Publication Account
Date 2007
Event ID 587222
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Publication Account
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/587222
NM04 5 DUN BEAG, VAUL
NM/0463 4926
This site is likely to be an oval dun rather than a broch [3, fig. 116] but is mentioned here because of the finds made in a limited trial excavation in 1963 [2]. The ruins stand on a rock knoll about 400m east of the broch Dun Mor Vaul (NM04 4). A trial trench on the summit of the knoll showed that the ruins of the main wall were overlaid by occupation debris which yielded decorated pottery indistinguishable from that found at Dun Mor Vaul as well as a complete bronze ring-headed pin. The finds are kept in the Hunterian Museum of the University of Glasgow. This evidence probably provides further confirmation that different kinds of Iron Age stone structure need not imply major cultural differences; pottery and artifacts are the best guide to these, or to their absence.
Sources: 1. NMRS site no. NM 04 NW 4: 2. E W MacKie in Discovery and Excavation in Scotland 1963, 20-1: 3. RCAHMS 1980, no. 196, 104-05.
E W MacKie 2007