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Pudding Law
Cultivation Terrace(S) (Period Unassigned)
Site Name Pudding Law
Classification Cultivation Terrace(S) (Period Unassigned)
Canmore ID 59082
Site Number NT81NW 57
NGR NT 83404 17204
NGR Description From NT 8337 1734 to NT 8342 1724
Datum OSGB36 - NGR
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/59082
- Council Scottish Borders, The
- Parish Morebattle
- Former Region Borders
- Former District Roxburgh
- Former County Roxburghshire
NT81NW 57 from 8337 1734 to 8342 1724
(From NT 8337 1734 to NT 8342 1724) Cultivation Terraces (NR)
OS 6" map, (1962).
There are cultivation terraces on the W face of Pudding Law above the Calroust Burn.
RCAHMS 1956, visited 1938.
There are two fairly well-defined lynchets and a few cultivation platforms on the W face of Pudding Law.
Visited by OS (WDJ) 1 September 1960.
These terraces are as described in the report of 1 September 1960.
Visited by OS(TRG) 10 September 1976.
During fieldwork for the Roxburghshire Inventory in 1948 (RCAHMS 1956), some traces of a 'Celtic field-system' were recognised over the hillsides in the immediate vicinity of the possible unenclosed platform settlement (NT81NW 40). This complemented the field-system recognised beside the Crock Cleuch homesteads (NT81NW 41 and NT81NW 41.01).
Aerial reconnaissance and ground field survey combine to reveal a complex archaeological landscape spread over the W slope of Pudding Law of which the earliest elements appear to be a series of four lynchets from NT 8337 1734 to, at least, NT 8342 1724. These lynchets occupy the moderate to moderately steep slopes between steeper ground and are spread over a trapezoidal area measuring 30m on the E and 150m on the W by about 130m from E to W. Each lynchet is about 35m to 40m apart and stands up to 1m in height. To the N of the Crock Cleuch, immediately W of the settlements, there are traces of a further three lynchets which may represent the N extent of the system (described under NT81NW 41.01). Aerial photography suggests that the whole of the lower slopes on the W side of Pudding Law, from the modern enclosure wall N to the Crock Cleuch, was subsequently extensively cultivated, thus greatly reducing the profile of the lynchets. At the S end of the cultivation, what appears to be a bank running cross-contour to link two of the lynchets, is more probably part of an extensive later field-system emanating from the farmstead at NT 8340 1700.
The character of the field-system, which comprises broadly spaced lynchets with few, if any, cross banks forming enclosures, is unusual in the survey area where the most visible components of contour cultivation are more concentrated. Perhaps later cultivation, in these other locations, along the contours has obliterated, or disguised, such previously existing lynchets in many instances. The few visible traces at Pudding Law are reminiscent of Bronze Age cultivation, in assocation with an unenclosed platform settlement, at Ellershie Hill and the existence of a possible unenclosed platform settlement immediately to the N is intriguing.
Information from RJ Mercer (University of Edinburgh) 2 April 1985
RCAHMS MS 2598. No. 44/571
Sbc Note
Visibility: This is an upstanding earthwork or monument.
Information from Scottish Borders Council
