Archaeology Notes

Event ID 673295

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Archaeology Notes

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/673295

NL68NW 1 6128 8760.

(NL 61288760) Dunan Ruadh (NR)

OS 6"map, Inverness-shire, 2nd ed., (1903)

The remains of Dunan Ruadh, a broch or galleried dun.

"On the edge of the rocky bluff facing the land are the ruins of a curved wall, in the heart of which there has been a narrow gallery. Only a small portion of the south-western arc of the building remains, the other parts having been completely removed. The wall has been about 13 feet 6 ins. thick. and while one or two courses remain in position on the outer face, the mound of stone stands about 7 feet in height. A small part of the inner wall of a gallery is traceable for a short distance".

RCAHMS 1928.

Dunan Ruadh is as described above except that the width of the wall is about 4.6m. Although there are no traces of walling other than at the landward end, it is unlikely that this feature was a broch: it is probably a galleried promontory dun.

Surveyed at 1:10,560.

Visited by (N K B) 21 May 1965.

NL 612 876 Rescue excavation of the last fragment of the broch on the island of Pabbay showed that its circuit wall was comprised of four separate concentric rings of walling, which in one place still stood ten courses high. An unexpected dip in the bedrock on which the broch is built preserved 1m of occupation deposits, from which bone, shell and pottery was recovered, together with fireplaces and complete sheep burials.

Sponsor: Historic Scotland.

P Foster 1996

Field survey has now been completed for all the main southern islands. Each monument located was described both structurally and topographically, drawn as a field sketch and, if considered worthy, photographed.

NL 6128 8764 Dun Ruadh (red dun) (PY10). A broch-type structure (NMRS NL68NW 1) which survives as only a remnant of the southern arc of its main wall with a small undisturbed area of deposits within the arc. Although most of the structure and its deposits have been swept away, the surviving remnants show that the site was occupied when the walls had collapsed down to c 1m in height. In midden refuse dumped on top of the wall, spilling down onto the collapsed corbelled roof of one of the wall chambers, was a bronze Pictish fist pin datable to around the 6th-7th century AD, which is thought at present to give an indication of the final phase of occupation. The excavation of the surviving deposits prior to their eventual destruction by coastal erosion, the clearing of fallen masonry from the face of the surviving wall, and the stone by stone recording of the structure in both elevation and plan was completed in 1998.

Sponsors: Historic Scotland, University of Sheffield, Institute of Archaeology, Prague.

P Foster 1998