Excavation

Date 27 January 2014 - 1 February 2014

Event ID 1013097

Category Recording

Type Excavation

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1013097

NS 83335 84986 A programme of vegetation clearance, an excavation supported by volunteers, and laser scanning was undertaken at Tappoch/Torwood Broch. The work which was undertaken, 27 January – 1 February 2014, formed part of the Lowland Brochs Project funded by Forestry Commission Scotland.

The vegetation, which included heather and bracken and covered most of the broch was removed, by hand, by volunteers, the AaM team (Cara Jones and Phil Richardson), staff from Stirling Council (Fiona Isobel Watson and Murray Cook), and the Archaeology Officer for Falkirk (Geoff Bailey).

Two trenches were then opened across a previously unrecorded feature, which lay outside the scheduled area. The excavation established that the feature comprised a bank built on top of an augmented bedrock shelf. The bank had been disturbed in places, probably during forestry planting. A peck-marked stone, which may have been used for fire lighting, and a large (50mm long) piece of charcoal, were recovered while sieving the rubble from the bank. The peck-marked stone was c100mm long with a peck mark just off-centre. Funding has been secured from the Catherine

Mackichan Trust to radiocarbon date the charcoal.

A subsequent phase of work at the site consisted of the laser scanning of the broch, by AOC Archaeology Group (Graeme Cavers and Gemma Hudson) and the production of drawings.

Archive: Archaeology Scotland and RCAHMS (intended)

Funder: Forestry Commission Scotland, Adopt-a-Monument (in kind) and Stirling Council Archaeologist

Geoff Bailey, Murray Cook, Cara Jones, Phil Richardson, Fiona Isobel Watson, Graeme Cavers and Gemma Hudson

(Source: DES)