Database Update

Date 31 August 2009

Event ID 578944

Category Recording

Type Field Visit

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/578944

This chambered cairn is situated at the present high water mark where it is still susceptible to tidal movement and erosion. The cairn is largely as described by Henshall and it remains unclear whether the large prostrate slab at the SW side of the chamber entrance was a portal stone or an upright of a facade. Excavation of the chamber and its floor deposits in 1997 revealed that it was divided into two compartments by upright sill stones 0.5m high, and presumably these stones equate with those shown on Henshall’s plan and described in the accompanying account as ‘two small stones placed across the chamber floor’ (page 516). However, Beveridge’s photographs of the chamber taken in 1908 do not appear to show these stones and indeed the interior appears relatively stone free. This suggests that Beveridge’s photographs were taken after he had cleared the chamber of ‘the accumulated rubbish’, and raises the possibility that he introduced the sill stones, perhaps in an attempt to stabilise the sides of the chamber and minimise further tidal erosion.

Visited by RCAHMS (ARG,SPH) 31 August 2009