Watching Brief
Date 4 February 1997 - 8 February 1997
Event ID 1012167
Category Recording
Type Watching Brief
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1012167
NS 3636 3451 The site of a new visitor centre at Dundonald Castle was prepared in February 1997. It was thought that buildings around the base of the castle rock could be exposed during this work, and therefore an archaeological watching brief was maintained by Kirkdale Archaeology.
A scooped platform to the S of the new building was initially examined, proving to be a small quarry hole measuring 4.3 x 3m. Fractured bedrock was exposed at ground level, and a line of presumed masonry exposed at ground level was shown to be a line of natural, weathered doleritic rock which has fractured to give the appearance of a man-made structure.
Within the area of the new visitor centre itself, turf and topsoil were removed to reveal traces of a formerly more extensive area of marshy deposits at the NW corner, the truncated remains of large salt marshes which originally extended to the NW. The remainder of the area was drier, sloping downwards towards the former marshland. Removal of the drier material revealed nothing of archaeological significance, despite excavation beyond the initial limits of 0.8m.
In April 1997 a watching brief was undertaken while contractors excavated a circular hole to form the foundation for a masonry plinth supporting a bronze view-finder outside the barmkin wall of Dundonald Castle. The site was over an exploratory archaeological trench dug in the 1980s. The material removed therefore comprised backfill and topsoil. A photographic record was made prior to backfilling.
A cable trench was also excavated to a general depth of 300mm below present ground surface, and followed a zig-zag route from a point at the extreme NW end of the assumed barmkin area, through to a point approximately 8.5m S of the possible chapel site, within the inner courtyard, and immediately W of the wall separating inner and outer courtyards.
Nothing was revealed of the residual masonry towards the tower house end of the castle complex. However, particularly within the entrance pend, substantial rubble deposits were revealed, suggested in part by the character of the debris (mortar-rich) and the shelving nature of the bedrock, which may well be coincident with the entranceway. The ground would appear to slope upwards from outside to inside, and the pend may well have exploited a natural terrace in the underlying bedrock. Little new evidence was found of the still enigmatic route of the barmkin wall to the NW of the tower house. It is clear, however, that the wall line remains close to the surface, which could easily be cleared if the need were to arise.
Observations of the general topography to the W of the tower house at or near 'Dumpling Hill' seem at present to indicate a form of forework associated with the 14th-century castle, and revealed traces of a terrace and a probable rectangular building. The terrace appeared to be exclusively associated with the tower and tower house elements, and did not necessarily reflect a rubble spread at the base of the ruined walls, being too regular in character. This feature is therefore best viewed as a platform, possibly deriving from elements of the Period IV complex (13th century), recycled as a base for the later castle. The indications of a rectangular building were reflected by three sections of walling extending from the terrace, forming the N, S and W walls of a straight-sided structure. The S wall was indicated by a projection from the terrace noted above, and the N wall lay on an alignment approximately opposite the assumed blocked entranceway within the tower house gate-house structure.
Sponsor: Historic Scotland
G Ewart and D Stewart 1997
