Note
Date 13 March 2015 - 31 May 2016
Event ID 1044299
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Note
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1044299
This fortification encloses one of the low summits along the crest of a narrow ridge above the NW bank of the River Ness, but while the OS surveyors who surveyed it at 1:2500 in 1960 and 1970 were in agreement that it is the remains of a fort, it was annotated Motte on the map and subsequently Scheduled as such in 1975. The level summit, which measures no more than 30m from ENE to WSW by 14m transversely, is featureless and falls away around its margin to a defensive line comprising a ditch some 3m broad and 0.8m deep, with an external rampart about 4m thick, set much lower down the slope. These defences enclose an oval area, which according to a plan drawn up about 1880 by James Fraser for the Inverness Scientific Society and Field Club, measures about 90m from ENE to WSW by 50m transversely (0.35ha); it has not been measured on the ground since and only the most general outline is visible on current satellite imagery. The entrance is on the ENE, opening on to the spine of the ridge, but its S side has been levelled over a distance of some 20m. The only feature visible within the interior are traces of an old trackway ascending to the summit on the N.
Information from An Atlas of Hillforts of Great Britain and Ireland – 31 May 2016. Atlas of Hillforts SC2898
