MHG39888 - Pit Alignment, Beaufort Castle

Summary

Site of four pit alignments, visible as cropmarks overlaying a circular enclosure which also appears as a cropmark.

Type and Period (1)

  • PIT ALIGNMENT (Neolithic to Late Iron Age - 4000 BC? to 560 AD?)

Protected Status

  • None recorded

Full Description

The crop-mark of a circular enclosure has been recorded 400 m SW of Beaufort Castle (Visible on RCAHMS air photograph IN 3211-3: flown 1977); it measures about 12 m in internal diameter. Other crop-marks visible immediately N of this enclosure are probably of recent date but there is another possible enclosure 150 m to the NE. RCAHMS 1979

Further air photograph in 1989 shows that the circular enclosure already recorded appears to have various indistinct internal features. It appears to overlie the edge of a series of pit alignments, consisting of four parallel lines of pits in a 'V' shape, immediately to the NNE.
They each lie approximately 3m apart. Immediately NNE there is a dark, almost square, area c10-12m long and wide.
Whether these are ancient or modern marks in the pasture is currently unknown.
Two long parallel lines of parchmarks running SW-NE across the Vshaped marks may prove to be horse jumps rather than pit alignments. (AP nos. 8904.20-26 and 8906.56-57, held in Inverness Museum, see also Archive.) (See NH54SW 44 and 45 for sites to N and NE.)
Information from J Harden 1989.

Sources/Archives (8)

Map

Location

Grid reference Centred NH 5045 4264 (30m by 30m) (2 map features)
Map sheet NH54SW
Civil Parish KILTARLITY AND CONVINTH
Geographical Area INVERNESS

Finds (0)

Related Monuments/Buildings (3)

Related Investigations/Events (0)

External Links (1)

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