Archaeology Notes

Event ID 821402

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Archaeology Notes

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/821402

NO65NE 61.00 67043 59881

NO65NE 61.01 66984 59872 Court of Offices

NO65NE 61.02 66749 59951 Walled Garden

NO65NE 61.03 66822 59990 Footbridge (Den of Dun)

NO65NE 61.04 67042 59845 Steps

NO65NE 61.05 67014 59370 West Lodge and Gates

NO65NE 61.06 67238 59460 East Gates

NO65NE 61.07 67047 59832 Sundial

NO65NE 61.08 66699 59949 Gateway

NO65NE 61.09 66792 59899 Icehouse

NO65NE 61.10 67072 59880 Walled Garden and Terrace Gatepiers

NO65NE 61.11 66963 59664 Well (possible Icehouse)

NO65NE 61.12 67225 59463 East Lodge

See also:

NO65NE 1 6675 5988 and NO 6670 5994 Dun Castle and Gateway

NO65NE 3 6707 5953 Gallows Knowe

NO65NE 70 6690 5999 Dairyman's Cottage (watching brief)

NO65NE 90 66891 59982 Dairyman's Cottage

NO65NE 110 6695 5923 Mains of Dun (steading)

Policies extend onto map sheet NO66SE.

Erected 1758.

A J Warden 1880-5.

The present house is entirely modern.

Visited by OS 24 June 1958.

NO 667 600 A historical designed landscape and archaeological survey was undertaken of the House of Dun Estate. The project established that the landscape took much of its present shape in the later 18th century, during and after the construction of the house to a design by William Adam after 1730. Adam incorporated ideas offered by the architects Alexander McGill and the Earl of Mar for both the house and its landscape setting. Some of his plans for the landscape appear to have been implemented, although they nowhere approached the grand scheme he had envisaged. In particular, it appears that the N-S avenue focusing on the house, which Mar proposed, was realised, along with the court of offices and walled garden to the W and E of the house respectively. The parks that now frame the house to the N and S were established in the latter half of the 18th century, and additional parks to the E and S formerly extended the setting. The designed landscape saw its second major phase of development in the mid-19th century, particularly under the influence of Lady Augusta Fitzclarence, who developed the gardens and the Den of Dun as features of the landscape. The designed landscape has, since at least the 18th century, been fringed by land used for agricultural and industrial purposes, the latter most notably at Dun Mill, while the wooded ravine of the Den of Dun appears to have been a planted feature for several centuries.

The most significant archaeological features on the estate include Fordhouse Barrow, excavated over several seasons in the 1990s, which consisted of a Neolithic passage grave surmounted by a Bronze Age burial monument; Gallows Knowe, another probable Bronze Age barrow, possibly reused as a judicial site in the medieval period; and the arch that is all that remains above ground of the medieval Dun Castle, seat of the Erskines of Dun. (GUARD 795).

Sponsors: National Trust for Scotland, Mrs Jane Stewart, Angus Environmental Trust

O Lelong 2001a