Excavation

Date 1984

Event ID 882878

Category Recording

Type Excavation

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/882878

Following the partial excavation of 1936-37 and the trial trenching of 1983, during the summer of 1984 most of the abbey's claustral area was excavated, including: the cloister garth; East Range; West Range; frater; and extensive trenches beyond those ranges.

The East Range at the excavated level comprised: slype/parlour; chapter house of at least three phases with associated floor levels and burials; two apartments of unknown functions (although one may have included the foundations of the day stair); a quadripartite-vaulted undercroft of two bays EW and at least two bays NS, the northern two bays divided by a secondary partition wall; and possibly the reredorter beneath an extant 19th century house. The house straddled a stone-lined 19th century lade whose course may have echoed that of the monastic great drain.

Beyond the East Range were: the monastic graveyard; two phases of an exteded chapter house; wall foundations and associated metalled surface thought to be pre-Augustinian, and a ditch cutting through the early metalling. The ditch appartenly acted as a swer at some stage and was backflled in the 12th century presumably to allow the construction of the East Range. Further south, down an alluvial terrace, were the poorly-constructed walls of a building, or buildings, of uncertain date. To the SW and S of the frater were kitchens and other domestic apartments as well as at least two timber buildings of medieval age.

S of the frater were the substantial remains of a building descriebed by RCAHMS Roxburgh I (1956, 206) as the undercroft of the infirmary but which may have been the abbot's lodging. Beyond, the ground adjacent to the Jed Water had been made up in medieval times but had been consolidated with only limited success.

Several post-monastic dwellings were evident in the vicinity of the East Range and part of the 18th/19th century manse was located to the west of the cloister garth.

Sponsor: SDD (AM)

J H Lewis and G J Ewart 1984