East Barns Quarry

NT 7204 7618 A programme of targeted excavation was undertaken, 5 September 2016 – 14 February 2017, in advance of a quarry extension. An evaluation and test pitting in 2005 had identified the presence of a prehistoric stone-built roundhouse and a suspected courtyard.

An area of 60 x 60m was machine stripped and then hand excavated. The work revealed the presence of six definitive stone-built structures along with associated areas of flagstones, stone revetment, various walls and a number of cut features. Some of these roundhouses had upstanding walls five courses high and there were direct stratigraphic links between many of them. To the NE of this cluster of houses lay another single discrete large structure with numerous phases of flooring. A rich assemblage of artefacts was recovered including 30 rotary querns, numerous stone bowls, stone balls plus pottery, lithics, coarse stone items and animal bone. A complete fibula brooch, a small metal toggle and fragments of at least two stone ingot moulds were also recovered.

The finds suggest a Late Iron Age date making the site comparable in age to the nearby excavated sites of Broxmouth Hillfort and Dryburn Bridge enclosed settlement. A programme of post-excavation works will be required to fully understand the site and place it within its context as part of this rich East Lothian landscape.

Archive: NRHE (intended)

Funder: Tarmac

Lindsay Dunbar – AOC Archaeology Group

(Source: DES, Volume 18)