Ballygowan
Fort (Prehistoric)
Site Name Ballygowan
Classification Fort (Prehistoric)
Alternative Name(s) Barr A' Chuirn
Canmore ID 39461
Site Number NR89NW 20
NGR NR 8147 9801
Datum OSGB36 - NGR
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/39461
- Council Argyll And Bute
- Parish Kilmartin
- Former Region Strathclyde
- Former District Argyll And Bute
- Former County Argyll
NR89NW 20 8147 9801
(NR 8148 9800) Fort (NR)
OS 6" map, Argyllshire, 2nd ed., (1900)
A fort, one of the local types of defensive enclosure (Feachem 1963), situated on a rocky knoll, its E side resting on the edge of a cliff. It is oval in plan measuring 114' by 50' within a wall originally about 12' thick. The interior is flat and grassy. The site overlooks the Kilmartin valley and old and new cultivation lie nearby.
The walls between the knolls on Christison's (1904) plan were thought by him to be modern.
D Christison 1904; R W Feachem 1963; M Campbell and M Sandeman 1964.
As described. Below the N end of the fort is a small annexe possibly associated with it.
Surveyed at 1:10,000 scale.
Visited by OS (W D J) 17 March 1970.
NR 8147 9801. A fort generally as desceibed in the previous information. The walling now only remains on the N and W where it is visible as a grass-covered band of stone 4.5m wide and up to 0.8m high. there is an entrance 1.5m wide in the west. Below the fort on the N is a natural terrace. This has a few facing stones visible around its edge and was almost certainly used as an annexe. To the W of the fort is a level field, with rig and furrow, partially enclosed by a relatively modern field wall. There is no trace of any earlier cultivation in the vicinity.
Surveyed at 1/10,000.
Visited by OS (B S), 13 April 1977.
Field Visit (May 1982)
The wasted remains of this fort occupy the top of an isolated knoll situated 360 m NNW of Ballygowan Cottage (Campbell and Sandeman 1964). The SE flank is protected by crags, but on the NW the approach is up a steep grassy slope. Oval on plan, it measures 34m from NNE to SSW by about 15m transversely within a wall which has been reduced on the N, W and S to a low stony bank with occasional outer facing-stones, while on the S and E no more than a grassy scarp and intermittent bands of rubble now survive. The position of the entrance is not certain, but it probably lay on the W, where there is a gap in the wall. Extensive areas of rig-and-furrow cultivation surround the fort, and below the wall, on the NE, there is a recent field-bank.
RCAHMS 1988, visited May 1982.
Note (29 October 2014 - 23 May 2016)
A small fortification occupying a precipitous and steep-sided knoll. Oval on plan it measures 34m from N to S by 15m transversely (0.04ha) within a wall reduced to a low bank from which occasional outer facing-stones protrude. The position of the entrance is not known.
Information from An Atlas of Hillforts of Great Britain and Ireland – 23 May 2016. Atlas of Hillforts SC2463
