Hill Of Fiddes
Recumbent Stone Circle (Neolithic) - (Bronze Age)
Site Name Hill Of Fiddes
Classification Recumbent Stone Circle (Neolithic) - (Bronze Age)
Canmore ID 20401
Site Number NJ92SW 1
NGR NJ 9350 2432
Datum OSGB36 - NGR
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/20401
- Council Aberdeenshire
- Parish Foveran
- Former Region Grampian
- Former District Gordon
- Former County Aberdeenshire
NJ92SW 1 9350 2432.
NJ 9344 2432 Stone Circle (NR) (Remains of)
OS 6" map, Aberdeenshire, 2nd ed., (1901)
Hill of Fiddes: Stone circle. A plan of 1777 exists (Anderson 1777) but the scale is not given. From the statement that the Recumbent Stone was 12ft (3.65m) long, we compute the overall diameter of the circle to be about 46ft, and the circumference taken through the centres of the stones, 138ft (42.1m). The stones stood on a well-defined ridge of earth and stones, and the interior is shewn flat and undisturbed. From a brief notice in 1863 (Temple 1863), we gather that all that then remained were one or two stones.
In the dike which has been built up against the pillar on the W, and the E end of the Recumbent Stone, there stand several great stones; two of these are within a few feet of the Pillar; the others on the E are both massive and more numerous. The Pillar of whinstone is 6ft 6" (1.98m) in height and the Recumbent Stone of the same material measures 4ft 3" (1.3m) high on the inner face, and on the outside 6ft (1.8m). Its extreme length is 9ft 8" (2.9m), and it lies due E and W.
F R Coles 1902; J Anderson 1777; C S Temple 1863.
The only remains of the circle now in situ are the recumbent stone and its west pillar and another stone 1.0m west of the pillar. All are incorporated in a modern field wall. The large stones built into the wall east of the recumbent stone may have been removed from the circle.
Revised at 1/2500.
Visited by OS (RD) 20 March 1964.
Length of recumbent stone is 8'9" (2.06m).
Visited by OS field Surveyor 22 June 1965.
All that remains of this recumbent stone circle is the recumbent stone and its flanking upright to the W, both of which appear to be of granite. The recumbent measures 2.7m in length by 0.9m in thickness and 1.6m in height, and the flanker measures 0.7m in breadth by 0.5m in thickness at ground level and 1.7m in height. They have been incorporated into a field-wall that is heavily overburdened by later clearance and other detritus, and it is by no means clear now, which (if any) of the other stones in the wall might also have been extracted from the stone circle.
Visited by RCAHMS (JRS, ATW), 28 January 1997.
This monument is situated on a well-defined ridge at an altitude of about 80m OD.
NMRS, MS/712/86.
Scheduled as Hill of Fiddes, stone circle.
Information from Historic Scotland, scheduling document dated 9 October 2001.
Field Visit (28 April 1999)
Reduced to only the recumbent and its W flanker, what little remains visible of this stone circle is now largely buried by field clearance a little S of the summit of the Hill of Fiddes. The recumbent block (2) faces SSW, measuring 2.8m in length by up to 1.5m in height, and its uneven summit rises to a point just W of its centre. The surviving flanker (1) leans slightly forwards and is about 1.2m high. Nothing else is visible, other than a deep bed of field-gathered stones extending back across the interior.
Visited by RCAHMS (ATW, AJL and KHJM) 28 April 1999
Measured Survey (28 April 1999)
RCAHMS surveyed the remains of Hill of Fiddes recumbent stone circle on 28 April 1999 with plane table and alidade producing a plan of the site and elevation of the recumbent setting at a scale of 1:100. The survey drawing was checked on-site on 2 March 2000. The plan and elevation were redrawn in ink and used as the basis for an illustration produced in vector graphics software and published at a scale of 1:250 (Welfare 2011, 374).
