Excavation

Date 16 March 2000 - August 2000

Event ID 1030815

Category Recording

Type Excavation

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1030815

A building recording exercise was carried out within the narrow passageway. A total of 37 individual contexts were recorded. The passage comprises two long elevations (E and W),alongside two short N and S elevations, the southern of which provides a window lighting through the S wall.In addition, the W wall of the Great Hall screen passage was also examined following the removal of panelling, with a total of15 contexts being recorded.The results of these recording exercises, coupled with th eevidence from excavations and building recording within the Queen Anne Building over the past two years, has allowed for an interpretative phasing of the development of the Queen Anne Building:

Period 1 - Pre-16th century, pre-Great Hall – vaults beneath the Gunhouse.

Period 2 - c1500 – addition of the Great Hall. (An intermediary phase between the completion of the Great Hall and the erection of the Queen Anne Building, not directly visible within the recorded fabric.)

Period 3 - 1708–13 – addition of the Queen Anne Building.

Period 4 - Mid-18th century – Military Barrack Hall.

Period 5 - 1891 – Hippolyte Blanc renovations.

The evidence gleaned from the recording of exposed fabric, coupled with evidence from the most recent excavations, and from the recording of the S wall exteriors of both the Great Hall and Queen Anne Buildings, has allowed for an interpretation of the development of this area of the castle. It has long been known that the vaults beneath the Great Hall and Queen Anne Building predate the structures which currently overly them. However, the recent recording work has highlighted the possibility that pre 16th-century (i.e. pre Great Hall) structures survive in part at Crown Square level, in the form of the S end of the W wall of the passageway.

A trench was excavated within the S room of the Queen Anne Building, over two stages of work. A blocked door had been noted in the E wall of this room, and the excavation was to be against this wall, in an attempt to locate its' threshold, and thus assist in reopening the door.

NT 2521 7356 The Lower Defence/Governor’s Garden. All of the area of the angled artillery bastion immediately below the Argyll Battery, known as the Lower Defence or Governor’s Garden, was systematically cleared of modern aggregate to reveal evidence of the gun platforms prior to their reinstatement. This was achieved progressively in discrete areas utilising a mini-excavator under archaeological supervision. The divisions of the sequence of trenches were ultimately absorbed within the single area covering the total surface of the bastion.

Period 1: c 1550–1708. There has been some form of angle-pointed artillery work on the site of the present Lower Defence since at least the mid-17th century. The Gordon of Rothiemay perspective of 1647 shows projecting bastions close to the site of the present configuration. It is likely, therefore, that part at least of the present earthwork is a development of the earlier work.

Period 2: 1708–1715. The twin embrasures and associated platforms were constructed to form part of the flanking defences for the ‘grand secret’, an elaborate, but never completed, hornwork for the E approaches to the castle.

Period 3: 1730–1737. The spur battery of the Queen Anne programme of work was altered by the creation of a parapet level and small arms firing platform on two sides of the earlier bastion.It is likely that the W wall was also rebuilt at this time – founded on apparently spare paving slabs from the parapet – and the new inner face of the N wall featured recycled stonework.

Period 4: 1737–1900. The gun platforms were robbed out and cleared away at some time prior to Period 5, and it may be that this is the time the area was initially converted to recreational use.

Period 5: 1900–1945. An arcaded, lean-to structure was built against the N face of the Argyll Battery wall base, along with a partially enclosed building to the E. These buildings are most likely evidence of the use of the Lower Defence as a coal store and smithy, both supplied by the large iron coal chute in the face of the Argyll Battery wall.

A Dunn 2000

Sponsor: Historic Scotland

Kirkdale Archaeology