Publication Account

Date 17 December 2011

Event ID 921642

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Publication Account

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/921642

The Roman camp at Cleghorn lies on a south-east facing slope on the north bank of the Mouse Water, close to the point where the Roman road is presumed to have crossed the river (at Cleghorn Bridge). The fort and camps at Castledykes lie 2km to the south-east. It was first recorded as an earthwork in 1764 by Roy (1793: Pl. IX) and stretches of three sides still survive in earthwork form.

The camp is parallelogram in form, measuring 509m from north-east to south-west by 389m transversely, enclosing 18.4ha (45.5 acres). Two tituli are still visible in Camp Wood on the north-west side, and Roy depicted a third on the north-east side. The upstanding rampart of the camp measures up to 0.7m in height and 4m in width, with an accompanying ditch up to 2m in width and 0.4m in depth. Excavations in 1971 by RCAHMS recorded that the ditch was V-shaped, 2.9–3.2m in width and 0.75– 0.9m in depth and was filled with natural silt (1971: 58–9). Later excavations (in 1977) by St Joseph recorded similar dimensions, with the ditch 3m in width and 1m in depth (RCAHMS St Joseph Collection: Notebook 7).

Seven Trajanic and Hadrianic coins were found at this camp after ploughing in 1986 (Bateson 1989: 167).

At Cleghorn Bridge, the presumed crossing by the Roman road, parts of a further probable camp have been identified (Cleghorn II), crossing the presumed line of the road (RCAHMS 1978a: 141–3). This may suggest a slightly different alignment for the road than has previously been assumed, or a significant timescale between the use of the camp and the use of the road.

R H Jones