Ballachraggan

RCAHMS surveyed the chambered cairn at Ballachraggan with alidade and plane-table on 24 April 1992 at a scale of 1:125. The resultant plan was redrawn in ink and published at a scale of 1:250 (RCAHMS 1994g, Fig.5).

NN60NE 58 6805 0650.

The badly disturbed remains of what is probably a Clyde type chambered cairn are situated on the crest of a ridge, but below its highest point, some 350m ENE of Ballachraggan farmsteading. Oval on plan, the mound now measures 30m from NNW to SSE and tapers in width from 23.5m on the SSE to 18.5m on the NNW; originally, however, the cairn may have been trapezoidal in plan and have extended further to the NNW. Towards the NNW end of the mound there are two approximately aligned settings of upright stones which may either represent the remains of two chambers, each entered from opposite sides of the cairn, or fragments of a single long chamber. The side-slabs rise to a maximum height of 1m above the floor of the chamber. To the S of the centre of the mound there is a quartz slab marking the site of a modern cremation deposit (the father of the present farmer). A modern plough scar skirts the NW arc of the mound.

(BOD 2)

Visited by RCAHMS (DCC) 6 May 1992.

The discovery of four unrecorded neolithic burial monuments is perhaps the most significant result of the survey. The Braes of Doune area stands in what was until very recently a gap, about 50km wide, in the distribution of Clyde-type chambered tombs, between those of Dunbartonshire and Stirlingshire, and the scattered group of outliers in Strathearn and Glen Almond (Henshall 1972, pp. 28-9, Map 3; RCAHMS 1994a, 37). Evidence that the Perthshire examples were not as isolated as they had appeared to be emerged with the discovery, in 1980, of a long cairn at Edenchip, near Lochearnhead (Davidson and Henshall 1984; NN52SE 10) followed, in 1991, by the identification of another at Auchenlaich, Callander, immediately west of the survey area (DES 1991, 9; NN60NW 4). The identification of four monuments on the Braes of Doune, three of which are of Clyde-type, underlines the possibility that more examples await discovery in south-western Perthshire, and thus that the links with the core of the Clyde tomb region were stronger than might hitherto have been supposed.

The four monuments differ from each other both in situation and in plan. At West Bracklinn [NN60NE 59] the cairn stands on the edge of a slight terrace at about 328m OD, an exceptional altitude for a Clyde-type burial, where it commands a wide view from the east round to the south-west. The much-robbed oval mound measures 8.4m by 7m, its long axis running NNE-SSW, with a chamber set slightly to the north of the centre of the cairn and aligned E-W. The slabs of the north side of the chamber are missing, and the west end slab has been displaced, but it seems to have consisted of two compartments, each about 1m in length by at least 0.5m broad.

The Ballachraggan cairn [NN60NE 58] stands in improved grassland at a height of 170m OD on a low ridge on a southwest facing hillside. It is considerably larger than West Bracklinn, measuring 30m in length and tapering from 23.5m in width at its SSE end to 18.5m at the NNW. Towards the NNW end parts of a three-compartment chamber (or possibly two chambers) set transversely to the main axis of the mound, are visible. The W compartment, which is the most complete, measures at least 2.4m by 1.1 m. There was no evidence of a chamber at either end of the cairn, but a plough-scar across the NNW end suggests that it may have been truncated, although it would not be alone amongst the Perthshire examples if there had been no end chamber - Clach na Tiompan in Glen Almond has side chambers only (Henshall and Stewart 1956).

At Severie [NN70NW 33] all that remains is a large, poorly-preserved cist, aligned N to S, on the summit of a prominent knoll. Parts of both sides and of the N end protrude through the turbid up to 0.1m, but only one of these slabs, on the E side, appears to be in situ. A large slab lying at an angle and rising 0.6m above the surface may have divided the chamber into two. It is impossible in its present state to estimate the length of the chamber, but it may have been about 1m wide.

The overlapping side-slabs and the transverse slabs subdividing the chambers identify the three tombs described above as members of the Clyde group. The long cairn at Bracklin Burn [NN70NE 10], however, is too badly robbed to be ascribed to any group. It sits on the spine of a low ridge at about 170m OD, above a small burn to the E and N, with gently-rising ground to the north-west. The cairn measures 53.5m in length and 14.8m in breadth at the ESE end, tapering to 8.5m at the WNW end. Within it there are the possible remains of two chambers: two large prostrate slabs towards the ESE end of the cairn, and, in the WSW half, two upright slabs set at right angles to the cairn's long axis (because of the uncertain status of these stones, they have been omitted from the plan).

RCAHMS 1994, 6-7