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Note

Date 20 November 2014 - 18 May 2016

Event ID 1044406

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Note

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1044406

Situated on the summit of this small island in the mouth of Loch Ailort, this small fortification is roughly trapezoidal on plan, measuring internally about 40m in length and ranging from 23m in length at the ESE end to 16m at the WNW end (0.08ha). The defences comprise a single wall with an extensively vitrified core still standing up to 2.5m high; it may have measured between 4m and 5m in thickness, though the only evidence of the wall-faces is a run of some 22m of the outer on the N. The position of the entrance is unknown, but the heads of gullies that may have provided access on the S and N have been blocked by traces of what may be an outer wall reduced to bands of rubble with occasional outer facing-stones, and the northern includes at least one piece of vitrifaction. Keith Blood, the OS surveyor who visited in 1970 and noted these remains, considered the possibility that they belonged to an earlier and larger enclosure, but on balance interpreted them as outworks; he also observed other fragments of rough walling blocking the gullies further down the slope and filling all the gaps in the outcrops around the foot of the hillock; the relationship of these remains to the summit enclosure is unknown. Within the interior there are three circular stone-founded structures, each about 6m in internal diameter, two of which are set against the inner line of the wall, though the stratigraphic relationship is uncertain.

Information from An Atlas of Hillforts of Great Britain and Ireland – 18 May 2016. Atlas of Hillforts SC2535

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