Woodycastle
Fort (Iron Age)
Site Name Woodycastle
Classification Fort (Iron Age)
Alternative Name(s) Woody Castle; Lochbank
Canmore ID 66277
Site Number NY08SE 2
NGR NY 07325 83680
Datum OSGB36 - NGR
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/66277
- Council Dumfries And Galloway
- Parish Lochmaben
- Former Region Dumfries And Galloway
- Former District Annandale And Eskdale
- Former County Dumfries-shire
NY08SE 2 07325 83680
(NY 0732 8367) Earthwork (NR)
Woodycastle (NAT)
OS 6" map (1957)
Woody Castle is situated on a low eminence in cultivated ground and represents the type of Dumfriesshire circular fort which often goes by the name of birren. It measures 200 ft (61m) in diameter within a massive rampart, spread to a width of 35 ft (10.6m), and an external ditch, which measures 45 ft (13.7m) in width where best preserved.
It was described in 1887-8 as having one original inner entrance, 15 ft wide, on the E by N part of the fort and an outer rampart, fast disappearing under the plough, also with an entrance about 70 ft N of the inner gateway. Suggested peninsular stronghold, probably with water on three sides.
J Lennox 1890; R W Feachem 1963.
See plan from RCAHMS.
RCAHMS 1920
A fort, generally as described and planned by RCAHMS.
Resurveyed at 1/2500.
Visited by OS (RD) 20 June 1966.
Note (1997)
NY 0732 8367 NO08SE 2
Listed as fort.
RCAHMS 1997.
Aerial Photographic Transcription (13 July 2012)
An interpretative transcription, or mapping, of information on oblique aerial photographs was produced on 13 July 2012.
Note (23 May 2014 - 15 November 2016)
The defences of this fort which enclose a low, but commanding, hillock on the floor of Annandale NW of Lochmaben comprise two elements: a rampart with an external ditch forming a circular enclosure on the summit of the hillock; and an outer rampart with an external ditch around its foot. The inner enclosure measures about 60m in diameter within a thick rampart that stands up to 1.2m above the level of the interior and about 3.5m above the bottom of the external ditch, which has been reduced to little more than a terrace on the S but elsewhere is accompanied by a counterscarp bank. The entrance is on the ENE, opening down the slope onto what is probably a surfaced entrance way, which can be seen as a parchmark on aerial photographs extending down to the entrance through the outer defences. These latter comprise a ploughed-down rampart with an external ditch up to 5m in breadth, which describe an irregular area of about 1.5ha. In contrast to the ditches, the aerial photographs also show a pencil-thin parched line set back concentrically from the inner lip of the outer ditch around the NE quarter, accompanied by a second line on the lip of the ditch around the NW; at the entrance on the ENE the terminals of the parchmark turn in slightly to either side, suggesting that they represent a stone component in the structure of the rampart.
Information from An Atlas of Hillforts of Great Britain and Ireland – 15 November 2016. Atlas of Hillforts SC0874
