Commissioners Field Meeting 2007

Date 2007

Event ID 1019544

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Publication Account

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1019544

The bronze age burial cairn in Gaich Wood (NJ02NW 2), situated 2km south-west of Grantownon-Spey, was visited during the survey of the Braes of Abernethy in 2006, in order to revise the existing record. The cairn is depicted on the 1st edition of the Ordnance Survey 6-inch map (Elginshire 1874, sheet XXXII) with the annotation ‘Stone Coffin containing Ashes found here AD 1860’ ; the contemporary OS Name Book entry (Elginshire, Book 6, p. 166) reports that ‘a stone chest was found near the centre containing dust or ashes. The greater part of the cairn is taken away for the purpose of building stone fences around the adjoining fields‘.

The cairn was sought in vain by the Ordnance Survey in 1966, who reported that ‘no trace’ of it was to be found, presumably on account of the fact that it had been ‘destroyed by afforestation’ (OS Record Card, 1 September 1966). It was quite a surprise to find not only that the cairn still remained visible, but that a large cist had survived at its centre.

The cairn is situated on a rocky, relatively steep south-facing slope on the north-west side of the Spey Valley. Oval on plan, it measures up to 22m in diameter from north to south by 18.5m transversely, but robbing has reduced the body of the cairn to a tree- and grass-grown spread of rubble about 0.3m in height.

At the centre of the cairn is a large cist, set against the northwest face of a very large boulder standing up to 1.7m in height. The cist measures about 1.8m from north-east to south-west by 1m transversely; and although the north-east end-slab is missing, those at the south-west end and on the north-west side survive, the latter comprising a massive slab measuring 2.3m in length by 1.3m in height and 0.4m inthickness. An earthfast boulder

on the south-south-east side of the cairn indicates that there was probably once a retaining kerb around the mound. Scarring on the surface of the cairn indicates at least two episodes of robbing.

CONTEXT

The cairn in Gaich Wood is one of a clutch of burial cairns lying to the west of Grantown and north-west of the River Spey, some of which have been robbed to reveal central cists. Indeed, one such previously unrecorded monument (NJ02NW 151) was discovered about 900 m to the north-west of the Gaich Wood cairn during the survey.

This group of early bronze age cairns is complemented by a series of Neolithic rock carvings and burnt mounds, which probably date to the centuries around the end of the second millennium BC. Together they suggest that the area north-west of the River Spey was relatively densely occupied throughout this period. This contrasts markedly with the corresponding area south-east of the river, where the same range of monuments is found more thinly spread. Quite why there should be sucha a contrast probably cannot be explained without setting the archaeology of the survey area in a wider geographical context.

This highlights one of the drawbacks to undertaking surveys of relatively small areas: there can be no certainty that the archaeology of these areas is truly representative of the broader picture. The discovery of so many new burnt mounds north-west of the Spey and hut-circles to the south-east has clearly demonstrated that the existing record of the area was largely unrepresentative of the archaeology that actually survives. Indeed, there is every reason to believe that the same is true of the areas surrounding the survey area and so it necessarily follows that there is no meaningful record to which theresults of the Braes of Abernethy survey can be compared.

LESSONS

The most important lesson to arise from the rediscovery of the Gaich Wood cairn is that Ordnance Survey records can never be taken at face value. While it is probable that this cairn and another about 500 m to the north-east (NJ02NW 1), were situated in impenetrable young woodland in 1966, the statement that there was ‘No trace of this cairn‘ in each case was simply wrong. The fact that these accounts were inaccurate has implications for those other sites recorded around the same time.

The second lesson is that forty years is perhaps too long an interval between the revision of site records. Many of the sites visited during the Commission’s survey at Yarrows in Caithness during 2004 and the present survey in East Renfrewshire were last evaluated by the OS in the mid-1960s. While many of the OS site descriptions often require little emendation, it is common for them to be the only record of many that have since been destroyed.

Lastly, the recognition that both of the cairns in Gaich Wood still survive has implications for their future management. The cairn with the cist adjacent to the large boulder is a most unusual monument, worthy of further research and also legal protection. The Commission can be pleased that it has played its part in its rediscovery and in bringing it to a wider audience.

Information from ‘Commissioners’ Field Meeting 2007'.