Banff, Sandyhill Road, Dovecot

NJ66SE 39 6820 6320

For Duff House and related buildings, see NJ66SE 8.00.

(NJ 6820 6320) Dovecot (NAT)

OS 6" map, (1938)

A hexagonal dovecote is perched on a knoll high up behind the town of Banff. It has a battlemented parapet with a 'cap' at each corner.

A N Robertson 1957.

This dovecot was surmounted by the Old Market Cross of Banff from 1768 to 1900 (See NJ66SE 26).

Mahood 1919.

The dovecot is in a fair state of repair and is c.5.0m high. The interior is circular with 'nests' all round reaching to roof-height. The parapet mentioned by Robertson (1957) was probably added when the Market Cross was erected on top of it in 1768.

Visited by OS (WDJ) 9 October 1961.

The dovecot, as above, may be contemporary with Duff House (NJ66SE 8.00), c. 1750.

Visited by OS (NKB) 1 February 1968.

Hexagonal dovecote on hilltop site. Harl pointed rubble with crenellated tooled ashlar wallhead. Tall round-headed blind arcade at north with square-headed doorway. Pulvinated cornice immediately below wallhead; single ashlar weeper drainage spouts project from centre of cornice, surviving on most elevations, draining flat stone slab roof masked by crenellation. 2 rectangular openings house flight holes, formerly fronted by alighting ledges supported on iron brackets (brackets survive).

The Sandyhills dovecote stands on a hilltop above the Deveron valley and Duff House, as a folly and ornament to the landscape. The central column, providing 96 additional nesting boxes, is unusual; structually it supports the stone slab roof. Until the 1980s the dovecote stood in a field, now (1994) largely built over with modern residential development. (Historic Scotland)