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Desk Based Assessment
Date 1969
Event ID 657179
Category Recording
Type Desk Based Assessment
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/657179
NF99SE 2 9753 9123.
NF99SE 2.01 97 91 Beakers
NF 976 913. A Neolithic/Iron Age occupation site, evidenced by middens and showing four layers of occupation was partially excavated by Simpson in September 1965, at Northton, in an area of sand dunes.
The first, at a depth of 15', lay on 2' of blown sand and contained pottery closely paralleled by that from the Neolithic kilns as Eilean on Tighe (NF87SW 1) and from the chambered cairns at Unival (NF86NW 1, 4, 6) and Clettraval (NF77SW 15). Apart from a pit, the only structural feature was a roughly oval setting of boulders surrounding the crouched skeleton of a child. Other boulders occurred but were uninterpretable owing to the narrowness of the section. The radiocarbon date for this layer was 4,100 +- 140 BC.
The second midden layer lay above 1' of wind blown sand. The material ran up the side of a possibly semi-subterranean stone built house with post-holes. A pit within the house included in its contents numerous sherds of Necked Beakers as well as those of an Irish Bowl Food Vessel. The radiocarbon date for this level was 3,080 +- 150 BC.
After the abandoning of the house and a further accumulation of blown sand, the area was re-occupied by Beaker groups, but no structures were found, possibly because only a small area has been examined.
Above these deposits and again separated by blown sand were two Iron Age middens, the uppermost probably related to a series of turf-covered enclosures on top of the dune. It was hoped to continue the excavations in 1966, and expose further structures beneath the main body of the dune. Finds from the excavation were purchased for the National Museum of Antiquities of Scotland (NMAS).
D Simpson 1966; Proc Soc Antiq Scot 1967; 1968.
The radiocarbon dates for the Neolithic and Beaker levels of this site are substantially too old, a possible explanation being that the sample may have been peat-charcoal.
E W MacKie 1969.
Information from the Ordnanace Survey Index Card.
