Dalmakethar

Fort, Dalmakethar Burn.

About ¼ mile east by north of Dalmakethar farm is another fort (fig. 10) at an elevation of nearly 400 feet above sea-level and at the edge of a steep bank overhanging the Dalmakethar Burn, which flows by on the north some 50 feet below. East of the fort the ground rises by an easy gradient to the skyline some 300 or 400 yards distant; to the south it falls away, trending westward; while on the west it has a rather steep declivity for some 50 feet to a hollow in the cultivated land below. The interior area of the fort is oval, with its longest axis north-north-east and south-south-west, measures 126 feet by 98 feet, and is entirely surrounded by a rampart of earth and stone. From the edge of the ravine of the burn on the north-east a double trench passes along the east side and the south end, with an intervening rampart broadest and deepest on the south, which diverges from the central enceinte as it passes westward on to the face of the steep slope. Thence it is said to have been continued obliquely to the edge of the ravine. The inner trench on the east has a breadth of 30 feet, and a depth of 4 feet and 5 feet respectively below the crests of scarp and counterscarp; while on the south it measures 45 feet in breadth, 9 feet in depth below the scarp, and 6 feet below the counterscarp. The outer trench is 23 feet wide on the east and of slight depth, while on the south it has a breadth of 34 feet and depth of 6 feet. The entrances have been from the north north-east and south-south-east and are 4 to5 feet wide. The former has been approached over a narrow space flanked by the rampart and the edge of the ravine; the latter directly through the defences. At both entrances the inner rampart broadens as it approaches the opening from either side. There appears to be a spring in the outer trench at its south west termination.

RCAHMS 1920, visited 14 August 1912.

OS 6" map, Dumf., 2nd ed, (1900).

NY 1197 9217 NY19SW 6

Situated at the top of the S bank of a steep-sided stream-gully, there are the remains of a fort and later settlement.

Roughly D-shaped on plan, the fort originally measured about 100m from NW to SE by 50m transversely within double ramparts (up to 6m thick and 1.5m high) and ditches (up to 9m broad and 1m deep), but since its depiction in 1861 on the 1st edition of the OS 6-inch map (Dumfriesshire, sheet 34), the W half of the site has been ploughed down.

The later settlement is situated within the surviving E half of the fort, making use of the SE arc of the earlier defences and the entrance. Oval on plan, it measures about 37m from NE to SW by 23m transversely within a wall reduced to a grass-grown stony bank up to 5m thick and 0.5m high; there is a possible second entrance on the NNE. A number of low scarps in the interior, including two which cut into the base of the earlier rampart on the E, may mark the positions of timber houses.

Visited by RCAHMS (JRS), 19 July 1990.

Listed as fort and settlement.

RCAHMS 1997.

RCAHMS surveyed the fort at Dalmakethar with plane-table and self-reducing alidade at a scale of 1:500 (circa 1991, plan is undated). The plan was redrawn in ink and published at a scale of 1:1000 (RCAHMS 1997, Fig. 165).

The remains of this fort occupy a sloping terrace on the S bank of the Dalmakethar Burn to create what is in effect a promontory fort backing onto the burn gully. The defences of the fort comprise twin ramparts and ditches which have been constructed across the neck of the promontory on the SE before swinging sharply NW down the flank of the promontory, ultimately to return to edge of the burn gully and enclosing an pear-shaped area measuring about 100m in length by 55m in maximum breadth (0.42ha). The defences on the SW flank almost certainly pick up the line of another natural drainage gully, which probably accounts for the way the two ditches seem to have coalesced into a single broad hollow as they approach the Dalmakethar Burn. Where better preserved on the SE, the defences have been considerable, both ramparts measuring in the order of 6m in thickness by 1.5m in height and their accompanying ditches up to 9m in breadth by 1m in depth. The inner rampart, however, has been slighted by the construction of a later settlement in the southern angle of the interior; oval on plan, the settlement measures 37m from NE to SW by 23m transversely within a wall reduced to a stony bank. The main entrance to the settlement is on the S, and possibly reuses an earlier entrance into the fort, though the counterscarp of the outer ditch appears to be unbroken.

Information from An Atlas of Hillforts of Great Britain and Ireland – 18 October 2016. Atlas of Hillforts SC1017