Archaeology Notes

Event ID 671263

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Archaeology Notes

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/671263

NJ84SW 16 c. 80 40

(NJ 800 407). An 'Ancient British' boat (? dug-out canoe), found 7ft below the surface in a moss on Monkshill in June 1889 was entrusted for preservation to the Trustees of the Church Hall of Fyvie Parish church in May 1908. It stood in the vestibule of the Hall at least until 1939. A former Session Clerk, who remembers seeing it often, describes it as 'something like a coble, about eight or ten feet in length, not wholly complete'.

For a period during the war, the Hall was occupied by the military, after which the boat had gone, probably destroyed. The commemorative bronze plate concerning it is in the keeping of the minister of Fyvie Parish church.

Information from Rev Charles I G Stobie, The Manse, Fyvie 26 June 1978.

(NJ c. 80 40). The Ordnance Survey note the discovery in June 1889 of what was probably a logboat at a depth of 7' (2.1m) in a peat-moss at Monkshill. It was kept in Fyvie parish church hall from 1908 until at least 1939, but is now lost. There are several remaining peat-mosses around Monkshill on the upper fringe of cultivated ground at an altitude of about 105m OD.

In 1978 there was recorded a local tradition that the 'Ancient British' boat was 'something like a coble', which may suggest that there was a stempost. The boat was 'not wholly complete', but the portion recovered measured about 8' (2.5m) or 10' (3.1m) in length.

R J C Mowat 1996.