Pricing Change
New pricing for orders of material from this site will come into place shortly. Charges for supply of digital images, digitisation on demand, prints and licensing will be altered.
Thrumster
Cruck Framed Cottage (Post Medieval), Farmstead (Period Unassigned), Quarry(S) (Period Unassigned)
Site Name Thrumster
Classification Cruck Framed Cottage (Post Medieval), Farmstead (Period Unassigned), Quarry(S) (Period Unassigned)
Alternative Name(s) Thrumster 1; Thrumster
Canmore ID 86667
Site Number ND34SW 130
NGR ND 33126 44312
Datum OSGB36 - NGR
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/86667
- Council Highland
- Parish Wick
- Former Region Highland
- Former District Caithness
- Former County Caithness
ND34SW 130 33126 44312
This farmstead lies immediately W of the A9 public road about 360m SW of Thrumster Church (ND 33315 44679). It comprises: a cottage (YARROWS04 637) facing the road; a second building (YARROWS04 639) 15m to the N; and a third building (YARROWS04 640) 26m to the NNE. In addition to the farmstead there are three quarries in the vicinity, one (YARROWS04 638) lying immediately W of the cottage, the second with a limekiln (see ND34SW 122) lies a further 40m to the W, and the third (YARROWS04 641) 25m NE.
The cottage measures 9.2m from NNE to SSW by 3.8m internally. Its clay-bonded walls, which are 0.6m in thickness, still stand gable high at the S end, and to its wall-heads on the E and W, but the N gable has been removed and replaced by a wide entrance framed by breeze-block jambs. The E side of the cottage has a central entrance and flanking windows and there is a single window in the middle of the W side. The S gable contains a fireplace with a cupboard recess to its W, and the modern A-frame roof is clad with corrugated asbestos or fibre-cement sheeting. No traces of the cruck-slots previously noted (Stell 1981, 84) were seen on the date of visit. The building to the N, which stands to wall-head height, measures about 10.1m from NE to SW by 3.2m transversely within clay-bonded walls 0.6m in thickness. It contains two compartments, the one on the SW having opposed entrances on the NW and SE respectively. The NE compartment has a blocked window it is SE side and the entrance was in the part of the NW side that has collapsed. The third building has been constructed against the face of the disused quarry to the NE. It measures 4.6m from NNW to SSE by 2.2 transversely within walls 0.6m in thickness and up to 1.6m in height, and there is an entrance on the NNE. The quarry, which has been dug into the foot of an E-facing slope, measures about 1m in depth and is up to 59m in length from N to S.
The present disposition of the buildings reflects the depiction of the farmstead on the 1st edition of the OS 6-inch map (Caithness 1876, sheet xxix), which also shows the limekiln to the W. The 2nd edition of the map depicts the two main buildings and the two quarries to the W of the cottage (1907, sheet xxix).
(YARROWS04 637-641)
Visited by RCAHMS (JRS) 11 August 2004
