EHG5992 - Trial trenching - proposed Championship Golf Course, Castle Stuart

An archaeological trial trenching evaluation was undertaken by Avon Archaeology (Highland) in 2022 in advance of development works for a new Championship Golf Course at Castle Stuart near Inverness. The evaluation was designed to establish the presence or absence of significant buried archaeological deposits, features and finds within the footprint of the development area. In accordance with the approved WSI document the intrusive evaluation in site Areas A and B involved trenching of a 7% sample of each area. Evaluation in site Area C, the zone considered to have lower archaeological potential, involved a 5% trenching sample. In each of these three areas the trenches were designed to provide a representative sample of each area as a whole and, where appropriate, target features of potential archaeological origin identified either by a geophysical survey undertaken in 2015 (see EHG5403) or features identified from documentary and aerial photographic sources. A total of 236 evaluation trenches were opened and evaluated. The majority were either 50m or 25m long by c 2m wide. Some variations were made to the layout of trenches in respect of that shown in the project WSI due to practical site constraints, in particular because a 15m safety easement was required by the machine operators to ensure safe operation of tracked machines adjacent to overhead power lines. In addition, some additional trenches were opened to clarify the extent of identified archaeological deposits and/or to confirm the absence of the same. Archaeological deposits and features provisionally dated to the earlier prehistoric to post-medieval periods were identified, the greatest concentration of which were located in Area A, the area directly adjacent to Castle Stuart. The archaeology identified outside this area, in evaluation Areas B and C, was considerably more dispersed and localised. Moreover, dating for the majority of the features identified in these areas remained uncertain due to an absence of stratified artefacts. The evidence recorded, both positive and negative, enabled areas where significant archaeological remains are preserved as buried features and deposits to be identified and, thereby, specific zones (Zones 1 to 14) where there is significant potential for the preservation of further buried archaeological deposits and features of equal or greater importance. If future development of the new golf course has a direct impact on any of these areas, further archaeological mitigation, involving either preservation in-situ by design or preservation by record through further archaeological recording, is likely to be required subject to the decision of Highland Council. Recommendations were made for future archaeological mitigation, based upon the preliminary results of the evaluation project. Recommendations were also made for a subsequent programme of PERD stage analysis and reporting work, necessary to fully understand, interpret and report the evidence gathered during the evaluation trenching stage alone. <1>