Archaeology Notes

Event ID 832054

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Archaeology Notes

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/832054

NS55SW 120 c.5393 5428

NS 523 541 to NS 599 556 A trial trenching evaluation was undertaken between April and June 2002 as part of the proposed construction of the Glasgow Southern Orbital Route. Trial trenching was used to evaluate an area totalling 5% of the total land-take for the proposed road; 305 trenches were excavated.

Only one major site of archaeological significance was revealed - a palisaded enclosure at Titwood, Mearnskirk (NS 5493 5428). Overall, this enclosure measured 36m N-S by 41m E-W. An entrance was located on the SE side which was 3.2m wide with two truncated post-holes sited at the terminals of the palisade. The palisade had been planned as a series of adjoining straight slots each approximately 5m long. Preservation of the palisade slot was found to vary substantially, with the W side of the enclosure the best preserved. U-shaped in section with steep sides and a flat base, the slot was found to be choked with packing stones throughout the better preserved sections, which measured up to 0.5m wide and 0.4m deep. Within the NW sector of the palisade, a suite of post-holes and slots appeared to indicate the ground plan of a sub-rectangular building with a central row of posts which possibly utilised the palisade as a wall along its N side. Sherds of pottery tentatively dated to the Late Bronze Age were recovered from the W part of the palisade slot.

An area of palaeoenvironmental significance was discovered at the W end of the route (NS 5221 5378 (centre), where an area of peat deposits up to 2.5m deep was discovered.

Data Structure Report deposited in WoSAS SMR and the NMRS.

Sponsor: East Renfrewshire Council per ASH Consulting.

A Rees (CFA) 2002

Information provided to RCAHMS has noted that the grid reference (ngr) given for the palisaded enclosure (NS 5493 5428) does not fall at Titwood, but near the Humby Bridge, 1km distant. The ngr has therefore been adjusted 1km to the west, to fall in a field near Mearnskirk House Nursing Home at Titwood which is noted in the article by A Rees (CFA) in Discovery and Excavation in Scotland 2002.

Information from RCAHMS (DE) from an e-mail Mr Stuart Nisbet, 15 March 2004.