Field Visit

Date 14 August 2000

Event ID 920355

Category Recording

Type Field Visit

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/920355

Seven stones stand or lie on the line of a row of birch and sycamore trees between the area of the old churchyard in Inverurie cemetery and the Bass (NJ72SE 13). Four are Pictish symbol stones, one is an early 17th-century headstone commemorating Walter Innes of Ardtannes, and two are simply roughly shaped slabs, one of whinstone, the other of pink granite. These last probably served funerary function, the massive form and unshaped nature of the granite slab suggesting that it may have been used as a mortsafe to deter the activities of 19th century body-snatchers.

Stuart relates that the symbol stones 'seem to have been built into the foundations of the old church, the walls of which were pulled down to afford materials for building the churchyard dykes in the early part of the present century. Numbers 2, 3 and 4 were recently observed in these dykes, and Number 1, while in the course of being broken up by the masons, who were building the dykes, was rescued by Mr Donald of Urybank, and has lain in the churchyard since that time'.

Visited by RCAHMS (IF), 14 August 2000.

J Stuart 1856.