Archaeology Notes

Event ID 725152

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Archaeology Notes

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/725152

NX05SW 13 0210 5179.

(NX 0210 5179) Dunaldboys. This mound appears to have been artificial, and is thought to have been a fort or place of strength. Quantities of stone have been removed from it to build dykes, and pieces of pottery found.

Name Book 1847

Dunaldboys, situated on a small promontory on the steep cliffs to the W of Craigwoughey Hill, comprises an Iron Age fort, reconstructed as a Medieval motte but never completed.

The Iron Age defences, sited to cut off the promontory, were semi-circular on plan, and rested on the cliff-edge to N and S. Only the N half of these defences survive, much mutilated, but they can be seen to have consisted of double ramparts and ditches, with an entrance causeway in the NE.

Construction of the motte commenced by re-cutting and enlarging the S half of the Iron Age defences to produce a single flat-bottomed ditch. The material obtained from the ditch was used to raise the enclosed area, but on the evidence of the surviving Iron Age defences and the incomplete nature of the motte, it is clear that the medieval work was never finished. The name Dunaldboys could not be confirmed locally. Surveyed at 1:2500.

Visited by OS (JP) 21 December 1970

This motte is situated at the head of the sea cliffs 350m S of the house at Knockinaam. It has been fashioned from an irregularly shaped natural mound (about 8.5m high) into the E side of which a terrace (13m by 12.5m) has been but and enclosed by a low bank. On the W the sides of the mound fall precipitously to the shore and on the SE it is enclosed by a ditch (7.5m broad and 1.5m deep), which is crossed by a causeway giving access to a bridging-point to the terrace.

Name Book 1847; RCAHMS 1985, visited October 1984.