Dirnanean

NO06SE 86 0645 6429

There is a cluster of buildings amongst the outcrops in the N corner of a field below Calamanach Wood, 350m WNW of the Dirnanean sheep dip. At least eight buildings can be identified but not all of them can have been occupied at the same time. In places their walls stand up to 0.7m high, but elsewhere they are reduced to footings or stony banks.

The northernmost of the buildings is a small structure measuring 6.7m from NE to SW by 5m overall.

Immediately to the WSW there is a building measuring 14.3m from NE to SW by 5.6m over walls 1m thick; this building has two compartments and there is an entrance in its SE wall facing into a small yard.

A third building lies on the SW side of the yard and measures about 11m from NW to SE by 5.4m overall. The S corner of the building on the SW side of the yard appears to overlie the NW corner of a fourth building. Although heavily robbed, the latter is the largest on the site and measures 16.5m from WNW to ESE by 6m overall.

Immediately S of its W end there is a small building (6.5m by 4.8m overall) set at right angles to it. This building overlies the N end of a sixth building, measuring 10.1m by 5m overall.

Immediately ESE of the largest building there are traces of a seventh building, and beyond it an eighth. The latter measures 8.5m from E to W by 5.5m overall and there is an entrance on S; the entrance leads into shallow hollow running across the interior, with traces of raised plinths to either side.

There are remains of low lynchets and enclosures in the field to the W. Visited by RCAHMS (SH) 27 September 1988.

RCAHMS 1990