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Publication Account
Date 2007
Event ID 586868
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Publication Account
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/586868
NC70 1 EAST KINNAULD 1
NC/7438 0159
This broch in Rogart, Sutherland, stands in a very remote position, high among the crags on the north side of and overlooking Strath Fleet – a fertile valley with many modern farms (visited 11/7/63 and 9/7/85). The structure, now a vast heap of stones, is built of irregular blocks of igneous or metamorphic rock and is full of its own debris. It stands about 122m (400ft) above the sea.
The entrance is on the west and fairly clear of debris at the outer end. There is an oval guard cell on its right, choked with debris but apparently 3.05m (10ft) deep; the lintel of the doorway to this cell is visible, immediately behind a built door-check at a distance of 2.74m (9ft) from the exterior. The passage is 5.19m (17ft) long and 84cm (2ft 9in) wide at the outer end. Three lintels are still in position over the outer part of the passage, starting at the door-checks.
On the left of the passage is the curved wall of another mural cell with a doorway to the interior of the broch, capped with a small triangular lintel [2, fig. 65] It is not clear exactly what this is, but it is unlikely to be a second guard cell; such rarely communicate with the interior (but see Clachtoll – NC02 1). However the Commission also saw what seemed to be the edge of a doorway leading from this cell to the entrance passage, but this feature is now obscured. Thus the broch may have two guard cells.
Traces of a mural gallery are visible in places all round the wallhead. At 7-8 o'clock it is higher than the entrance lintels, so it should be an upper gallery at this point. Yet it continues round to 12 o'clock where it looks as if it is at ground level since the natural rock surface outside the broch is much higher at this point. However at 8 o'clock there is a void from the gallery to the interior, the sill of which is exposed; thus the gallery here ought to be an upper one. The author saw no trace of a scarcement on the exposed inner wallface in 1963, but one was reported in 1966 and denied in 1981 [1]. The inner face is well built in spite of the coarse nature of the stone.
Dimensions (author’s measurements): 6-12 o'clock, overall diameter 18.61m (61ft); internal diameter 9.61m (31ft31 6in). The wall is therefore c. 4.42m thick and the wall proportion would then be about 48.4% (the entrance passage was found to be only 4.88m (16ft) long, not 5.19m (17ft) ). More recently the wall was stated to vary in thickness from 4.1m on the east to 5.1min the sides of the entrance on the west [1]. This last measurement conflicts with the author's.
Sources: 1 NMRS site no. NC 70 SW 5: 2. RCAHMS 1911a, 164-5, no. 477.
E W MacKie 2007
