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Note
Date 15 January 2016 - 18 May 2016
Event ID 1045144
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Note
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1045144
The defences of this fort, perched high on the SW shoulder of Birkenside Hill on the E side of the Leader Water opposite Chapel on Leader, had already been reduced by ploughing by the mid 19th century, and by the time that James Hewat Craw came to draw up a plan about 1912 only the line of the outer rampart could be traced, accompanied on the S by a length of broad ditch. Since 1976, however, the fort has been regularly under crop and has been photographed as a cropmark on no fewer than fourteen occasions, not only revealing the overall plan of the defences, but also traces of timber round-houses within the interior; Getmapping satellite imagery taken under bare earth conditions has also revealed traces of the ramparts. Oval on plan, the fort has measured at least 115m from E to W by 90m transversely (0.86ha) within at least two ramparts with external ditches, while the soilmarks also suggest the presence of a third, counterscarp rampart, around the NE quarter; together they evidently formed a massive belt of defences in excess of 30m deep. There are at least two entrances, on the ENE and WSW respectively, and at the former the causeways through the ditches are slightly staggered to create an oblique approach exposing the visitor's right side. In some years the cropmarks have revealed two palisade trenches set about 5m apart and 5m within the lip of the inner ditch, but these are not strictly concentric with the ditch, converging on the E and diverging on the W, and should probably be regarded as evidence of a free-standing enclosure, or indeed successive enclosures, upon the site; in view of the soilmark traces of the massive ramparts, the palisade trenches are almost certainly of earlier date, though enclosing a similar area. On the SE the inner of the palisade trenches intersects the ring-grooves of at least two timber round-houses.
Information from An Atlas of Hillforts of Great Britain and Ireland – 18 May 2016. Atlas of Hillforts SC4003
