Achiltibuie
Building(S) (Post Medieval), Enclosure(S) (Post Medieval), Hut(S) (Post Medieval), Rig And Furrow (Post Medieval)
Site Name Achiltibuie
Classification Building(S) (Post Medieval), Enclosure(S) (Post Medieval), Hut(S) (Post Medieval), Rig And Furrow (Post Medieval)
Canmore ID 115180
Site Number NC00NW 2.05
NGR NC 0277 0879
NGR Description centred on NC 0277 0879
Datum OSGB36 - NGR
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/115180
- Council Highland
- Parish Lochbroom
- Former Region Highland
- Former District Ross And Cromarty
- Former County Ross And Cromarty
NC00NW 2.05 centred on 0277 0879
(Formerly NC00NW 4 0278 0898)
(NC 0278 0898) "Mill?" (Nothing on OS 6"map 1881).
OS 6"map annoated by I Crawford, September 1961.
On the southern bank of the stream is a crude rectangular platform measuring 6.0m by 4.0m. It is bounded by an old field bank on the N and by partially buried boulders on the other sides.
The stream is small and not fast flowing and there is no evidence of it having been adapted to providing power for a mill.
The platform can not be certainly identified as the ruin of a building and there is nothing in its appearance suggestive of a mill.
Visited by OS (G H P) 25 May 1962.
(Formerly NC00NW 10 0261 0883)
Two small contiguous enclosures at NC 0261 0883 are incomplete, irregular in plan, and defined by small protruding stones, probably the foundations of narrow walling. The interiors are grassed-over and quite featureless.
Visited by OS (F R H) 22 June 1962.
(NC 0261 0883) Enclosure (NR)
OS 1:10,000 map, (1971)
These enclosures are too obscured by peat for accurate classification. It seems likely, however, that the more westerly one is a hut circle with a diameter between wall centres of 9.5m. The remains of a probably later field dyke brush its NW arc.
Visited by OS (A A) 16 July 1974.
(Formerly NC00NW 20 028 087)
'The large enclosure known as Bad a'Chotair contains traces of a system of narrow strip fields, but with no associated dwellings. It appears to have been farmed from Achiltibuie, but it is not known exactly when it was abandoned. The system appears to overlie elements of later prehistoric settlement (see also NC00NW 8-10, 12).
Visited by R Gourlay (Highland Region Archaeologist), 24 August 1988.
Field Visit (9 August 1994 - 10 August 1994)
The ridge of Bad a' Chotair forms an island of dry ground set amongst the wetter moorland of the Achiltibuie grazings and has attracted settlement over a long period (formerly NC00NW 20).
May's map of Coigach (1758; SRO, 85395) describes the ridge as a shieling ground, and shows it enclosed within what may be a bank. Sections of an earthen bank, possibly that depicted by May, can still be seen running around the ridge. It may be of more than one phase of construction and, at the SE end, was superseded by a stone wall which divides the enclosed area into two parts. Blocks of what are probably relatively late, straight rig can be seen in the NW half, along with a series of turf banked enclosures. The SE half appears to have been improved but, in its stone-walled phase, it was probably a stock enclosure, hence the four pens (ACHIL94 363-5, 370) and the three buildings (ACHIL94 366-8) around its perimeter, which were depicted as unroofed on the 1st edition of the OS 6-inch map (Cromartyshire 1881, sheet iii). Latterly, the wall was crossed by a sub-division of the grazings which runs up the hill from the crofts.
Surrounding the ridge there are at least nine small huts or pens, built either of stone or turf (ACHIL94 352-4, 356-9, 372, 376), with a tenth (ACHIL94 374) set beside a wall which crosses the S end of the enclosure. Amongst these small structures there is also what is probably a building (ACHIL94 361), which may have served as a shieling hut (formerly NC00NW 4). There is an oval enclosure (ACHIL94 360) lying to the W of the ridge; it measures 19.2m by 6.5m within a line of boulders which lie on, or in, the peat (previously NC00NW 10). Its date and function are unknown. Another, smaller, enclosure (ACHIL94 377) lies to the E of the ridge, immediately below a late sub-division of the grazings.
(ACHIL94 352-4, 356-61, 363-68, 370, 372, 374, 376-7)
Visited by RCAHMS (JBS) 9-10 August 1994
