Our bog butter is going 'home' for the season!
Our bog butter is going “home” for the summer! 
It will be one of many objects in the Old Haa Museum’s summer exhibition about Yell archaeology.
This amazing object – a large lump of butter weighing 4kg (8.8lbs) was preserved in deep peat near the Loch of Littlester, near Burravoe. It was covered by a sheepskin bag or wrapping, which still adheres in fragments. Burying foodstuffs in peat was a form of refrigeration and preservation. By the later medieval period, Shetlanders paid part of their rentals in butter. Storage during the year was necessary until payment was due in early summer.
We had the butter radiocarbon dated some years ago and it was churned about AD1030, perhaps by third or fourth generation Norse settlers to Shetland.
The Old Haa in Yell has recently opened for the season - drop along for a visit. They are open until 1 October. 
