Gigha, Cnoc Largie

NR65SE 7 6550 5143

(NR 6546 5139) A large over-grown, dry-stone, oval enclosure on the south side of Cnoc Largie. It appears to have been too substantial to be a sheepfold.

R E MacCallum 1961; Information from R E MacCallum to OS, 1962.

On Cnoc Largie is a large grassy patch that looks as if it had been cultivated in early times. In the NE corner there are still to be found the remains of a wall of an oval enclosure 62 feet by 43 feet in extent. Two stones standing on the south side seem to indicate the gate, whilst at the upper end a bee-hive hut has collapsed. Between the enclosure and the public road, and almost in a line down the slope of the hill, lie three cairns.

R S G Anderson 1939.

The feature described by the previous authorities is located at NR 6550 5143 on a slight rise of rough ground in an area of narrow rig cultivation. Ground inspection failed to establish whether it is a robbed cairn, to which some stones cleared from the adjacent cultivation have been added, or some form of massive near-circular "enclosure", possibly a hut circle, whose central area has filled with clearance. The few stones protruding through the turf covering are of varying sizes commensurate with field clearance.

Overall it measures about 16.5m NE-SW by 15.5m transversely with a fairly level summit 0.5m high. The only structural remains in situ are some large facing blocks in the NW margin (RCAHMS refers); these resemble the remains of the kerb of a cairn, but could equally represent the outer base footing of a hut circle. No inner wall face is apparent, but this would be obscured by clearance stones. A depression in the SW arc may indicate an entrance but this is uncertain; there is no trace of the stone "gate" nor of the "bee-hive hut" noted by Anderson. To the SW are one or two isolated rock outcrops with stone clearance piled over and around them, and these are presumably the "cairns" mentioned by Anderson (1939).

Surveyed at 1:10 000.

Visited by OS (N K B) 2 February 1978.