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Archaeology Notes
Event ID 714160
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Archaeology Notes
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/714160
NT48SE 1.2 4748 8038.
(NT 4748 8038) Earthworks (NR)
OS 6" map (1968)
Luffness House stands towards the NW angle of a square fortification defined by a ditch partly filled in. It is hard to say whether this might represent the work raised by the French commander de Thermes in 1549 to block English supplies to their garrison at Haddington (see NT57SW 42), and ordered to be destroyed in 1552, (as suggested by the RCAHMS, and believed in 1853 (Name Book)) or whether it shows the outline of an earlier castle or enclosure as asserted by Tranter (1962), but the former seems more likely.
C McWilliam 1978; RCAHMS 1924, visited 1913
In 1723, the site is described as 'the remains of some old fortifications viz four bastions and two Fusnes (ie fosses or ditches)'.
W Macfarlane 1906
The fortifications round Luffness House are now much wasted by improvements to the grounds. On the S and SE of the house, they are represented by a large irregular L-shaped ditch now overgrown with grass and conifers. To the E of the house are the mutilated remains of two large mounds with an intervening ditch 2.0m deep, and on the W side are the remains of a broad ditch some 2.0m deep, fading out as it approaches the W end of the L-shaped ditch.
Revised at 1:2500.
Visited by OS (WDJ) 21 November 1962
No change to the previous field report.
Visited by OS (SFS) 13 August 1975
