Aerial Photography

Date 2019

Event ID 1114557

Category Recording

Type Aerial Photography

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1114557

NT 753 136 Pennymuir Temporary Camps, NT 765 123 Woden Law fort, NT 769 118 Dere Street Roman road and earlier cross-ridge earthworks.

A preliminary photographic trial using a drone camera was carried out over the Roman camps which flank Dere Street (Canmore ID: 83741). Camps A, B and D responded well where the earthworks were unploughed, while an Infra-red filter revealed parts of the perimeter of Camp C where cultivation had removed all surface traces.

Woden Law fort (Canmore ID: 58068) was subjected to vertical photographic scan and 3D modelling; these picked out the ramparts very clearly, as well as some of the extensive cord-rig that covers the slopes immediately below the outermost ‘Roman’ earthworks on the east side.

The Roman road, Dere Street was photographed where it crosses a narrow neck of ground south-east of the fort between Whitehope Cleuch and Twisehope Cleuch; the scan revealed its embankment over five earlier cross-ridge dykes (Canmore ID: 58075, 58105) and tell-tale quarry pits where the road to the south is terraced into the hillside. Part of a nearby palisaded homestead (Canmore ID: 58109) was also included in the survey.

Archive: NRHE (intended); 3D modelling at https://sketchfab.com/3d-models/wodens-law-hill-fort-3b241068ffe0463dad356942d5801711;

Funder: Private individuals

Tony Hunt and John Dent

(Source: DES Vol 20)