Publication Account
Date 2007
Event ID 586996
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Publication Account
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/586996
NH79 1 BRAE ('Strath Carnaig') NH/7050 9903 (visited in 1989)
Probable broch in Dornoch, Sutherland, in the form of a crater-like mound of rubble on a rise above a flood plain; there is turf growing in the interior. The structure is badly ruined although both wallfaces are visible throughout most of the circuit. These indicate an internal diameter of about 8.3m with the wall thickness varying from 4.3m to c. 5.7m.
An entrance was reported on the west-south-west in 1963 but later visitors, including the author, could not see it [1]. A gap 0.7m wide in the inner face on the north side was thought to be the entrance to an intramural gallery and by 1989 a fragment of this gallery had become exposed. A small section of scarcement can also be seen now.
Dimensions: internal diameter c. 8.3m, wall thickness 4.3m thick in the east-north-east, and c. 5.7m in the west-south-west. The overall diameter should therefore be about 18.3m (60.0 ft) along that diameter but is perhaps less elsewhere. In 1989 an accurate survey of the inner wallface was undertaken and showed it to have been set out close to a true circle with a radius of 4.05 +/-- 0.11m (a diameter of 8.10 m, or 26.56 ft) .
Sources: 1. NMRS site no. NH 79 NW 11: 2. RCAHMS 1911a, 38, no. 107.
E W MacKie 2007
