Archaeology Notes

Event ID 668015

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Archaeology Notes

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/668015

NJ52SW 15 47 20 and 55 24.

(NJ 4720 5524) Mar's Road (NAT)

OS 6" map, (1959)

A main road from Kildrummy Castle, the seat of the Earls of Mar, little used since the construction of the road by Auchindoir and Rhynie. Simpson (1949) suggests that it was 'the ancient trackway known as Mar Road' that was being used by the Gordons to pass eastward to the Suie Road (LIN 516), and south to Edinburgh, when they were intercepted by the Forbes and the Battle of Tillyangus, 10th October, 1571 (NJ52SW 6) was fought. He adds that the names 'Drover's Hollow, Drover's Well and Resting Stone', shown beside the road on a plan of Knockespock estate dated 1841 now in Aberdeen University Library, confirm its ancient importance.

Name Book 1866; W D Simpson 1949.

Mar's Road, as described on OS 6" map sheets NJ52SE, NJ52SW, a minor drove road of little importance.

Visited by OS (RL) 4 October 1967.

(Newspaper reference cited).

NMRS, MS/712/53.

(White Hill: NJ 5283 2425). The Mar Road in this sector is a well-defined grass-grown trackway about 7m wide. It has been terraced into the rising ground on the S to a depth of 0.5m. On the N, the edge of the road is marked by a grass-grown bank measuring 4.5m in width and 0.5m in height.

Visited by RCAHMS (ATW, PC), 9 September 1998.