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Date 30 June 2014 - 23 May 2016

Event ID 1045624

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Note

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1045624

This earthwork is situated on the SW side of the valley of the River Esk, occupying a steep-sided promontory formed between the escarpment overlooking the haughland, and the gully of an unnamed tributary. Triangular on plan, the interior measures a maximum of 44m from N to S by 40m transversely (0.09ha), and is defended by a massive earthen rampart with an external ditch which have been drawn across the neck of the promontory on the S. The rampart measures up to 7.6m in thickness by 1.8m in height, and the ditch is 10m in breadth by over 2m in depth; there is also a counterscarp bank along its outer lip. Both Alexander Curle in 1912 and the OS in 1973 observed traces of a stone wall along the crest of the rampart, and there is also evidence of a robbed wall along the NE margin of the promontory. A causeway across the ditch at the NW margin of the promontory marks the position of the entrance.

The earthwork defences are unusually massive for such a small enclosure, which in 1980 first led RCAHMS investigators to review its classification as a fort and to speculate that there was perhaps a missing earthwork castle in this reach of the River Esk; the date of the defences can only be demonstrated by excavation.

Information from An Atlas of Hillforts of Great Britain and Ireland – 23 May 2016. Atlas of Hillforts SC1084

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