Archaeology Notes

Event ID 685156

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Archaeology Notes

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/685156

NO19SE 4 15604 92374

(NO 1561 9238) Braemar Castle (NAT)

OS 6" map, Aberdeenshire, 2nd ed., (1903)

Braemar Castle is a tall, five storeyed turreted house of the L-plan, measuring 51 feet by 47 feet, with a large round stair tower in the re-entrant angle. It was built in 1628, burned in 1689, and remained a ruin until 1748 when it was leased and garrisoned by the Government after the erection of the rectangular curtain wall. The British Museum library has engineers' drawings of this reconstruction which show a large well in the north salient.

W D Simpson 1949; D MacGibbon and T Ross 1887.

Braemar Castle, in good condition and open to the public during the summer months. Later single storey constructions have been added

between the 18th century curtain wall and the 17th century tower house on the N and W sides.

Visited by OS (N K B) 26 October 1967.

Listed.

Scottish Castle Survey 1988; N Bogdan and I B D Bryce 1991.

Visible on air photograph AAS/93/11/G23/4. Copy held by Grampian Regional Council.

Information from M Greig, Grampian Regional Council, March 1994.

NO 1560 9237 A watching brief was undertaken on 25-6 October 2007 during the excavation of two service trenches

between the curtain wall and the N side of the castle. Braemar Castle was built in 1628 and burnt down in 1689. It remain a ruin until 1748 when it was rebuilt and used as a government garrison, and the star-shaped curtain wall was built. The stratigraphy observed during the watching brief appears to demonstrate that a well or cistern (which is depicted on a 1750 plan of the castle) within a salient of the wall was almost certainly built as part of the mid-18th-century renovations. A similar feature occurs at Corgaff Castle, also garrisoned at the same time.

Reports deposited with Aberdeenshire SMR and RCAHMS.

Funder: Aberdeenshire Council.

H K Murray and J C Murray, 2007.