Loch Ashie
Clearance Cairn (Period Unassigned)(Possible)
Site Name Loch Ashie
Classification Clearance Cairn (Period Unassigned)(Possible)
Canmore ID 13260
Site Number NH63SW 28
NGR NH 6209 3369
Datum OSGB36 - NGR
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/13260
- Council Highland
- Parish Dores
- Former Region Highland
- Former District Inverness
- Former County Inverness-shire
NH63SW 28 6209 3369.
(NH 6209 3369) Cairn (NR)
OS 6"map, Inverness-shire, 2nd ed., (1905)
Possibly a chambered cairn or one which has been utilised as a butt. Aligned NE-SW 23 ft by 33 ft.
Information from A A Woodham to OS 9 August 1963.
This cairn is 12.0m NE-SW by 10.0m NW-SE and is 0.5m high. It consists of bare stone rubble with a few larger slabs protruding near the NE end which may represent the remains of a chamber choked with smaller stones. Abutting on the ENE side of the cairn is a hut-circle (see NH63SW 23) Re-surveyed at 1/2500.
Visited by OS (R D) 30 August 1963.
Doubtful chambered cairn.
Information from A S Henshall (NMAS) to OS 28 September 1963.
This cairn of stones is correctly described by Loader, except that the slabs referred to form no intelligible pattern and are unlikely to be part of a chamber. Its situation on a slope and its similarity to clearance heaps of bare stones nearby. (see NH63SW 32) suggest that it is also a clearance heap and not a cairn.
Visited by OS (A A) 4 March 1970.
NH 6208 3348 An excavation was conducted before the commencement of new pipeline works. The excavation work was a continuation of the survey previously conducted by Wordsworth Archaeology Services (unpubl survey report, 1998).
A series of nine cairns and two dykes were located within the area. Excavation showed that remains considered to be a hut circle represented a clearance cairn with a deflated centre. All the cairns revealed very simple construction processes with little material suitable for dating. They were all reasonably well preserved. The dykes examined were generally poorly preserved, surviving as linear mounds of stone, with limited internal structure visible.
A series of ard marks appeared to respect the edge of one of the cairns. A single flint flake was recovered from within a stone dyke and may indicate a prehistoric date for the feature.
A report was lodged with Highland SMR.
Sponsor: Mott McDonald for North of Scotland Water Authority.
K Cameron 1999
Field Visit (19 August 1943)
Cairns etc, SW of Loch Ashie.
On the crest of the same ridge, SSW of the dun is a line of 9 small cairns, mostly about 20’ in diameter. But No.6 (from the N) at the highest point of the ridge is at least 25’ across. No 9 about 3/10 mile WNW of West Town farmhouse is also about 24-26ft in diameter. It is situated near the centre of a ring framed by a peat-covered bank interrupted by a gap at the ENE and defined externally by slabs which measures 42’ to 45’ in overall diameter. This ring certainly resembles a typical hut-circle and the small cairn seems to have been heaped within it and to be posterior to its use. A perfectly distinct hut-circle measuring 31’ overall is visible on a strip of level ground below the crest of the ridge E of cairn 9. The E flank of the ridge is traversed by several very ruinous enclosure baulks of stones, the last named hut-circle itself standing within an irregularly rectangular enclosure thus bounded. In cairn 2 there are traces of a built cist.
[NH63SW 32 and NH63SW 39]
On the next ridge to the NW and WNW of the fort [NH63SW 1] are numerous small cairns 12’—15’ in diameter, again on the E flank of the ridge near the 800’ contour. These seem to have been disturbed and dug into.
[NH63SW 23 and NH63SW 28 ?]
Further to the NW there is another group of similar small cairns on the small ridge on the E flank of the ridge that is followed by the high road from Inverfarigaig to Inverness, as noted on the OS map.
[NH63SW 44?]
Visited by RCAHMS (AG) 19 August 1943
Map ref: xix (‘Cairns’)
