Sharman, P. (2007). Excavation of a Bronze Age funerary site at Loth Road, Sanday, Orkney. Edinburgh: Society of Antiquaries of Scotland. https://doi.org/10.5284/1017938.

Excavations in 1991 beside Loth Road, Sanday, revealed a funerary site, including two cists, which contained cremated human bone, and several pits. The cremation burial in one of the cists was contained in a soapstone vessel. These features presented evidence for the sorting, selection and differential deposition of pyre remains. The cists and pits were surmounted by a kerbed cairn of unusual construction. Radiocarbon dates from the pits placed the site in the Early to Middle Bronze Age.

A detailed archaeological description is presented along with phasing and radiocarbon dates.

Funerary rites the world over confirm relationships between the living, and establish a different relationship with the newly dead. These relationships may not end with the burial, but continue long after in dialogues with the ancestors, in physical or incorporeal form. Rites of placation or supplication and rituals of remembrance may all have a part to play.