Watching Brief

Date 30 January 2013 - 12 February 2013

Event ID 994128

Category Recording

Type Watching Brief

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/994128

NS 6878 5936 A watching brief was undertaken, 30 January – 12 February 2013, during the removal of rough racking and other recent repairs at the wall head of the N rampart. The repair programme focused on the western half of the 14th-century N rampart, built against a reduced section of residual curtain wall, running up to the circular donjon.

The exposed masonry was examined, recorded and two main phases of construction identified. The surviving upper 1m of the new build consisted of well-shaped rectangular red sandstone blocks, used as facing stones, with more random rubble forming the wall core. The recent rough racking consisted of a jumble of large blocks of red sandstone with copious amounts of cement, creating a random rubble wall core.

The most striking aspect of the N rampart is its sheer mass and stability. This is in part the result of the use of the reinforced centrally placed entrance, the tower at the W end and the short section of masonry built at 90degrees angles to the residual 13th-century N curtain wall. These measures enabled a width to length ratio of c1:10 (2.8m:28m for the main N rampart build). This is comparable to the broadly contemporary ‘Douglas’ work at Tantallon Castle (East Lothian), where a similarly massive and apparently free-standing screening wall is threaded between corner and central towers; a wall c3.6m wide (at intervals) and c35m long. This, and other such basic formulae, appear to be an aspect of a long tradition of wall construction, based on practical experience and a knowledge of the physical properties of the resources available, as much as any by aesthetic/strategic considerations.

Archive: RCAHMS (intended)

Funder: Historic Scotland

Gordon Ewart, Kirkdale Archaeology, 2013

(Source: DES)