Archaeology Notes

Event ID 702429

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Archaeology Notes

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/702429

NS53NW 3 5313 3538.

(NS 5313 3538) Cairn (NR)

OS 6" map (1968)

A gallows is said to have stood on the summit of Gallow Law (name: NS 531 353). There is also a cairn with most of the stones now removed in which bones, supposedly human, were found.

Name Book 1856

The remains of this cairn are represented by a grass-covered mound 17.0m in diameter and 1.0m high with a few stones protruding through the surface. It is surmounted by a modern monument, inscribed;

"Gallow Hill Cairn, 1926. To the memory of James Smith of Threepwood, who died for civil and religious liberty, 1684' (see also NS53NW 5 and NS53NW 7 ).

Visited by OS (JLD) 22 August 1956

Situated on the SW crest of Gallow Law, this probable cairn is poorly defined and almost indistinguishable from the general undulations of this pasture, hummocky area. A vague scarp, with little evidence of stone content, arcs around the SW side of the modern monument at a distance of 6 to 7m. This scarp is lost around the N where the swelling has no definition.

Revised at 1:2500.

Visited by OS (JRL) 23 July 1982