Archaeology Notes
Event ID 665516
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Archaeology Notes
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/665516
NJ16SE 11 1627 6295
See also NJ16SE 10. For York Tower and Fortreath Mausoleum (NJ 1632 6296), see NJ16SE 39.
(NJ 1627 6295 Fort (NR) (remains of)
R W Feachem 1963.
A defaced and mutilated fort, with quintuple defences consisting of three walls and two outer ramparts occupies Knock of Alves. The inner wall, now fragmentary encloses a summit area 125' by 75' in which stand the York Tower and a mausoleum (NJ16SE 39). The second wall encloses an area 415' by 75' and the third, possibly contemporary, is now almost obliterated by an access road leading up the hill. The two ramparts, 18' apart, run round the lower slopes of the hill.
R W Feachem 1963.
The remains of a fort, the only feature surviving in recognisable form being an outwork consisting of a rampart with an internal quarry ditch, with surrounds the W, N and E flanks of the hill.
It is reduced to a terrace towards its E end, where it has also probably been eroded by the main access route to the summit of the hill. A track and quarry truncateit in the W.
All that survives of the inner wall described by Feachem (1963) is a mutilated scarp, only traced with any degreee of certainty in the N and W. There is no sign of stonework.
Of the second and third walls described there is no definite trace and the measurement of 415ft appears erroneous. There are two or three scrub and bracken-covered scarps towards the W end of the fort but these are too vague to identify positively as artificial.
There is no trace of defence along the steep, boulder-strewn and overgrown S slopes. A track leads from the summit westwards along the flank of the hill, truncates the rampart in the W, and follows the base of the rampart eastwards to a quarry about half-way along it. This is presumably the track quoted by Feachem (1963) as obliterating the third wall.
A ruinous hill-dyke traverses the top of the hill from E to W.
Revised at 1/2500.
Visited by OS (W D J) 10 December 1962 and (R L) 26 January 1972; visible on RAF air photographs 82/883 0001-2 and 106/9/Scot/UK/169 2351-2.
Archaeological investigation was carried out by EUCFA in December 1997 in advance of the laying of a power cable to serve the telecommunications mast. An area of 55.5 sq m was opened; trench 1 was dug within the NW sector of the interior and trench 2 across the defences on the NW.
A circular pit (measuring about 0.5m in diameter by 0.5m in depth) and a possible levelled area (containing a layer of burnt material) were revealed in trench 1. Two sherds of possible prehistoric pottery were found (one of them in the pit and the other unstratified), and a bipolar quartz flake was also found apparently unstratified. Window glass found in this trench may have come from the York Tower (NJ16SE 39).
The excavation of trench 2 showed the defences to be obscured by slope-wash, root damage and animal burrowing. The inner ditch was found to measure 3m in breadth and 0.7m in depth; three layers of fill were identified.
NMRS, MS/726/121.
Air photographs: AAS/97/06/G10/5-6 and AAS/97/06/CT.
NMRS, MS/712/29.
NJ 1627 6295 A site visit was conducted to determine the least damaging route for the laying of a power cable to serve a telecommunications mast which is sited within the hillfort at Knock of Alves, near Elgin (NMRS NJ16SE 11). A trench, excavated across the defences and through the interior of the fort, identified one of the outer defensive ditches. A small pit containing a few sherds of prehistoric pottery and fragments of burnt bone was also located within the fort interior.
A report has been lodged with the NMRS.
Sponsor: Orange PCS Ltd.
B Glendinning 1998
