Spott Dod
Fort (Iron Age)
Site Name Spott Dod
Classification Fort (Iron Age)
Canmore ID 57798
Site Number NT67SE 5
NGR NT 66486 74472
NGR Description Centre
Datum OSGB36 - NGR
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/57798
- Council East Lothian
- Parish Spott (East Lothian)
- Former Region Lothian
- Former District East Lothian
- Former County East Lothian
NT67SE 5 NT 66491 74471
In June 1983 the exploratory excavation was undertaken of this crop-mark site, which was apparent as an enclosure of about 1.5 ha, defined by two closely spaced interrupted ditches both apparently congruent with a palisade slot or similar feature set on the inner side. Such causewayed ditches have been obeserved in some numbers in Scotland recently and in view of the accepted chrono-cultural association of this ditch type in Southern and Central England it was decided to test this site to establish its date and nature.
Excavation revealed the presence of a fairly massive V-section ditch which may well have been cognate with a dump style rampart. It is possible that settlement in small sub-circular structures preceded this early defensive phase. This inner ditch appears to have been virtually levelled when a series of palisaded enclosures were built on the site, one of these probably being associated, late in the site's development, with a shallow recut in the head of the V-section ditch. This and other recuts would appear to be discontinuous and may have influenced the position as protrayed upon the aerial photograph. The outer ditch was minimal in stature and was interrupted and appears to be the equivalent of the shallow recut phenomenon in the inner ditch cognate with the construction of an outer palisade.
R J Mercer 1983.
Listed as Spott Dod, fort.
Information from Historic Scotland, scheduling document dated 15 October 1993.
Note (2 January 2016 - 31 August 2016)
The site of this fort lies on the summit of Spott Dod, which forms a secondary summit on a ridge dropping down NE away from The Chesters (Atlas No. 3913). Probably oval on plan, the defences have been photographed on a single occasion in 1977, when parchmarks in grass revealed traces of a complex system of causewayed ditches and palisade trenches forming the NE and SE sides of the enclosure. And though the marks fade away on the N and SSW, one of the ditches extends a sufficient distance onto the steep NW flank of the hill to be confident that the defences probably formed a complete circuit. Thus defined, the enclosure represented by that ditch measures about 150m from NE to SW by 120m transversely (1.4ha), though the interiors of the two or three palisaded perimeters visible within its line are considerably smaller. An evaluation carried out in 1983 by Roger Mercer recovered evidence of two ditches, the inner some 2m in breadth by 2m in depth and containing a complex sequence of recut fills, and the outer no more than 1m and 0.8m broad and deep respectively. Palisade trenches were set 2m to the rear of each ditch, while within the course of the inner there were at least three other lines of palisading, one comprising a double row of posts. Two radiocarbon dates from charcoal at the base of one of the recuts in the inner ditch and from the palisade trench immediately within it demonstrate that the enclosure is Iron Age, but little else.
Information from An Atlas of Hillforts of Great Britain and Ireland – 31 August 2016. Atlas of Hillforts SC3914
Note (10 June 2023)
The location, classification and period of this site have been reviewed and changed from ENCLOSURE (PERIOD UNASSIGNED).
