Loch Glashan

(NR 9168 9252) A group of five roughly rectangular buildings on the only island in Loch Glashan was excavated in 1961, previous to the site's being flooded by a hydro-electric scheme in the autumn of the same year.

The excavation, which was a joint enterprise by DoE, Glasgow Art Gallery and Museum, and Glasgow University, revealed that three of the buildings (I, II and III on plan) were medieval, as shown by the recovery of 13th - 14th century pottery and coins, one of Edward II of England (1307-1327) and one of Robert II of Scotland (1370-1390). The walls were dry-stone, possibly with turf, and the floors were earthen. Domestic structures are indicated except in the case of Building I which yielded no domestic finds and is of the correct orientation and proportions for a chapel, as well as being of slightly less primitive workmanship than the other buildings. The two remaining buildings were later, one being a recent bothy.

The buildings lay on a revetted artificial terrace, and a stock-pound lay behind them. Both these features were shown to be contemporary with the early buildings, as was the causeway which connected the island to the shore.

Some beautifully worked stones, which were found incorporated spasmodically in the walls of the early buildings, were obviously never intended for the usage made of them, and a rebated arch, which compares with the arch of Kilmory Church (NM80SE 3), suggests that a church may have been projected on the terrace, whose careful preparation seems out of keeping with the relatively mean buildings which occupied it. If this were so, there is neither recorded nor place-name evidence that a church was ever built, nor did extensive trenching reveal any trace, but there is a local belief that the island was once the site of a monastery.

H Fairhurst and J G Scott 1961; H Fairhurst 1969

A natural island, situated close to the SE shore of Loch Glashan, was submerged along with an adjacent crannog (en.1) in 1961, when construction of a hydro-electric dam raised the surface-level from 96m OD to about 110m. The following description is based on the published report on the excavation directed by the late Dr H Fairhurst in advance of this flooding, at a time when the water-level was about 3m lower than normal (en.2*).

The island measured about 95m from NE to SW by 48m, and was separated from the shore by a channel which at its narrowest point, about 10m in width, was spanned by a paved causeway or ford. A central rocky ridge rose to a height of about 10m, and to the SE or landward side five buildings were ranged along an artificial terrace up to 12m in width. This had been built up with turf and soil behind a drystone revetment-wall about 1m in height, which was found to rest upon an earlier kerb of oak logs. The line of the revetment was continued for some distance along the NE and S shores by stony banks which in the former area degenerated into 'a mere strip of stones' (en.3). Some 20m SW of the causeway the revetment returned to form an angular re-entrant which was interpreted as the entrance, although no steps to the terrace were identified here or elsewhere. Although this re-entrant was probably above the normal shore-line, it resembles the boat-landings found in other late-medieval island-dwellings (see Nos.143,145). A pentagonal enclosure at the NE end of the island was probably of no great age.

Of the five structures on the terrace, those to the N (IV on fig.) (en.4) and the S were of post-medieval date, the latter being a bothy of recent construction, perhaps used for duck shooting, and the other a rectangular drystone hut, about 7m by 4.5m over all, of the type found in local shielings. The remaining buildings to the N of the possible boat-landing (II, III) were both roughly built of local stone which appeared to have been mixed with turf. Building II, whose S end-wall overlay the revetment and was supported by a crude buttress, measured about 13m to 15m from NE to SW by 8.5m over walls from 1m to 2.5m thick, the SE wall being considerably longer than the opposite one. It was divided into two unequal rooms by an inserted cross-wall which incorporated several worked stones, apparently in re-use (infra). The larger NE division contained a hearth-stone and two opposed doorways, while in the E end of the smaller room iron hinges for a possible cupboard door remained in situ, but there was no evidence of an entrance-doorway. Building III lay 1 m N of II and at right angles to it and measured about 10m by 7m over 1m walls; its door may have been in the N wall, but no other features were preserved. Fragments of late medieval pottery were associated with both structures, and a silver half-groat of Robert II (1371-90) and a stone mortar were found in building II.

Building I, situated W of the boat-landing, was much superior in construction to buildings II and III, although likewise of drystone rubble. It measured 7.5m by 4m within 0.8m walls standing up to 1m in height, and was orientated about 8 degrees N of E. The dimensions and layout, and the lack of domestic finds, are consistent with the interpretation of this structure as a chapel (en.5), but the position of the only certain doorway, a blocked opening at the S end of the Wend-wall, is not matched elsewhere; the identification of a doorway in a more conventional position in the N wall is uncertain because of stone-robbing for the adjacent bothy. There were slight remains of an inserted partition-wall immediately W of this possible opening.

All three buildings appeared to belong to the first occupation of the terrace, which was dated to the late medieval period by numerous sherds of green-glazed pottery. In addition to the Robert II coin from building II, a penny of Edward Il of England (1307-27) was found on the floor of the boat-landing. More remarkable was the re-use in buildings I and II of 18 worked stones of local schist, including 2 jamb-stones with a 75mm rebate and numerous apparent quoin-stones, some with diagonally-tooled margins (en.6). The two jamb-stones have been incorporated in the screen-wall flanking the entrance to Lochgair power station (NR 924908), along with an arch-head found lying in the boat-landing. Although now broken into three fragments, this was monolithic and the outer edge conforms roughly to the segmental curve of the 1m daylight-opening, which is wrought with a 70mm rebate. A comparable monolithic archhead, possibly of late medieval date, spans the S door at Kilmarie, Craignish (No. 67), and voussoired doorways of similar segmental form, but with chamfered arrises, are found in the late 14th-century tower of Duart Castle, Mull (en.7). There was, however, no evidence that any of the worked stones at Loch Glashan had been incorporated in a building before their re-use as rubble, and no trace of an appropriate structure was identified.

The name of this island has not been preserved, but it was probably that mentioned in a charter of about 1315 by John of Glassary to Dugald Campbell granting ' Knocnagullaran...with its lake and island', and other lands (en.8). 'Cnocnagoloran' had been included in the 1240 charter to Gillascop MacGilchrist (see No.130), and the bounds given in the 1315 document allow its identification with the township of Knock, whose pre-improvement buildings are visible about 0.8km S of the island site (NR 919915 and 920917).These lands and others forming 'a third of Glassary' remained in Campbell ownership, although claimed in the 15th century by the Scrymgeour lords of Glassary, and were probably included in the 1462 grant of Minard and other lands by the first Earl of Argyll to his uncle Duncan Campbell, ancestor of the Campbells of Auchenbreck, whose principal residence was subsequently at Loch Gair (No. 136) (en.9). An earlier dispute over ownership may have led to the abandonment of work on an ambitious building, for which the worked stones were intended, in favour of the simpler buildings described above. While the possibility that Building I was a chapel cannot be discounted (en.10), the series of late medieval island-dwellings and minor domestic sites recorded during the current survey of Argyll provides an adequate secular context for the settlement. The island is not indicated on Pont's manuscript map of the last quarter of the 16th century, and the absence of finds suggests that it had been abandoned as a residence before that period.

RCAHMS 1992