Discovery of Ancient Lost Settlement on Scotland's Isle of Skye Rewrites Early Human History

[Judi Lynn]

Tim McMillan·May 13, 2025

In the windswept reaches of northern Scotland, where jagged cliffs meet the crashing waves of the Atlantic, a discovery has emerged that challenges long-held assumptions about human history at the icy edge of Europe.

Archaeologists have unearthed stone tools on the far northern coast of the Isle of Skye, suggesting that humans thrived at what was once considered the bleak and uninhabitable margin of the world during the final throes of the last Ice Age.

The study, published in The Journal of Quaternary Science, details the finding of Late Upper Paleolithic (LUP) tools at South Cuidrach on the Isle of Skye. These tools—identified as likely belonging to the Ahrensburgian culture—represent the most northerly evidence of human occupation in Britain from that period.

It is a revelation that not only rewrites the timeline of Scottish prehistory but also reminds us just how many ancient mysteries remain hidden under our planet’s shifting tides and rugged landscapes.

“Together with the new stone alignments and several other nearby sites, this region now contains more evidence for the LUP than anywhere else in Scotland,” researchers wrote. “We anticipate that by examining this new evidence within the various broad geographical and geomorphological conditions, there is significant potential for the discovery of further LUP locations both on and off‐shore in this region.”

More:
https://thedebrief.org/discovery-of-ancient-lost-settlement-on-scotlands-isle-of-skye-rewrites-early-human-history/

[Easterncedar]

1. Thanks, Judi Lynn

You are one of the best teachers I have ever had.

[NJCher]

2. I remember when

The RG would go to this area about once a year. He felt some sort of ancestral pull, especially about Orkney.

These days he’s lucky to pull off a trip to one of their major cities.

I sent him this article. He will love it.

Thanks Judi Lynn. You’re the best !

[LT Barclay]

3. I think that is because current science underestimates the importance of travel by boat

Here’s an example: no country fully claims my last name. I finally saw a chart of Scottish clans and allied families. It showed my family name in western Wales and northwestern Scotland. The guy who had the map said I’d have to know which group I was descended from. On the way home I realized that it probably was one group just on both sides of a trading route. My dad’s family apparently has always (from what I can determine) been in transportation or business. Because if you were going to go between those places in those days, I think the hazards of the seas were far less dangerous than the hazards of dragging a bunch of goods overland.