Archaeology Notes
Date - 1980
Event ID 647961
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Archaeology Notes
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/647961
NB35SE 2 39630 54080
(NB 3962 5407) Steinacleit (NAT)
Chambered Cairn (NR)
OS 6" map, (1964)
Reputed chambered cairn: Although described by the RCAHMS as a denuded chambered cairn and stone circle, Henshall, although she found the site greatly ruined and difficult to understand, saw little indication that it had been a chambered tomb, and believes that it may be the remains of a building.
About 1920 the site was stripped of 3 or 4ft of peat which partly covered it, revealing what, in 1928, the Commission described as an oval enclosure, 270ft by 183ft, formed by a wall varying in width from a single stone up to 5 or 6ft. The reputed cairn lay within the SW end, with its centre about 50ft from the enclosure wall.
Today (A S Henshall 1972) the most obvious feature of the cairn is its kerb or wall-face, with a diameter of 54ft. The RCAHMS described it as consisting of ten large upright stone blocks mostly broad of face and thin of edge: there were indications of four others beneath the ground, while, of six prostrate stones, one resembles, possibly fortuitously, the shape of an axe. Henshall adds that the stones stand on the east side up to 3ft 8ins high above the turf and that their full length, as suggested by the fallen stones, is between 6 and 7 1/2ft. Round the north part the wall is continuous, with large stones set horizontally between the earthfast blocks. On the ESE there seems to be part of an outer wall-face with three stones joining it at right-angles to the main wall (A S Henshall 1972). The RCAHMS saw this as an overlapping of the ring, or kerb, with a single stone set at right-angles, suggestive of an entrance.
"Within the kerb, and at places outside it, there is a considerable quantity of loose stones or cairn material, banked near the edge to a maximum height of 3ft, but dish-towards the centre. In the interior there are several large set stones apparently belonging to an interior structure" .., the most notable being an upright stone on the west side 2 1/2ft wide and 2ft thick which projects 4ft above the present ground-level. "The concave centre and the space between the interior orthostats make it difficult to interpret the remains as a tomb. In some respects the site suggests a ruined building, though the use of such large stones set on their sides or their ends is, on the whole, against this." (A S Henshall 1972).
Within the SE end of the enclosure is a standing stone, and 145ft distant from the kerbed structure is a standing stone 5 1/2ft high: another (NB35SE 3) lies 540 yards due N.
(RCAHMS 1928; A S Henshall 1972).
'Stein-a-cleit', according to the MoPBW guide-post.
Visited by OS (A W B) 22 June 1956.
Steinacleit (Information from MoPBW plaque), a multilated cairn 15.8m in diameter, is prominently situated on a false crest. It is defined by a discontinuous circular kerb of 11 large slabs set on edge, with several others now prostrate. The hollowed interior is a disturbed area of turf-covered stones containing 3 earthfast blocks, apparently too widely spaced to be part of a chamber. The 'outer wall face' on the ESE edge of the cairn is formed by 4 loose slabs on edge, one of which crosses the line of the kerb. These do not form part of the original structure.
There is no clear evidence of a 'building' here but these slabs and the 3 interior blocks may be part of an intrusive structure.
The alleged stone circle around the cairn is a ruined field wall of indeterminate age terminating in the S on the scant remains of an oval structure c.4.0m across. The wall is almost certainly constructed from material robbed from the cairn, and the 'standing stones' are bracing stones incorporated in it, and fortuitous tumble.
Re-surveyed at 1/2500
Visited by OS (N K B) 18 June 1969.
Steinacleit may be a homestead (defended?) showing at least two phases and possibly adopted from a megalithic structure. The enclosure wall would appear contemporaneous. The evidence for a cairn is dubious.
Visited by OS (J R L), May 1980.
