Warth Hill

ND36NE 15 3716 6988.

(ND 3716 6988) Cairn (NR)

OS 1:10,000 map, (1975).

The remains of a cairn, about 57ft in diameter, in which the primary short cist, of roughly dressed slabs, was exposed in the centre by Anderson about 1870.

The peristalith, of closely set blocks 2 to 4ft long and 1 to 1 1/2ft high, is visible in the S with, 6ft within it and set concentrically, a number of large stones, point upwards. A rectangular cist is exposed about 17ft in from the S edge (RCAHMS 1911). This may be the cist which was exposed many years before 1870 and which contained a skeleton. The cist is said by Anderson to have lain 3 ft SW of the central cist, but his measurements and the RCAHMS's vary. It measured 4 1/2 by 2 1/4 by 1 2/3ft deep.

Six feet E of the central cist was a well-like hole, almost square, with dry-built sides and about 20ins wide. It went down to soil level and contained only black ashes. The quantity of ashes filling every crevice of the cairn suggested that it had been used as a beacon site.

J Anderson 1871; RCAHMS 1911, visited 1910.

A cairn on the summit of Warth Hill (c. 125m OD) measuring 19.0m in diameter and 2.0m high. The hollowed centre is partly filled with debris and there is no trace of the two cists. The W and N edges of the cairn are mutilated by modern ditches, but there is no trace here, or elsewhere, of a kerb, nor of the upright stones 6ft within it. It looks as if a trench, now filled in, has been cut from the SW edge of the cairn into the centre. There is no trace of the well-like square hole.

Visited by OS (A A) 10 March 1972.

No change to the previous field report.

Surveyed at 1:10,000.

Visited by OS (J B) 12 July 1982.