South Uist, Uamh Ghrantaich

At the foot of a steep rock face, at NF 8423 3338, there are the mutilated remains of an earth house comprising three almost circular chambers, and two interconnecting passages. The entrance is in the north side of 'A' which is completely exposed, the latter measuring 3.0m in diameter and now only about 1.2m high. The passage leading from 'A' to 'B' is still underground and has a sharp bend in it. It is 0.7m high, 0.9m wide and 4.6m long. 'B' which is the best preserved of the three chambers, is 2.0m in diameter and is now completel enclosed showing corbelled walling; two cupboards in the northern wall and the entrance to the second passage (photo), the latter 0.6m high, 0.5 wide and 1.6m long. 'C' is completely underground and only an estimated diameter of 2.5m can be taken. The overall height of the structure must have been about 2.6 metres.

Thirty metres SE of the earth house there are the scant remains of a hut circle, 6.0m in diameter, within a small enclosure (at NF 8425 3336).

See 1:500 survey and photo.

Surveyed at 1:10560.

Visited by OS (R D) 16 May 1965.

(NF 8430 3337) Uamh Ghrantaich. End House (NR)

OS 6"map, Inverness-shire, 1st ed., (1880)

This earth house was not noted by the RCAHMS in 1915. Nor does Thomas refer to it at all, although he is one of the authorities for its publication on the OS 6"map, 1880. Thomas recorded only two earth houses in this vicinity and these have been identified by the field investigator with Uamh Iosal - NF83SW 2 and with NF83SW 5.

Information from OS (SW) 15 October 1965

Sources: RCAHMS 1928; F W L Thomas 1870; Name Book 1876.

This site, which comprises the heather-grown remains of a wheelhouse with a souterrain attached, probably overlying a round-house, stands on a narrow terrace at the foot of a cliff on the S flank of Maoladh na-h-Uamha. Much of the site is obscured by fallen rocks. The wheelhouse is identified here for the first time, its remains having previously been misidentified as the ruinous remains of an outer, third, chamber of the souterrain.

The wheelhouse measures about 6m in diameter within a wall that stands up to 1.7m in height on the NE, where a 5m stretch of the inner wall-face is preserved and where the souterrain is entered through a small opening. Immediately S of this opening there is a freestanding drystone radial pier that measures 1.2m in length by 0.5m in thickness and a second more ruinous pier survives to the NW of the opening. What may be a third is visible in the W part of the wheelhouse interior. There are two aumbries immediately N of the souterrain entrance, the larger measuring 0.3m in width by 0.5m in height and 0.6m in depth.

The opening to the souterrain measures 0.4m in width by 0.5m in height and leads into a 0.6m square passageway that extends ENE for a distance of about 6m before turning to the NE where, after about 2.7m, it reaches an oval chamber measuring 2.5m from E to W by 1.5m transversely and 1.4m in height. A smaller side-chamber, which is attached to the SE side and measures 1.7m in length (terminating on solid rock) by about 1m in width, is visible through a 0.35m square aperture.

Underlying the W side of the wheelhouse are the much more dilapidated remains of a roundhouse, the ruinous outer face of which on the SW still stands 1m high. Elsewhere, the wall has been reduced to little more than a spread of rubble and the position of the entrance is not visible.

A description and plan of the souterrain was published in 1870 (Thomas 1870, 164-5, fig 15), following the presentation of the material to the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland in March 1867. It was subsequently depicted as an indistinct shape between two cliff faces on the 1st edition of the OS 6-inch map (Inverness-shire (Hebrides) 1880, Sheet LIV; Name Book 13, 51), and annotated ‘Uamh Ghrantaich Erd House’. The site was not visited by JG Callander in 1915 as part of the preparation of the Inventory of Monuments and Constructions in the Outer Hebrides, Skye and the Small Isles (RCAHMS 1928).

Visited by RCAHMS (GFG, IP, AM) 24-5 April 2013.

DGPS survey.