Archaeology Notes

Event ID 726655

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Archaeology Notes

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/726655

NX19NE 27 1972 9830.

NX 19726 98320

Enclosure, Houdston Hill: visible on RCAHMS air photographs.

NX 1972 9830. The air photographs show the cropmark of a semi-circular ditched enclosure about 70m in overall diameter. The ditch is a regular c.3m wide and has no entrance break; the interior appears to be featureless.

What appears to be the angled line of an old field boundary encloses the cropmark to the S, suggesting that the enclosure may have been substantially extant in relatively recent times. However, there is no surface trace of this enclosure on the N-facing crest of Houdston Hill at about 40m OD. It had almost certainly a complete sub-circular circuit; the gentle slope on the N side of a fence is under permanent pasture, while the field to the S is under plough.

The farmer at Houston farm reports nothing unusual here and has no knowledge of a former field boundary on the line indicated.

Visited by OS (JRL) 28 November 1980

Also photographed by Dr St Joseph in 1977, 1979 and 1980.