Colachla
Dun (Prehistoric)
Site Name Colachla
Classification Dun (Prehistoric)
Canmore ID 39811
Site Number NR96NE 1
NGR NR 9545 6832
Datum OSGB36 - NGR
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/39811
- Council Argyll And Bute
- Parish Kilfinan
- Former Region Strathclyde
- Former District Argyll And Bute
- Former County Argyll
NR96NE 1 9545 6832.
A mile SW of and across Allt Osda from Caisteal na Sidthe and behind a small plantation of Scots firs, is a circular dun. Externally it measures 75' in diameter. The tumbled stone rampart has spread to 9'. The doorway is to the N and is 4' wide.
V G Childe and A Graham 1943; Information contained in letter from E B Rennie to OS, 27 November 1967.
NR 9545 6832: Situated on a small ridge is a sub-circular dun measuring internally 20.5m N-S by 18.0m. The wall, best preserved on the N where inner and outer faces remain, is 3.0m wide and up to 0.7m high. On the W, few traces remain as the wall here was constructed along the edge of a steep rocky scarp.
The well-preserved entrance to the NNE is 1.4m wide and 1.8m long. No check is visible.
The interior is featureless.
Surveyed at 1:2500.
Visited by OS (D W R) 25 October 1972.
Field Visit (17 September 1942)
This site was included within the RCAHMS Emergency Survey (1942-3), an unpublished rescue project. Site descriptions, organised by county, vary from short notes to lengthy and full descriptions and are available to view online with contemporary sketches and photographs. The original typescripts, manuscripts, notebooks and photographs can also be consulted in the RCAHMS Search Room.
Information from RCAHMS (GFG) 10 December 2014.
Field Visit (October 1984)
This ruined dun is situated on the flat summit of a rocky ridge 350m SW of Colachla, a position which affords spectacular views across to Arran. The dun measures 17m in diameter within an irregularly-built wall which is best preserved on the N, where it is 3m thick. A number of inner and outer facing-stones can still be seen, the former including several large blocks set upright in a way which is uncharacteristic of the wall structure of duns elsewhere in Argyll. The entrance is on the NNE, and the outer corner-stone and two facing-stones of the W side-wall are still in position.
Visited October 1984
RCAHMS 1988
