EHG5512 - Trial trenching - new house plot, Miltown, Applecross

Trial trenching was carried out by C Dagg in 2019 on the site of a proposed house, ancillary works and access road south of Milton in the parish of Applecross. A rapid walk over survey was carried out in advance of ground breaking work in order to identify any visible archaeological features. This noted the steepness of the slope down to the stream in the vicinity of the proposed Trench 1 and concluded that there was an extremely low potential for archaeological features to be located here and so it was not excavated. Equally, Trench 7 and Trench 8 were removed from the design due to the steepness of the slope and large boulders. In all, 5 trenches were excavated. The steep and stony nature of the terrain made it immediately obvious that there had been no settlement or cultivation over the greater part of the development area east of the modern fence line or west of the stream. This conclusion was supported by the results of Trench 6, which was archaeologically negative. A small area of more level ground to the north of the proposed house site had some evidence for improvement in the form of one field clearance pile investigated in Trench 5, but this was the only archaeological feature noted east of the former enclosure. <1>