La Motte () is a

tidal island A tidal island is a raised area of land within a waterbody, which is connected to the larger mainland by a natural isthmus or man-made causeway that is exposed at low tide and submerged at high tide, causing the land to switch between being ...

, and listed archaeological site, also known as Green Island, located in the Vingtaine de Samarès in the parish of St Clement on the south-east coast of Jersey,

Channel Islands The Channel Islands are an archipelago in the English Channel, off the French coast of Normandy. They are divided into two Crown Dependencies: the Jersey, Bailiwick of Jersey, which is the largest of the islands; and the Bailiwick of Guernsey, ...

. There is evidence of human visits to the island since

Neolithic The Neolithic or New Stone Age (from Ancient Greek, Greek 'new' and 'stone') is an archaeological period, the final division of the Stone Age in Mesopotamia, Asia, Europe and Africa (c. 10,000 BCE to c. 2,000 BCE). It saw the Neolithic Revo ...

times, having left a

cairn A cairn is a human-made pile (or stack) of stones raised for a purpose, usually as a marker or as a burial mound. The word ''cairn'' comes from the (plural ). Cairns have been and are used for a broad variety of purposes. In prehistory, t ...

, a number of

midden A midden is an old dump for domestic waste. It may consist of animal bones, human excrement, botanical material, mollusc shells, potsherds, lithics (especially debitage), and other artifacts and ecofacts associated with past human oc ...

s and

cist In archeology, a cist (; also kist ; ultimately from ; cognate to ) or cist grave is a small stone-built coffin-like box or ossuary used to hold the bodies of the dead. In some ways, it is similar to the deeper shaft tomb. Examples occur ac ...

s which were uncovered in the early 20th century. The island rises to above

mean sea level A mean is a quantity representing the "center" of a collection of numbers and is intermediate to the extreme values of the set of numbers. There are several kinds of means (or "measures of central tendency") in mathematics, especially in statist ...

and can only be accessed at low tide. The rock is from the late

Pleistocene The Pleistocene ( ; referred to colloquially as the ''ice age, Ice Age'') is the geological epoch (geology), epoch that lasted from to 11,700 years ago, spanning the Earth's most recent period of repeated glaciations. Before a change was fin ...

covered with

loess A loess (, ; from ) is a clastic rock, clastic, predominantly silt-sized sediment that is formed by the accumulation of wind-blown dust. Ten percent of Earth's land area is covered by loesses or similar deposition (geology), deposits. A loess ...

below a grassy surface.

Location

The island is approximately from the beach and rises to above sea level. The island has a grassy surface and is predominantly clay surrounded by rocks. In recent times efforts have been made to reduce erosion of the island by the construction of walls and steps. It is only accessible at low tide and cut off twice a day when the sea water rises.

Archaeology

Some

archaeological Archaeology or archeology is the study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of Artifact (archaeology), artifacts, architecture, biofact (archaeology), biofacts or ecofacts, ...

evidence has been found here. Remains of a cemetery on La Motte are believed to be from later settlers. There are

elements including a

and a number of

s, dating from 1500 BC to 300 BC, on La Motte. The 18

s have been removed, and transferred to the

La Hougue Bie La Hougue Bie is a historic site, with museum, in the Jersey parish of Grouville. La Hougue Bie is depicted on the 2010 issue Jersey 1 pound note. Toponymy ''Hougue'' is a Jèrriais/Cotentin variant form of the more common Norman form ''H ...

museum. They were excavated between 1911 and 1914.

Geological site

The surrounding area and beach were listed as a site of special scientific interest in 2009. The rock was laid down in the late

and is covered with preserved

. They provide evidence of past environmental changes in the locality.

Gallery

File:La Motte Saint Cliément Jèrri.jpg, La Motte seen from the beach at La Sordonnière. File:Aerial photo of La Motte tidal island, Jersey.jpg, La Motte seen from the air.

References

External links