PREHISTORIC “Eden” has been “unexpectedly” discovered in Fife as archaeologists have unearthed artefacts and structures spanning more than 10,000 years.
Archaeological excavations were carried out between 2017 and 2021 and were commissioned by Persimmon Homes North Scotland prior to the construction of new houses at Guardbridge, around three miles north-west of St Andrews.
Discoveries by experts from GUARD Archaeology during the excavations have been outlined in two new publications, which include a Bronze Age fort and the remains of roundhouses, evidence of Neolithic farming, several medieval kiln burners, and hunter-gatherers from the Mesolithic age.
“Before we began, the ditches of a fort in the north-east corner of the site had already been identified on aerial photographs,” said Maureen Kilpatrick, who directed the excavations.
“These ditches enclosed a small area at the edge of the escarpment overlooking the Eden Estuary.”
While most of the fort was left intact, the excavation revealed that the fort likely originated during the late Bronze Age and continued through much of the Iron Age until the early centuries AD.
The discovery of spindle whorls and loom weights helped experts determine that the fort’s inhabitants weaved woollen cloth and that fragments of shale bracelets helped to demonstrate personal adornment. Remains of Iron Age houses were also found outside the fort.
“What was really surprising about this site was all the other archaeology we found outwith the fort, not just Iron Age but much earlier too,” Kilpatrick said. “We really didn’t expect to find the whole prehistory of Fife in one field.”
Archeologists also discovered the remains of substantial roundhouses from earlier in the Bronze Age, from which an assemblage of pottery sherds and animal bones was recovered.
Experts also found that metalworking was also carried out during the late Bronze Age, as “rare” casting moulds for a sword blade and a socketed gouge, a tool used in carpentry, were found.
“The archaeological evidence gathered at Guardbridge demonstrates that the site was occupied for almost all of the Bronze Age period, between 2200 and 800 BC,” added co-author Thomas Muir.
“The occupants crafted intricate metalwork and processed wool into yarn.
“From the porch of one of the roundhouses was found evidence that one of its occupants had once sat there knapping flint for tools.”
The site was also used before the Bronze Age during the Neolithic by some of the first farmers of Fife, who left many pits across this site, containing burnt cereal grains, saddle querns and pottery sherds, archaeologists said.
However, there was no trace of their houses found.
Archaeologists also found traces of a temporary Mesolithic campsite, which predates the Neolithic period.
“We found evidence of a fire-pit radiocarbon dated to around 4320-4051 BC,” said co-author Jordan Barbour.
“This fire-pit was associated with a cluster of burnt lithics arranged in a distinctive star-shaped pattern, indicative of a tent or shelter, where a small group of hunter-gatherers once camped to hunt and fish in the nearby estuary.”
Below this was a scatter of flints from around 10,000 BC during the Late Upper Palaeolithic period, where some of the very earliest inhabitants of Fife once sat knapping flint tools.
While settlement at this site seems to have drawn to a close around the end of the Iron Age, several medieval corn-drying kilns were also found, dating to between AD 900 and 1300.
“These kilns were presumably worked by farm labourers belonging to the farm of ‘Segy’ which appears on early maps,” said co-author Charlotte Hunter.
“The different construction techniques apparent shows how these kilns changed over time, improving in design and size to meet the growing demand from the growing medieval population of Fife.”
These were the last traces of archaeology with origins stretching back in some form or another to some of the earliest occupations of Scotland.
The archaeological work was funded by Persimmon Homes North Scotland and was required as a condition of planning consent by Fife Council.
The local authority were advised on the archaeological matters by the Fife Council Archaeology Service, who considered there to be a potential for hitherto unknown archaeology to be buried at the site due to the proximity of known prehistoric archaeology.
“When Fife Council approved the development of houses on land at Guardbridge, no one imagined the process would reveal such remarkable archaeological discoveries,” said James MacKay, managing director, Persimmon Homes North Scotland.
“Many current residents here may not have imagined that where they now live, so too did many people over the entire duration of Scotland’s prehistory.
“The building of houses at this site has provided an inadvertent but invaluable opportunity to learn more about how people in Fife lived during prehistory.”
