Archaeology Notes
Date 1973 - 1981
Event ID 697562
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Archaeology Notes
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/697562
NR92SW 4 9493 2118
(NR 9493 2118). Cairn (NR)
Human Remains, Urn and Stone Axe found AD 1900 (NAT)
OS 6" map, (1924)
This Clyde group, ? long cairn is represented by a turf- covered mound 8-10ft high. It is roughly oval, oriented NNW-SSE and measures about 60 by 47ft. The N end and W side have probably been little disturbed, but on the E it has been curtailed by a track, and the SE end has obviously been robbed to build the lime kiln which lies just S. The original length is uncertain; the width was probably about 52.
The cairn was excavated by Bryce in 1900, the excavations being later filled in, so that now only the tops of three upright slabs may be seen at a high level near the N end of the cairn.
Bryce showed the chamber to be of two compartments, and also found a secondary short cist, 4ft S of the chamber. He found two Neolithic bowls and a stone axe in the chamber along with unburnt bones from 14 people, and animal remains, while the short cist contained fragments of an inhumation accompanied by a food vessel and a flint knife. The artifacts are now in the NMAS (Acc Nos EO 225-7, 229, 230) and the human remains in the Hunterian Museum, Glasgow.
Sources: T Bryce 1902; A S Henshall 1972.
The grass-covered remains of the chambered cairn are generally as described by Miss Henshall. All that is now visible of the chamber is two side slabs and a displaced end or septal slab.
The cairn has been mutilated in the north east.
Surveyed at 1:2500.
Visited by OS (B S) 17 October 1977.
A plaster replica of one of the neolithic bowls is in Brodick Castle.
Information from TS 'List of material in Brodick Castle', 1981, No. 82.
