Historic Scotland places in Orkney

A Norse bishop's palace of the 1100s, where King Haakon IV died in 1263, facing Black Patie's Renaissance Earl's Palace beside St Magnus Cathedral; open April to September, adult £8.50, half price in the first EH year.

A Neolithic stalled cairn on the Rousay hillside, its outer wall laid in a decorative pattern, entered down a ladder through a hatch into a skylit chamber; free, open all year, a short steep climb from a roadside lay-by.

Scotland's best-preserved broch village on Eynhallow Sound, an Iron Age tower and stone houses inside ramparts, with a Pictish house and finds in the visitor centre; open April to September, adult £8.50, half price in the first EH year.

Tidal island off north-west Orkney with Pictish and Norse remains, a 12th-century church and a clifftop lighthouse, reached over a rocky causeway at low tide; free, open all year, car park at the Point of Buckquoy.

The ruins of a stone castle built by the Norseman Kolbein Hruga in 1145, the earliest recorded in Scotland, and his family's Romanesque chapel on the island of Wyre; free and open all year, by ferry from Tingwall.

Neolithic chambered tomb of about 3000 BC above Finstown, called the tomb of the dogs after the 24 dog skulls found inside, entered on hands and knees by its original passage; free, open all year, bring a torch.

A turf-roofed horizontal water mill of the 1820s near Dounby, the only mill in Orkney with all its machinery, its paddle wheel, grindstones and hopper still in place; free, open all year, five minutes' walk from the B9057.

A Neolithic tomb cut into a single great block of sandstone in the glen below Ward Hill on Hoy, thought unique in the British Isles, with graffiti by Hugh Miller and a spy; free, open all year, ten minutes from the road.

The Norse earls' residence at Orphir described in the Orkneyinga Saga, beside the vaulted apse of a church modelled on the Holy Sepulchre, one of only two medieval round churches in Scotland; free, open all year.

Roofless courtyard palace of 1569 to 1574 built by Robert Stewart, Earl of Orkney and half-brother of Mary, Queen of Scots, in Birsay village; free, open all year, a short walk from the Brough of Birsay causeway.

A well-preserved Iron Age earth house in Hatston Industrial Estate, Kirkwall, with steps down to a curving passage and a pillared chamber; free, the key is collected from the Judith Glue shop on Broad Street; bring a torch.

The oldest standing stone houses in north-west Europe, two Neolithic farmhouses more than 5,000 years old on the west shore of Papa Westray, with stone cupboards and hearths; free, open all year, a field walk from Holland.

A Neolithic stalled cairn high above Eynhallow Sound on Rousay, where 29 people and 36 red deer were buried, entered by its original passage under a modern dome; free, open all year, a steep 15-minute climb.

A Neolithic and Bronze Age farming settlement in the dunes of Westray, where the UK's earliest carved human figure was found; free and open all year, with most uncovered during the summer dig.

5,000-year-old chambered tomb in the Heart of Neolithic Orkney, lit by the midwinter sunset and carved with Viking runes, seen on guided tours from Stenness; book ahead; adult £11, half price in the first EH year.

An Iron Age broch tower standing 4.3 metres on a rock shelf above Eynhallow Sound on Rousay, facing Gurness, with its water tank, hearth and partitions intact; free, open all year, ten minutes' walk from the road.

A Neolithic stalled tomb 32.5 metres long under a protective hangar on the Rousay shore, its twelve stalls seen from walkways above, where 25 people were buried; free, open all year, a steep walk down from the road.

An unfinished Z-plan castle of the 1560s near Pierowall on Westray, built for Gilbert Balfour of Mary, Queen of Scots' household and pierced by 71 gunholes, with a great spiral stair to the top; free, open 10:00 - 16:00.

A ruined church of the 1200s, rebuilt in the 1600s with a laird's aisle and fine carved grave slabs, in the graveyard by the harbour at Pierowall on Westray; free and open all year, car ferry from Kirkwall.

A 5,000-year-old chambered tomb on Sanday, entered by crawling through a 9 m passage into a chamber still 4 m high; free and open all year, a coastal walk from the parking area, ferry from Kirkwall.

An Iron Age earth house under a working farmyard near Kirkwall, the only souterrain ever found to hold human bones, those of about 18 people; free, open all year, down a ladder through a hatch.

Scotland's largest stone circle, 36 surviving stones of around 2500 BC inside a rock-cut henge between two lochs, in the Heart of Neolithic Orkney World Heritage Site; free entry, open all year.

Western Europe's best-preserved Neolithic village by the Bay of Skaill, 5,000-year-old houses with stone furniture, a replica house and visitor centre, in a World Heritage Site; adult £16, £14 online, half price in the first EH year.

The finest Norse church in Scotland after St Magnus Cathedral, with a round tower, built on Egilsay where Earl Magnus was murdered; free and open all year, ferry from Tingwall, tower closed for conservation.

Four towering standing stones of about 3100 BC, perhaps Britain's earliest henge, in the Heart of Neolithic Orkney World Heritage Site between two lochs; free, open all year, small car park, a short walk from Barnhouse village.

A rare two-storey Neolithic tomb on Rousay, half a mile from the ferry pier, its upper and lower chambers both open to visitors, with a unique miniature chamber nearby; free, open all year, take a torch.

Neolithic stalled cairn of about 3000 BC on the Loch of Stenness, the type site of Unstan Ware pottery, entered by a low crawl into a five-stalled chamber under a skylit roof; free, open all year, down a farm track.

A Maeshowe-type Neolithic tomb of about 3000 BC on Wideford Hill near Kirkwall, entered by a hatch and steel ladder into a tall chamber with rare scratch art; free, open all year, a 750 metre walk from the road.