dumfries-1920/04-062

Transcription

INVENTORY OF MONUMENTS IN DUMFRIESSHIRE.

In many cases the mound alone survives, and there is no trace of a court or bailey,
which may indeed have disappeared in certain instances through agricultural opera-
tions; in others we are not justified in believing it ever existed. At Lochmaben
(No. 445 (1)) there is only the great mound with its encircling ditch and evidence of
other ditches on one side. The dimensions of this mound are unusually large for a mote,
but may be compared with those of Troqueer in Kirkcudbright, and of similar mounds
in England. What was the mote-hill at Tibbers (No. 157), too, was also of exceptional
size. While at Coats Hill (No. 395) cultivation may well have encroached upon the
further defences of the mound, there is more doubt with regard to the Mote of Hutton
(No. 296), where cultivation seems unlikely and where there is no sign of a bailey.
Good standard examples of the complete mote and bailey are Auldton Mote at Moffat
(No. 483), the Mote of Rockhall (No. 448), and the Mote of Ingleston (No. 238), while
Dinning Mote (No. 65), too, is normal in plan, save that there is no ditch intervening
between the mote and bailey. In each of these cases, and indeed in almost every case
in the county, defences have been carved out of natural ridges, though no doubt work
was done in heightening the mound and sloping the scarps. Hutton Mote appears
to be entirely artificial, though placed upon a naturally lofty site, where the upcast
earth has been used to gave additional height to the mound. Thus, in most cases -
Dinning, Rockhall, Maxwelton (No. 241) are good examples - the slope of the hillside
augments the defences of both bailey and mound.
A notable feature in some of the motes is the presence of terracing on the scarp,
of which examples also occur in the neighbouring county of Kirkcudbright. Here may
be noted the two terraces on the mound at Lochwood (No. 316); at Garpol Water
(No. 397) the terrace round the mound is a prolongation of the bailey court, but the
ditch also is continued below. In both examples there are traces of drystone parapet
walls on the terrace, and at Garpol even round the bailey court.
Though the standard plan of mote is that of the round hillock, and the bailey
is fitted to it with a curvilinear outline, the shape of both is generally determined by
the nature of the high ground which has been utilised. Thus at Annan (No. 3) the
mote is pear-shaped, and the bailey very long in comparison with its breadth, while
at Dinning (No.65) the bailey is rectangular. As might be expected, no signs of the
wooden defences are now discernible on the surface, and no proper excavation of these
sites has been made, but this type of wooden defence persisted in Scotland generally
till a comparatively late period. Similar in principle were the characteristic "peels"
or palisaded enclosures erected during the War of Independence by Edward I., of
which Lochmaben Peel (see No. 445) was an example; while the fact that Edward
Bruce in 1313 could capture thirteen castles in Galloway in one year suggests
that these were still the small castella of the mote-and-bailey type, of which so many
traces survive. The peel, indeed, as the simplest and cheapest form of defensive
structure, persisted right through Border history (cf. p. lxii.).
The position of these Dumfriesshire motes was apparently dependent upon
different considerations. That at Castledykes, Dumfries (No. 128), was of course a
royal construction; with Troqueer Mote on the opposite side of the river it probably
covered a ferry crossing, as in the parallel case at York. Others, such as Annan, were
manorial residences or the head places of baronies. Annan, Lochmaben, and Moffat
motes were the work of the Bruces, the dominant family in Annandale. Of the more
outlying examples nothing very definite can be said. Many are in the neighbourhood
of fords; Garpol Mote (No. 397) is a conspicuous example of this position. Hutton
Mote is on a retired but lofty site with a wide view of the surrounding country; it was

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