Archaeology Notes

Event ID 697977

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Archaeology Notes

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/697977

NR86SW 2 8296 6231.

(NR 8296 6231) Cille Bhride (NAT) Chapel (NR) (Site of)

OS 6" map (1925)

Cille Bhride, Whitehouse: These remains stand within a square enclosure, surrounded by a dry stone wall within which there is a double row of mature trees. In general, the ground surface slopes E-W, but the central area is level. Here, there are two buildings, one now only footings, the other entire. The former is sub-rectangular, measuring 10.0m E-W by 6.4m over walls 0.9m thick. The corners of the building are noticeably rounded both internally and externally. The position of the entrance doorway is uncertain, but it may have been towards the W end of the N wall. This building has been identified as a chapel (T P White 1873), but the sub-rectangular plan and clay-mortar construction are untypical of structures of this class. According to local tradition, the building served as a place of worship "at some remote period" (Name Book 1867). The intact building is a former burial enclosure of the Campbells of Stonefield. It was probably erected shortly before 1799. The dry stone wall surrounding the site probably dates from the same period.

Lying just outside the NE corner of the supposed chapel, there is a boulder 0.61m x 0.46m, with a socket cut on one face, presumably to hold a cross. This is no doubt the socket referred to in 1873 when it had "a fragment of a pillar in it 2' high".

RCAHMS 1971