Archaeoastronomy in the British Isles - The Stones and the Stars: Building Scotland's Newest Megalith - page 100

F IG . 4.31 The Ness of Brodgar peninsula. Ring of Brodgar on right, Stenness
stones to the right of the peninsula, on the far side of the water (Vistamorph TM
photo by Chris O'Kane)
F IG . 4.32 Kilmartin Glen (Photo by Chris O'Kane)
And at Kilmartin, that isolated backwater that could never
have sustained an advanced lunar observatory, “Something like
350 monuments are clustered within a six-mile radius….It is even
thought onlookers might once have gathered on the natural terraces
on the valley sides (Fig. 4.32 ) to watch ceremonies and processions
performed among the henges, stone circles and burial cairns on
the valley floor below…” Kilmartin was the source of some of the
earliest bronze items made in Britain; it was “like a roundabout,
a hub where copper from southern Ireland and tin from Cornwall
were brought together for onward passage to bronze consumers
living in Scotland's north-east…”