Murder Loch

NY08NW 8 0311 8538.

NY 0311 8538 Cropmarks noted on APs by J Condry (information from letter 23 May 1974) indicate the line of a ditch marking a square enclosure with rounded corners and a gap in the SE side. The site lies on a wide elongated grass-covered natural knoll at Shieldhill and commands a good view through Annandale as far north as the Lowther Hills about 17 miles away.

Ground inspection shows vague swellings and undulations corresponding with the AP markings and a general platform effect within the enclosed area. The most pronounced side is the NE where a superficial depression approximately 5.0m wide appears to terminate in a rounded corner. The SW side is also discernible as a vague depression 5.0m wide but neither of the other two sides can be determined with any certainty.

A possible entrance (corresponding with the gap in the line of ditch shown on APs) appears as a slight dip in the lip of the central platform. The overall dimensions of the platform from the scarps of the ditches on either side is about 50.0m whilst transversely, the distance across the flat summit of the knoll is about the same.

The AP markings indicate a site with Roman characteristics and the position favours a Roman work. Shieldhill lies between the Roman fortlet at Fairholm (NY18SW 12) and the fort at Carzield (NX98SE 8) on the route (as yet unlocated) of a Roman road (RR 76) linking Annandale with Nithsdale. Though unlocated, Roy (1793) routes this road by way of Murder Loch and Lanegate thus passing by the SE side of the Shieldhill site. If such a route is acceptable, the possibility then exists that Shieldhill may be a Roman fortlet.

Surveyed at 25" from APs.

Visited by OS (ECW) 30 May 1974

Air photography dating from 1984 shows the fortlet to be within a thin outer line of defence formed by a roughly sub-rectangular enclosure measuring about 0.6 ha in area.

G S Maxwell and D R Wilson 1987