RCAHMS, The Recumbent Stone Circles of Scotland

Date 1999 - 2011

Event ID 555900

Category Project

Type Project

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/555900

The origin of this survey project lay in a landscape study of Donside in Aberdeenshire undertaken by RCAHMS from 1995-2001 (RCAHMS 2007). This area encompassed the core of the distribution of recumbent stone circles, which was itself one of a number of factors underpinning the initial selection of that area. Having visited and surveyed those in Donside, RCAHMS was asked to plan Tomnaverie in Deeside on behalf of Professor Richard Bradley prior to a series of new excavations that were designed to elucidate the character and chronology of these unusual monuments. This provided not only the opportunity to look further afield, but also the stimulus to embark on a wider programme of recording in support of this new work, which it was intended to complete roughly 100 years after Frederick Coles’ systematic survey of this class of monument.

The results of the survey were originally conceived in a traditional format, combining a descriptive Inventory with a brief introduction. However, the sheer wealth of material that was available was not fully appreciated at the outset of the project and this changed the emphasis of the final publication (Welfare 2011). These monuments are important for their place in the evolution of antiquarian and archaeological thought, as on the one hand they played a central role in the pursuits of local antiquarians from the 16th century onwards, while on the other they influenced the wider study of megaliths, beginning with the correspondence between Dr James Garden and John Aubrey (1692-95). Suffice it to say that the engagement of the likes of Sir Henry Dryden, William Lukis, Alfred Lewis, Sir Norman Lockyer, General Pitt-Rivers, Alexander Keiller and Gordon Childe gives the study of these circles a much wider resonance, while their recurring architectural resemblance and orientation within a restricted geographical region also placed them at the centre of the debates about ancient astronomy in the late 20th century.

As a result, the emphasis of the printed volume (Welfare 2011) differed from the original conception, for rather than focusing upon the description of the individual circles, it concentrated instead upon a more general discussion of their architecture and the ideas that this may encapsulate. As such, it provides a commentary on the records contained within the National Collection now held by Historic Environment Scotland. Such is the wealth of information for each monument, however, that an extended Gazetteer (with an important explanatory introduction) was also prepared, which is available online from www.historicenvironment.scot/media/4427/great-crowns-stone-illustrated-gazetteer.pdf . This contains plans and descriptions of the remains of each ring and a synthesis of the work that has taken place there, including critiques of older excavations in the light of more recent discoveries. The Gazetteer is also supported by an extended Appendix reviewing the other monuments that have been claimed to be recumbent stone circles. This online component of the publication represented a new departure for RCAHMS and was intended to provide general readers and researchers alike with a consolidated record of all the data that was collected in the course of the work. In addition, an electronic version (with minor corrections) subsequently brought together these two volumes into a single ebook, which is available from the Apple Bookstore (Welfare 2013).

Information from HES (ATW) 20 January 2021.

People and Organisations

Related Event(s)

Event	Type	Subtype	Notes
887251	DESCRIPTIVE ACCOUNTS	PUBLICATION ACCOUNT	In 1867 OS surveyors noted the site of what they termed a Stone Circle in a field 250m south-east of Nether Balfour (Aberdeenshire 1869, lxii). It had been removed some 20 years before and measured about 18m in diameter, with what was described to them as ‘the remains of about 20 yards [18.3m] of road paved with flat stones, evidently leading to the circle, from the NE’ (Name Book, Aberdeenshire, No. 88, p 107). Annotated Causeway on the map, this was one of a number of such features that they had been told about, in every case adjacent to a Stone Circle – Bankhead (NJ52NW 25); Crookmore (NJ51NE 16 and NJ51NE 144); Druidsfield (NJ51NE 1); and Newbigging (NJ52NW 10). At both Druidsfield and Newbigging, Coles was persuaded that these had been rings with recumbent settings, but it was Alexander Keiller who then drew a connection between causeways and recumbent stone circles, thus drawing Nether Balfour into this category (1934, 18). Without any visible remains to contradict this identification, the inclusion of these structures in lists of possible and probable recumbent stone circles has been inevitable (Burl 1970, 78; 1976a, 352, Abn 79; 2000, 421, Abn 82; Ruggles 1984, 59; 1999, 187 no. 53). However, the most recent analysis of the descriptions of these monuments suggests an alternative explanation. Rather than rings of freestanding orthostats, they were all (excepting Druidsfield) probably walled enclosures or hut-circles with attached souterrains of the type that can still be seen at New Kinnord in the Howe of Cromar (Gannon et al 2007, 70–1).
887070	DESCRIPTIVE ACCOUNTS	PUBLICATION ACCOUNT	In the late 18th century, probably about 1770 (NSA, xii, Aberdeenshire, 177), a Druidical temple was removed from the farm of Standingstones to provide stones for the foundations of the manse at New Deer (Stat Acct, ix, 1793, 191). On the strength of the place-name alone this was probably a megalithic ring, and Rev Hugh Taylor, the minister of the parish, placed it ‘about half a mile north from the church’ (ibid), a location that falls on the lower slopes of the Hill of Culsh to the south of Standingstones steading. The exact position of the circle and its character are unknown, but in 1870, almost 100 years after its removal, Alexander Wilson of Mill of Auchreddie pointed out its site on the summit of the Hill of Culsh to the OS surveyors, claiming to remember ‘when a boy to have seen one of the stones which formed part of the circle standing near where the Trig Station now is’ (Name Book, Aberdeenshire, No. 64, p 52); apparently confronted with an eyewitness, the OS surveyors duly marked the site of the circle on the summit (Aberdeenshire 1874, xx; NJ84NE 2, NJ 8811 4829) where the monument commemorating William Dingwall-Fordyce MP (1836–1875) now stands. Alexander Wilson, however, was only born in 1802, some 30 years after the circle is supposed to have been removed, so his testimony cannot be considered reliable. Nevertheless, some memory of where the circle stood may have survived into the 20th century, sufficient for Rev William Beveridge to mount an excavation in 1913 at what he believed to be the spot, assisted by the tenant of the farm, James Littlejohn, and his sons. Explicitly, this was in one of the fields on the south face of the hill rather than anywhere on its summit (Beveridge 1914, 191–2), its site identifiable by the quartz scattered in the ploughsoil. This was spread over an area about 9m across, within which they found ‘masses of burnt soil’. On further investigation they also discovered four pits, two of which were filled with stones and had possibly contained inhumations. Mr Littlejohn was no stranger to archaeological remains on his farm (Abercromby 1901), but he was not the tenant when the OS surveyors prepared the Name Book and may not have held the farm from long before the turn of the century. As a result it is not clear whether Beveridge had tapped into surviving local lore, or whether Littlejohn’s discoveries in his fields had simply led him to rationalise his own observations with the parish records held in the two Statistical Accounts. The enduring quality of quartz, however, holds the promise that this particular location might still be identified by field-walking. In conclusion, there is no reason to doubt that a stone circle once stood on the lower slopes of the Hill of Culsh, but its exact position is lost and in the absence of any compelling antiquarian description there are no grounds to identify it as a recumbent stone circle. Burl first raised this possibility, based on the understanding that it stood on the flank of the hill and that its site correlated with the quartz and burning reported by Beveridge (Burl 1970, 73, 79; 1976a, 351, Abn 39; 2000, 420, Abn 38); Ruggles was more sceptical (1984, 56 note c, 59; 1999, 186, no. 14; cf Barnatt 1989, 460, no. 6:123).
887252	DESCRIPTIVE ACCOUNTS	PUBLICATION ACCOUNT	These two granite stones stand on a south-facing terrace some 300m north of Dunecht School. Set about 3m apart, the western (A) presents a pear-shaped profile to the south, measuring a maximum of 1.6m by 0.9m and 2.9m in height, while its eastern neighbour (B), a slab measuring 1.8m by 0.55m and 2.1m in height, has an asymmetric profile that appears to arch over towards the east. The taller western stone has been reused as a Pictish symbol stone and bears the incised outline of a mirror case and a mirror-and-comb on its south face (Fraser 2008, 34, no. 36). Which also has a single cupmark on its west side. Lying on the dump of field gathered stones that has collected around them there is a large boulder (C) measuring 2.9m in length by 1.4m in breadth. The origin of this boulder is unknown, though in 1865 the OS surveyors annotated the two stones Stone Circle (Remains of) (Aberdeenshire 1869, lxxiii). The entry in the Name Book identifies them as one of ‘the three druidical temples in the district, of the usual circular form’ mentioned in the Statistical Account (x, 1794, 248 note) and claims the other stones had been broken up to build field walls (Name Book, Aberdeenshire, No. 15, p 68). If the boulder now lying between the two stones was part of a circle, it must have been buried rather than broken up. It is a relatively recent addition and was not present when Coles visited the stones in 1902 (1903a, 83–4) or when James Ritchie photographed them in 1904 (RCAHMS AB4830). The suggestion that these are the remains of a recumbent stone circle comes from Coles, who had no doubt that he was looking at the flankers of a recumbent setting. This assessment has been generally accepted ever since (Burl 1970, 78; 1976a, 352, Abn 80; 2000, 421, Abn 83; Ruggles 1999, 187 no. 69, 266 note 14), though both Ruggles (1984, 57 note r, 60) and Barnatt (1989, 463, no. 6:147) have raised the possibility that they might be part of a four-poster setting or simply a two-stone alignment. The present survey has tended to this latter view and has not found Coles’ hypothesis entirely convincing. Compared with the flankers of other recumbent settings, this pair is unusual; more typically the profile of the eastern slab would suggest that the recumbent lay to its east rather than between them. However, excavation could resolve the issue.