Police are hunting vandals who have damaged one of the world’s most important prehistoric sites on Orkney.
One of the stones at the world famous Ring of Brodgar has been damaged by someone who has scratched initials and a date close to where Viking runes are engraved.
Orkney tour guide Rod Richmond was on a visit to the ring on Thursday evening when he discovered the initials AA and the year 2015 had been hacked into the stone.
He said he had informed the police and Historic Scotland of the incident.
He also alerted other tour guides in Orkney in the hope that they can pinpoint the time the vandalism happened.
He said he was “furious and disgusted” that someone would commit such an act at such a significant site.
Mr Richmond said he was almost certain that the culprit was not local, since the stones are such a treasured part of Orkney’s cultural heritage.
This latest incident happened almost a year to the day since one of the stones was found damaged after someone scratched a noughts and crosses design on it.
A spokesman for Historic Scotland said: “We were very disappointed to discover that the Rune Stone had been vandalised in this way and immediately contacted the police, as it is a criminal offence to damage a scheduled monument.
“Our conservation experts will review the damage soon and put together a programme of remedial work to mitigate the damage done.
“Fortunately incidents such as this are rare, and we continue to work with the local community to educate people on the significance of these prehistoric sites.”