Archaeology Notes

Event ID 782609

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Archaeology Notes

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/782609

NN81NE 19 8923 1765.

NN 8923 1765 The site has long been known from the air as a rectangular enclosure sitting immediately E of (and parallel to) the Roman road c600m SW of the fort of Strageath, and suspected of being a fortlet.

A resistivity survey showed one site to be rather too small, however, at 18m (N-S) by c23m (E-W). Trial excavations showed the N and S ditches to be flat bottomed, c2m wide and 1m deep and to have been backfilled after only a brief period of use. Excavation in the interior revealed no sign of a rampart or palisade, but a 7.2m (E-W) by 3m (N-S) structure, founded on three massive beams, was found just inside the N ditch, which yields a single samian fragment.

Sponsor: University of Manchester.

D J Woolliscroft 1995.

Excavation (by D J Woolliscroft) of this rectangular ditched enclosure aligned on the Roman road c.600m SW of Strageath Roman fort, revealed a site 18m N-S by 23m E-W within a flat-bottomed ditch c.2m wide and 1m deep. No trace could be found of an internal rampart. The N part of the interior had been occupied by a timber structure, 7.65m E-W by 3m N-S, founded on three massive beams represented by parallel foundation-trenches; one of the latter yielded a decorated samian sherd of Flavian date. No entrance gap in the ditch W towards the road was visible on aerial photographs, nor could one be located by geophysical survey.

L J F Keppie 1996

NN 892 176 Further excavation on the rectangular enclosure (NMRS NN81NE 19; Woolliscroft 1995) found the ditch system to be an open square, c 18m across, with the open side facing E, away from the Roman road to Strageath, which runs c 10m to the W of and parallel to the site's W ditch. Inside, three sleeper beam founded structures were located, also forming the same E-facing open square, one of which yielded two sherds of Roman coarse ware cooking pot. As in 1995, the ditch showed a steep-sided, flat-bottomed profile and no entrance break was located facing the Roman road. The remains of two roundhouse foundations were traced underlying the beam structures.

Sponsor: Roman Gask Project.

D J Woolliscroft 1998