Righorach, Glen Nochty

NJ31NW 11 centred 3036 1632

NJ 3038 1632. The remains of houses and part of an enclosure have been noted in an area of rough grazing at an altitude of about 380m OD.

NMRS, MS/712/9.

The following site has been identified while checking maps held by Grampian Regional Council. Full information is held in GRC SMR.

NJ 303 163. Remains of houses and part of an enclosure.

Sponsor: Grampian Regional Council.

M Greig 1995.

(Reclassified as farmstead). A small farmstead is situated in the centre of the floodplain on the S side of the Water of Nochty: it comprises three buildings and a garden plot.

The first building (NJ 3038 1631) is a rectangular cottage measuring about 11.9m from E to W by 4.9m transversely over coursed rubble walls 0.8m in thickness and 1.6m in height. There is a central entrance on the S, but no other domestic architectural features are visible. A byre abutting on the W measures 6.2m from E to W by 3.2m within coursed rubble walls 0.8m in thickness and 0.7m in height. It, too, has a central entrance on the S.

A garden plot lies 5m ENE of the cottage and measures 18.6m square within a stone and earth dyke 1.1m in thickness and 0.4m height. River erosion has destroyed almost the whole of the NE side of the garden wall, save for the E corner, and there is an entrance to the garden on the SW.

A rectangular two-compartmented building, probably a byre (NJ 3041 1630), is situated 4m to the SSE of the cottage. It measures 12.6m from NW to SE by 4.4m over coursed rubble walls 0.75m in thickness and 0.8m in height. The SE compartment measures 6.15m by 2.8m internally, while its better preserved counterpart to the NW measures 5.1m by 2.8m Although there are no clear traces of entrances, these probably lay on the NE side of the structure.

A well-preserved rectangular kiln-barn (NJ 3033 1633), which has been built into the foot of the E facing scarp of the valley, lies 42m WNW of the cottage. It measures 12.2m from E to W by 6.1m transversely within grass-grown banks 1.7m in thickness and 0.4m in height. There is an entrance in the S side. The bowl of the ruined rubble kiln at the W end of the structure measures 1.5m in diameter and 1.5m deep, within walls 1.3m in thickness, and the remains of a central draw-hole are visible on its E side.

The cottage and its attached byre are depicted as roofed on the 1st edition of the OS 6-inch map (Aberdeenshire, 1869, sheet lx) which also depicts the garden and a second building to the SSE. The latter, however, is portrayed upon an axis opposed to that of the detached byre there today, which was presumably built at some time between 1869 and the end of the century. With the exception of the kiln-barn, which is not shown on either the 1st or 2nd edition maps, all the surviving buildings were unroofed in 1903 (OS 6-inch map, Aberdeenshire, 2nd edition, 1903, sheet lx).

Visited by RCAHMS (ATW, IWF), 4 July 1997.