Field Visit
Date July 1986
Event ID 1082611
Category Recording
Type Field Visit
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1082611
This township is situated at an elevation of 75m OD on the S-facing hillside above the E entrance of the Kyle s of Bute, enjoying a wide view over Rothesay Bay to the Firth of Clyde. Although the lands of 'le Stroyne' appear in 1474 to have included a considerable area of the Colintraive pen insula, Roy's Map of about 1750 confirms that the present township was the 'Strone' which until 1700 had belonged to the Lamonts of Coustoun, 2.5km to the N (en.1). The hearth-tax assessment of 1693 names three tenants (en.2), and the surviving buildings may be divided into three groups. The settlement was probably abandoned towards the end of the 18th century when it became part of the Campbell of Southhall estate.
The settlement is bounded to the N by a massive turf-and-stone dyke running along the hillside, below which there are some traces of rig-cultivation. The site is intersected by a steep-sided gully formed by a seasonal water-course, now affected by modern land-drainage. This gully separates two groups, each of two main buildings (A1, A2, B1, B2), while a third group occupies a lower and less well-drained terrace (C1-4) to the S. These structures vary from about 11m to 14m in length by 6m in width over drystone walls about 0.8m in thickness and up to 1m in height, displaying both round and square angles. Almost all are aligned with the slope, and the interior of the largest building (A1) slopes considerably from N to S, although it stands on a revetted platform. This building and the probable dwelling in the adjacent group (B1) contain inserted cross-walls, while a possible barn to the W of the latter (B2) has been contracted in length. Two of the buildings (A2, B2) were associated with turfwalled enclosures and may have served as barns, while a third enclosure, possibly a stackyard, lies close to the head-dyke near a corn-drying kiln whose bowl is 2m in diameter. Two adjacent rectangular scoops cut into the hillside to the SE may mark house-stances, but no foundations are identifiable.
RCAHMS 1992, visited July 1986
