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Field Visit
Date June 1981
Event ID 921635
Category Recording
Type Field Visit
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/921635
NR c. 400 976. A burial was discovered in 1882 in sand-dunes about 1km NE of Colonsay House. Excavations (Soc. Antiq. Scot. MS 175 (c); Anderson 1907, 443-9) then and in the following year revealed a rectangular enclosure measuring 4.6m (15ft) by 3.1m (10ft) over all and constructed of stone slabs set on edge and running E and W; one slab at the E end and one at the W were marked with roughly incised lines in the form of a cross. In the SW corner of the enclosure was the crouched burial of a man accompanied by an iron sword, a spearhead, an axehead, a shield-boss, fragments of an iron pot, a silver pin, four bronze studs and a balance with seven decorated weights (NMAS IL 759-797). On the N side of the enclosure there were the remains of an elaborate horse harness decorated with bronze mounts, while at the E end, about 2.1m (7 ft.) from the crouched burial, were what are described on the plan as human remains; this possible second burial, however, is not mentioned in either of the surviving reports. Outside the enclosure on the E lay the skeleton of a horse accompanied only by an iron girth-buckle.
Some time after the end of the excavations three Northumbrian copper stycas were found in the enclosure on the surface of the loose sand. The two that can be identified were issued under Eanred 1 (808-841) and Wigmund, Archbishop of York (831-854); they have been pierced for suspension and cannot be regarded as current coin. In the sand within the area of the enclosure there were a considerable number of boat-rivets and clench nails which suggest the presence of a boat; this may have formed a roof for the stone enclosure.
RCAHMS 1984, visited June 1981
