Archaeology Notes

Event ID 656931

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Archaeology Notes

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/656931

NF99SE 4 970 914.

(Area NF 970 915) Evidence of settlement is apparent among the sandhills on the neck of the Rudh 'an Teampull promontory to the N of the church An Teampull (NF99SE 6), the whole area being littered with shells, unornamented hand-made pottery and occasional animal bones. The area contains a grave (5ft 2ins x 1ft 6ins) formed by stone slabs set on edge, within which were found a few skeletal remains. Circular heaps of stones (12ft diameter x 1ft high) resembling cairns; a group of structures consisting of a circular setting of stones (9ft diameter), like a hut circle; a circular ring of stones (4ft 3ins diameter) with an inch-thick dark layer at foundation level; and another circular ring containing only clean sand. On the edge of a sandhill area (34 x 13ft) with rounded corners outside the S corner of which is blackened sand indicating a fire-place.

RCAHMS 1928.

Little is now to be seen in this area of dunes, centred at NF 9700 9144, except a few small mounds, resembling clearance heaps, in a hollow, and what is probably the 'grave' described by the Commission. This latter, at NF 9697 9145, is defined by eleven small stones on edge, and is oriented N-S. There is no sign of skeletal remains and the setting bears little resemblance to a cist or later grave.

There are traces of cultivation both within and with- out the wall which spans the headland to the S, but this is probably fairly recent. (See NF99SE 6 for possible association with chapel and broch site)

Visited by OS (A A) 3 July 1969.