Archaeology Notes

Event ID 797021

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Archaeology Notes

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/797021

NT37SW 168.07 3255 7253

NT 3269 7250 A major programme of monitoring, evaluation and architectural recording was undertaken at the mansion house and within its surrounding policies during conservation works between June 2000 and August 2001.

Fruit store. A part-ornamental, part-functional garden building located at the NE end of the Long Garden (N of the mansion). An evaluation trench was excavated across the threshold of the entrance revealing floor levels and recent collapse deposits within. An assessment of the structure was undertaken, identifying a principal first and two lesser secondary phases of construction that related to the reordering of the functional space behind the ornamental blind facade.

Lady's Walk. A 0.5m wide trench was laid across this substantial mid- to late 18th-century raised walkway running NE-SW across open parkland to the N of the mansion. It was revealed to have been formed of two 1.8m-high skins retaining an earth core. The skin to the NW is of brickwork in English garden wall bond, while that to the SE is of mortared rubblework. A cambered upper surface - possibly originally grassed - and a lateral drainage channel were also identified.

Flower Garden. A series of evaluation trenches examined details of the Flower and Long Gardens just to the NW of the mansion. This revealed that the two had formerly been divided by a brick wall aligned NE-SW. Details of various garden paths were identified, as was the line of the N part of the curving Flower Garden wall. An evaluation trench located at the rear (N) side of a ruined later 18th-century glasshouse revealed the brick-lined 'oven pit' associated with its internally heated wall. This still contained a supply of coal, a stoke shovel and its cast-iron oven door.

Sponsor: National Trust for Scotland

T Addyman 2001

Walled garden. The extent of the walls, including the foundations, was established, and showed that the recesses were perhaps for bee boles or the cultivation of plants.

Archive to be deposited in East Lothian SMR and the NMRS.

Sponsor: NTS.

A Daly 2003