Archaeology Notes

Event ID 720793

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Archaeology Notes

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/720793

NT66SW 3 6370 6354.

(NT 6370 6354) Table Rings (NAT)

OS 6" map (1957)

'Table Rings': This cairn stands just over 1150ft OD on the shoulder of Penshiel Hill. The cairn itself measures about 33ft in diameter at the base and has a flat top 23ft in diameter. It rises to a height of 4ft above the bottom of a surrounding ditch which is about 23ft wide. Outside this is a low earthen bank about 7ft wide. The whole structure has the appearance of a bell cairn.

RCAHMS 1924, visited 1913; R W Feachem 1963.

'Table Rings': name verified. This turf and heather covered cairn is generally as described, though it cannot be classed as a bell cairn. It appears undisturbed and stands 1.3m above a ditch which averages 5m wide. There is no suggestion of a berm. The bank, up to 3.5 wide around the regular arc of the east side, forms a series of straights around the less pronounced west side. It averages 0.7m high internally and 0.4m high externally. Of possible significance is an earthfast and protrate slab, 1.0m long and 0.5m wide, on the western edge of the cairn's flat top.

Surveyed at 1/10,000.

Visited by OS (JRL) 20 April 1979

NT 6370 6354. A rescue excavation and watching brief were undertaken at this round cairn (NMRS NT66SW 3) surrounded by a ditch and external bank, which had been inadvertently damaged by the digging of a trench intended for a sunken grouse butt and associated drainage. The excavations showed that the external bank is of simple construction, formed largely of upcast subsoil - presumably extracted from the ditch. A turf-derived layer beneath topsoil on the summit of the bank represents either a turf capping or, more likely, an earlier phase of turf growth. No old ground surface was located beneath the bank, which suggests that the area was stripped of turf during cairn construction. The ditch was c 0.9m deep.

A detailed contour survey of the site was completed, and a rapid erosion survey of rabbit damage was conducted.

The watching brief ensured that the site was reinstated to its previous profile and that no further damage occurred on monument during the excavation of the new shooting butt, c 3m to the N of the cairn.

A report has been lodged with the NMRS.

Sponsor: Historic Scotland

R Strachan 1998.