Note

Date 23 March 2015 - 31 August 2016

Event ID 1044310

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Note

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1044310

Atlas of Hillforts of Britain and Ireland

This fort occupies a knoll rising from the NW flank of the Hill of Urchany, from which the ground drops away sharply down to the Geddes Burn. The defences comprise two elements: a small oval enclosure occupying the N end of the summit; and an outer enclosure encircling its foot. The inner enclosure measures about 33m from N to S by 16m transversely (0.04ha) within a wall reduced to a mound of rubble about 6m in thickness, in which occasional pieces of vitrified stone can be found. A modern track approaches obliquely up the W flank of the knoll to gain access through a gap in the wall on the N, but it is not known whether this was also the position of the original entrance. While the inner enclosure occupies little more than half the summit area, the outer forms a much bigger circuit around its foot some 5m below, comprising a rampart about 3.5m in thickness by 1m in height with an internal quarry ditch cut back into the slope and about 3m in breadth by at least 1m in depth. This takes in a roughly oval area about 90m from N to S by 45m transversely (0.31ha), though the circuit is not continuous and in addition to the gap where the modern track crosses on the W, it is broken by two gaps on the S, another two on the E, and a fifth at the N tip. At this last, the terminals of the rampart overlap, but the ditch continues across the gap and it is uncertain whether this is an original entrance; in 1964 the OS suggested that a scarp outside this gap was the remains of a hornwork protecting the entrance. The southern of the gaps on the E partly coincides with a steep gully dropping down the slope to a water-hole at the foot of the knoll. The relationship between the inner and outer enclosures is unknown.

Information from An Atlas of Hillforts of Great Britain and Ireland – 31 August 2016. Atlas of Hillforts SC2910