Folklore & legend

The Two Stones of West Skeld

West Skeld, Sandsting

Undated; recorded in the 1840s

The New Statistical Account for Shetland, quoted by Black and Thomas, says that two standing stones at West Skeld in Sandsting are said to be the metamorphosis of two wizards or giants who were on their way to plunder and murder the people of West Skeld. They had not calculated their time with enough care, and before they could finish their business or get back to their dark homes the first rays of the morning sun appeared and they were changed. They stand there still as two tall moss-grown stones of ten feet high.

It is the same motif as the Haltadans on Fetlar and the stone midwife of Lunna Ness: the sun petrifies the trow or giant. Spence adds that the Shetland standing stones were typically credited to the race of giants. Whether the stones are Neolithic or later is not stated.

Evidence
Long-standing local tradition
Access
Open ground
Location
60.187, -1.442 (Sited to the village)

Sources: G. F. Black and N. W. Thomas, Examples of Printed Folk-Lore concerning the Orkney and Shetland Islands (Folk-Lore Society, 1903) [public-domain]; John Spence, Shetland Folk-Lore (Lerwick, 1899) [public-domain]

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