Publication Account
Date 1985
Event ID 1016244
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Publication Account
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1016244
Over 300m high, Hownam Rings command the ridge over which a track known as 'The Street' passes from Hownam, along the high plateau and across the Border to Upper Coquet Dale. The site is naturally protected on three sides, but is easily accessible along this ridge.
Excavation has identified at least four phases of occupation, the last dating from the late 3rd century AD and comprising an undefended settlement of circular stone-built houses and a roughly rectangular enclosure containing a single stone-walled house. This settlement lies both within and upon the abandoned ramparts of the previous phase.
Whilst it is uncertain when the triple ramparts were abandoned, they had been built perhaps in response to such new weapons as slings or chariots. They represent a major remodelling of an earlier 3.6m thick stone wall, faced either side with stone blocks and infilled with rubble. Within the entrance to this single wall, blocked up when replaced, a quem was found,dated to the late 1st century AD.
The first phase, no longer identifiable on the ground, was a simple palisaded enclosure which had been reconstructed very soon after completion on almost the same line. Originally thought to date to the 1st or 2nd century BC, radiocarbon tests now suggest these first phases to be 6th or 7th century BC-giving a total occupation span of some 700-800 years.
'The Shearers' (NT 790192-791192), a line of 28 stones, cross the plateau some 82m south-east of the fort. Eleven of them are exposed at turf-level. Said by some to be standing stones, they are more likely the 'grounders' of an ancient field-dyke probably erected during the occupation of the fort. Such field dykes, in association with late-Roman/early-Anglian homesteads, survive at Crock Cleuch, about 5km west-south-west (NT 833176).
Information from 'Exploring Scotland's Heritage: Lothian and Borders', (1985).
