Toftsholm

NY59SW 40 5018 9455

This farmstead is situated on a small terrace within a field-system to the S of Toftsholm Sike. It comprises the footings of a rectangular building (LID96 171) and a garden enclosure on the NW. The building measures 28.75m from NE to SW by 4.3m transversely within faced rubble footings 0.75m in thickness and 0.5m in height. The interior is divided into four compartments and an outshot 4.8m in length is butted on to the NE end. There is an entrance in the SE side. The building is depicted, roofed, on the 1st edition of the OS 6-inch map (Roxburghshire 1863, sheet xlii) and named Upper Row. The garden enclosure is also shown, together with two conjoined garden enclosures to the N and what may have been a further garden enclosure and roofless building to the NE; no trace of this building, or any of the additional gardens, was found on the date of visit. The farmstead is shown on Roy's map (Roy 1747-55).

The field-system is of at least two distinct phases, the later of which is outlined as improved ground on the 1st edition map and comprises large plots demarcated by straight boundaries. Relict hedgerows shown on the 1st edition coincide with the banks of an earlier field-system of oval and irregular plots, the layout of which is recorded on an aerial photograph (RAF 541/A 468 frame no.4238, 26 April 1949). Patches of rig, measuring about 3m between furrows, can also be seen on the aerial photograph. At least two turf-banked enclosures are visible on the aerial photograph on the hillside to the S of the farmstead. One may have been a stock enclosure (NY 5018 9433), while the interior of another appears to have been cultivated (NY 5015 9419). Both have since been levelled by cultivation.

(LID96 171)

Visited by RCAHMS (DCC) 11 March 1996 with additional information from aerial photography 18 March 1998

W Roy 1747-55