Ardmarnock
Chambered Cairn (Neolithic), Cup And Ring Marked Stone (Prehistoric), Cup Marked Stone (Prehistoric)
Site Name Ardmarnock
Classification Chambered Cairn (Neolithic), Cup And Ring Marked Stone (Prehistoric), Cup Marked Stone (Prehistoric)
Alternative Name(s) Ardmarnock 5
Canmore ID 39909
Site Number NR97SW 1
NGR NR 9164 7265
Datum OSGB36 - NGR
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/39909
- Council Argyll And Bute
- Parish Kilfinan
- Former Region Strathclyde
- Former District Argyll And Bute
- Former County Argyll
Field Visit (16 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This site was included within the RCAHMS Emergency Survey (1942-3), an unpublished rescue project.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 (1972 - 1976)
Surveyed at 1:10,000.
Visited by OS (IA) 2 November 1972 and (BS) 7 October 1976.
Measured Survey (20 June 1985)
RCAHMS surveyed Ardmarnock chambered cairn on 20 June 1985 with plane-table and alidade producing a plan at a scale of 1:100. The plan of the cairn was redrawn in ink and published at a scale of 1:250 (RCAHMS 1988a, 39).
Field Visit (May 1985)
Access to this cairn (Henshall 1972, 330-1) which is situated on a NNE-SSW ridge 200 m E of Ardmarnock farm and 150 m S of Ardmarnock House, is provided by a path cleared through an otherwise almost impenetrable rhododendron shrubbery. At the date of visit, it was not possible, because of the undergrowth, to measure the full extent of the cairn but, as seen in 1942, the cairn material was traced for 'at least 70 feet' (21 m) along the axis of the ridge (Childe and Graham 1943, 32-3); this confirms the earlier account that the cairn was 20 yards long (18 m) (Stat. Acct. 14, 250-9). A spread of stones measuring at least 9 m in diameter and 1.2 m in height at present surrounds the chamber, which is aligned NNE and ssw and is composed of two compartments, of which the outer has two large side-slabs, that on the w leaning slightly to the w, and that on the E leaning considerably to the E, and each of them about 2 m high. The outer end of this compartment is obscured by a tree, but it is about 0.7 m wide. The inner compartment measures 1.45 m by 0.9 m and about 1.4 m in depth; the septal slab separating the two compartments is about 0.35 m lower than the side-slabs an dthe end-slab, which is pointed at the SE corner and at least1·5 m high. The upper edge of the septal slab is slightly hollowed, but it is not possible to be sure whether this was deliberately shaped, as suggested by Childe, or is, perhaps, more probably the result of weathering. The septal slab is, however, decorated with two opposing cup-markings (Morris 1977, 50): a cup and-ring marking on the outside (0.43 m from the w side and 0·3 m from the top) measures some 85 mm in diameter overall with the central cup 45 mm in diameter and 10 mm deep; the plain cup on the inner face (0.43 m from the w side and 0.32 m from the top) is 40 mm in diameter and 10 mm deep. Several displaced slabs lie round the chamber, including the cover slab of the inner compartment (1.65 m by 1.4 m and up to 0.15 m thick), and the massive slab that covered the outer compartment (2.2 m by 1.9 m and up to 0.25 m thick).
RCAHMS 1988, visited May 1985
