Tomavorar

NN63NW 95 63209 37740.

This farmstead comprises seven buildings, including a kilnbarn and a limekiln, in enclosed grazing on the W bank of the Allt Coire a' Chonnaidh, about 1.5km W of Carie farmsteading.

At the centre of the farmstead there is a substantial rectangular range, in which at least three phases of construction can be identified (BL00 1023). Originally, this building measured internally 16.3m in length by 4.2m in breadth, but an extension, measuring 7.5m in length, has been added at the WSW end. The gable ends stand up to 3m high, and the side walls reach 1.7m, though the latter have been rebuilt in places, probably for the reuse of the building as a fold. The original portion of the building (presumably a byre-dwelling) has an entrance on the SSE (opening into the WSW half of the building) and a loft window in the WSW gable. The extension also has an entrance on the SSE, a splayed window and a possible cruck-slot in the NNW side, and a fireplace and an aumbry in the WSW end. A further compartment or outshot has been built onto the WSW end of the extension; this measures 5.4m by 5.2m within clay-bonded walls, and it is open to the SSE, suggesting that it may have served as a cartshed.

The entrances to this range both open onto a terrace, revetted with stone, which runs the length of the building and defines the N side of a roughly triangular yard, measuring about 45m by 30m, and around which stand most of the farm buildings. In the E part of the yard, directly in front of the original byre-dwelling, there is a boggy hollow, probably marking the site of a midden, and the second building (BL00 1024) stands to the E of that, in the E corner of the yard. This is aligned NE and SW, and measures 15.7m by 2.5m within walls up to 1.3m high. It has an entrance in the NE end and the interior has been divided into at least two, possibly three, compartments.

The SE side of the yard is defined by a stone dyke running SW from the S corner of the second building, while the SW side is defined by a row of four buildings, described here from NW to SE. The first of these, at the W corner of the yard, is a kilnbarn measuring 7.5m from N to S by 3.4m transversely within rubble walls generally standing up to 1.8m high (BL00 1025). It has an entrance in the E side, at the SE corner. The bowl, which measured about 2.6m in diameter, was at the NNE end, set into rising ground, but only its rear wall survives (standing a remarkable 3m high); the rest has been removed, presumably to increase the space within the barn after the kiln fell out of use.

To the SE of the kilnbarn there is a gable-ended building on top of a low knoll (BL00 1022). It measures 6.1m by 2.9m within walls up to 1.5m high, though the SSW end has entirely collapsed. There are two possible cruck-slots in the WSW wall, which also has traces of harling on its inner face. Immediately to the SSE there is a small building set into the side of the knoll (BL00 1021). It measures 3.5m from NW to SE by 2.4m transversely within walls 1.1m in thickness and up to 1.5m high, it has an entrance in the SE end and the interior is choked with rubble, probably from the collapsed gable of the building on top of the knoll. The unusual thickness of its walls suggests that this building served as a cold store. The fourth building on this side of the yard (BL00 1020) is a gable-ended construction measuring internally 12.6m by 3.9m. The SE end and part of the NE side have been rebuilt and incorporated into the wall of a large fold (which extends to the SE and measures about 40m in length by 20m in breadth); otherwise the walls are reduced to footings, except the NW gable, which stands up to 1.7m high.

Finally, the limekiln (BL00 1026) is set into the side of a burn gully about 30m NW of the kilnbarn at NN 63162 37745. It measures 2.5m in diameter within a wall 1m in thickness with a splayed draw-hole on the SW. The bowl has been about 2m deep, but it is now partly choked with rubble; its inner facing stones are reddened and fire-cracked.

Tomovorar may be the 'Tomnavrour' depicted at approximately this location on Timothy Pont's late-sixteenth century map of Loch Tay (National Library of Scotland, Pont 18(1)). However, no settlement is shown here on John Farquharson's 1769 Survey of the North Side of Loch Tay (National Archives of Scotland, RHP 973/1 Plan 7); at which time this area lay within the outfields of the farm of Wester Carwhin. The existing remains were probably constructed after the establishment of new farms on the outfields of Carwhin in 1797-8, and may be the new steading built by 1800 on the Outfields of Carwhin by James Malloch (Harrison 2003, RCAHMS MS1155/6, pp.71-3). The 1st edition of the OS 6-inch map (Perthshire 1867, sheet lxix) names the site Tomavorar, and depicts as roofed all the buildings described above, with the exception of the limekiln. The 2nd edition of the map (Perthshire 1900, sheet lxix NW) shows all the buildings (including the limekiln) as roofless.

(BL00 1020-6, 2564)

Visited by RCAHMS (SDB) 9 June and 18 July 2000.