Excavation

Date 2 March 1993 - 7 May 1993

Event ID 1034062

Category Recording

Type Excavation

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1034062

NS 790 940 A series of small-scale excavations and watching briefs were completed between March and May 1993 as part of the major ongoing programme of rebuilding and upgrading at the Castle. The results of this most recent fieldwork can be summarised in terms of the four areas of the Castle effected.

1. The Overport Battery Casemates and Trance (part of the new restaurant development)

During the removal of 19th and 20th-century levelling deposits. A remnant of a defensive line, predating the Queen Anne works, was discovered in Casemate 1

2. Guard Room Square

Beneath elements of the southern Queen Anne defences, slight evidence of the earlier southern access route on to the site was traced in the form of worn and weathered bedrock.

3. The Lower Square

During the excavation of a series of pipe and service trenches, water conduits - both for drainage and water supply, were found, the earliest of which dated to the Queen Anne rebuilding programme. Also, some crude stonework with associated midden deposits, were discovered towards the SE of the Great Hall. These features are provisionally dated to the late 15th/early 16th century and represent levelling up, whether casual or deliberate, over the steeply shelving bedrock to the E of the Great Hall, down to the

North Gate.

4. The Queen Anne Battery Casemates

The interiors of four of these chambers were cleared of 19th and 20th-century infill, down to primary (early 18th century) occupation levels. Evidence of wooden floors and large squared hearths in each was found, all of which were later obscured by the raising of the floors throughout the range towards the middle of the 19th century.

G Ewart

Sponsor: Historic Scotland

Kirkdale Archaeology