Excavation

Date 1994

Event ID 571251

Category Recording

Type Excavation

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/571251

NS 780 779. Excavations revealed a 'V' profiled ring ditch 24m in internal diameter (28m external), immediately S of the Antonine Wall and inside this large temporary camp. Inside it, a post hole structure 4.1m sq was set on a lightly metalled clay platform and associated with four fragments of Roman glass, two of which were bangle fragments of Antonine date. The ring ditch slightly pre-dated the building of the Wall itself but the structure may be a signal/watch tower associated with it, since its location is the only position able to see, and so link, the forts of Castlecary and Westerwood. A metalled track led S from the internal structure to the Military Way.

Excavations to the W of the ring feature traced the intersection of the Wall with the temporary camp defences, the camp ditch had been cut through a layer of turf slip from the Wall and thus post dated it. The camp may therefore be Severan or associated with the later Antonine re-occupation. Just to the E of this, traces of a secondary stone platform were located.

In the field to the E of the main site, a further ring feature, visible as a surface feature, was found to be a relatively modern clay pit.

Elsewhere on the site, both the Antonine Wall and the Military Way were found in excellent preservation, with the road a little S of the OS line. Indeed, despite a long history of ploughing, up to four layers of turf were found on the Wall base in places and three culverts were located, one of which was completely intact, with its cap stones still in place.

Sponsor: University of Manchester, Soc Ants Scot.

D J Woolliscroft 1994.