Publication Account
Date 1985
Event ID 1018909
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Publication Account
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1018909
The stone is one of the most impressive single monoliths in Argyll, standing to height of 4m and measuring 1.2m by 0.9m at the base. Tradition has it that the stone, Clach na Carraig or Clach Diarmid, and the little cairn to the south-east mark the burial place of the Irish hero Diarmid. The cairn, which is about 4.5m in overall diameter, has a kerb of large granite boulders; excavation in 1967 discovered only a small quantity of cremated bones and white quartz pebbles around the bases of all the kerb-stones. There are very few stone circles in Argyll, and that at Strontoiller is one of the more accessible, although the stones are not individually large. There are about thirty-one boulders set on a 'circle' of about 20m in diameter.
These three sites, together with a series of cairns at the southern end of Loch Nell, 3.5km to the south-west, suggest that this has been an important area of settlement in the neolithic and bronze ages.
Information from ‘Exploring Scotland’s Heritage: Argyll and the Western Isles’, (1985).