Langdale

NC64NE 2.00 centred 695 452

NC64NE 2.01 NC 7005 4565 Farmstead

(Centred NC 695 452) An extensive area of depopulation named Langwell (Roy 1747-55) or Langdale (Macfarlane 1906-8).

W Roy 1747-55; W Macfarlane 1906-8.

It was cleared and burned in 1814.

J Prebble 1963.

The deserted township known locally as Langdale is encroached upon by the present crofting settlement, and the general pattern is destroyed but for its head dyke still surviving much of the course. There are half a dozen or so building footings evident, the larger two measuring 21.0 by 4.0m and 25.0 by 4.0m, and the remainder ranging from 5.0 by 3.0m to 12.0 by 4.0m, also several ruinous enclosures and traces of field walls and banks. Rig and furrow is apparant.

At NC 6929 4497, close by the remains of a broch, (NC64SE 1) are the ruins of a dry-stone building. Rectangular on plan with no sub-divisions, it measures 21.7m E-W by 4.4m within a wall 1.1 to 1.2m thick surviving on average to two courses.

Two evenly spaced entrances are in the south side. The building is within the old township wall but in isolation. The debris present indicates a structure of some substance, and a "meeting house"; though lacking the formal T-shape, is suggested, although there is no local knowledge of such.

Visited by OS (J M) 10 July 1978.

A township comprising one roofed building and forty-two unroofed structures, of which thirty are buildings, is depicted on the 1st edition of the OS 6-inch map (Sutherland 1878, sheet xxxvi). Seventeen roofed and eighteen unroofed buildings, five unroofed structures or enclosures are shown on the current edition of the 1:10,560 map (1962) and 1:10,000 map (1992).

Information from RCAHMS (AKK) 30 August 1995.