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Sundayswells
Ring Cairn (Bronze Age)
Site Name Sundayswells
Classification Ring Cairn (Bronze Age)
Canmore ID 18023
Site Number NJ60SW 4
NGR NJ 6165 0365
Datum OSGB36 - NGR
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/18023
- Council Aberdeenshire
- Parish Kincardine O'neil
- Former Region Grampian
- Former District Kincardine And Deeside
- Former County Aberdeenshire
NJ60SW 4 6165 0365.
(NJ 6165 0365) Cairn (NR)
OS 6" map, (1959)
A ring cairn with a diameter of 48 feet defined by a kerb of rounded stones about a foot high, set at random intervals with their flatter sides outwards. The cairn is now about 3 feet in height. The interior of the cairn is exposed but has been much disturbed. The inner wall is formed of large stones up to 2ft 10ins in height on a diameter of 9 feet. There is no evidence of a circle of monoliths round the cairn.
The interior was excavated about 1889 and a bell beaker was recovered. This was donated to the National Museum of Antiquities of Scotland (NMAS) - EQ 566 - in 1948 with some fragments of cinerary urns - EQ 568 - possibly from this site.
A S Henshall 1963; F R Coles 1906.
A ring cairn as described and illustrated by Henshall (1963).
Revised at 1/2500.
Visited by OS (NKB) 12 February 1968.
Field Visit (18 July 2005)
This ring-cairn is situated on the NNE side of a ride within a mature conifer plantation and occupies a position on the leading edge of a slope below and to the NE of the summit of Sundayswells Hill, commanding fine views down into the valley to the SE. The cairn is largely grass-grown, though several rotten stumps can still be seen within its make-up, and measures 16m from N-S by 14.8m transversely and up to 1.3m in height. Eight stones of the outer kerb are visible, all with their smoother more regular face outwards. Seven of them lie on the W arc, running intermittently from the WNW to the SW, and the eighth lies on the SE. On the N, the cairn has been constructed over a gentle scarp and some cairn material may have slipped down to mask the kerb. The inner court measures 2.4m in diameter, but has been badly damaged, partly through the construction of a wall of coursed rubble on top of the surviving kerbstones, and partly as a result of an entrance driven into the interior from the SE. The court now has the appearance of a shooting butt, though as the hill has been planted with trees since at least the middle of the 19th century, it is likely to have been used for some other purpose. The inner kerb appears relatively intact on Ritchie’s photographs, dating from 1899-1919, but now only six slabs remain, four of them in situ and the two others on the N and S are displaced inwards. The height of these stones rises towards the SW suggesting that the inner court was graded. All the kerbstones are granite.
The cairn is first depicted on the 2nd edition of the OS 6-inch map, together with numerous cairns containing cists, bones and pottery found to the NE in 1884 (Aberdeenshire 1901, sheet lxxxiii.nw). This date may coincide with the excavation of the centre of the cairn by Innes, the then owner of Learney estate, who unearthed a Beaker, further sherds of pottery and some fragments of bone (Ritchie 1919, 75).
Visited by RCAHMS (ATW,ARG) 18 July 2005
Measured Survey (18 July 2005)
RCAHMS surveyed Sundayswells ring-cairn on 18 July 2005 with plane table and alidade producing a plan and section at a scale of 1:100.
