Knap of Howar
Knap of Howar image gallery
Drop in on the oldest standing stone buildings in north-west Europe, occupied more than 5,000 years ago.
The Knap of Howar comprises the substantially complete walls and stone fittings of two side-by-side Neolithic buildings.
Linked by a passage, they’re both oblong-shaped and stand just over 1.6m tall, with intact entrances. Each of the two ‘houses’ contains surviving stone cupboards and stalls. They're among the best preserved and most visible early Neolithic settlements anywhere in north-western Europe
The buildings date back to the third millennium BC, around the same time other monuments in Orkney's outstanding prehistoric landscape were built. The inhabitants of the Knap may have been buried in the chambered cairn at Holm of Papa Westray.
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