lanarkshire-1978/03_119

Transcription

No. 201 -- HOMESTEADS AND SETTLEMENTS -- No. 205

201 Unenclosed Platform Settlement, Reed Gill.
About 200 m W of the confluence of the Reed gill and
the Camps Water, and at a height of 300 m OD, there
are three platforms, each measuring 13 m in width.
987226 -- NS 92 SE -- September 1976

202 Unenclosed Platform Settlement, Whelphill.
Spread over a distance of about 600 m westwards from
Whelphill farmhouse, there is a settlement consisting of
at least eleven platforms which are situtated at a height
of about 300 m OD. The platforms are here described
as they occur from W to E.
Four of them, measuring 19m, 15 m, 13 m and 12 m
in width respectively, lie between the E edge of an area
of improved pasture and an unnamed tributary of the
Midlock Water. Almost immediately E of the tributary
there are two more platforms, one above the other,
which measure 15 m and 18 m in width. A single plat-
form, 17 m wide, lies about 150 m farther E. Lastly,
immediately WNW of Whelphill there are at least four
platforms disposed in line obliquely across the contours;
they measure 19 m, 20 m, 17.5 m and 17 m in width
respectively.
This settlement, together with Nos. 198 and 199
farther to the W, forms a complex of platforms which
extends for a distance of 3 km along the N side of the
valley of the Midlock Water.

985205-991206 -- NS 92 SE -- September 1976

HOMESTEADS AND
SETTLEMENTS

203 Settlement, Berries Burn. This settlement (Fig.
37) occupies the end of a small promontory which pro-
jects from the lower SE slopes of Castle Hill, being
flanked on the E by the Berries Burn and on the W by a
wide marshy hollow. Lying only 85 m NE of the fort
No. 214, it consists of an incomplete enclosure which is
bounded by a curvilinear bank and ditch and measures
43 m internally from N to S. The bank measures about
4.6 m in average thickness and stands to a maximum
height of 1 m above the bottom of the shallow ditch.
There is no suggestion that the bank and ditch were
ever constructed on the E side, although it is possible
that the settlement was originally enclosed by a palisade,
which was in the course of being replaced by an earth-
work when the occupation of the site came to an end; ¹
no surface indications of such a palisade can, however,
be seen.
The interior contains traces of a single ring-ditch
house measuring about 12.8 m in diameter over all.

952220 -- NS 92 SE -- February 1975

[Drawing inserted]

Fig. 37. Settlement, Berries Burn (No. 203)

204 Homestead and Enclosure, Cairney (Sites).
Considerable deposits of overburden stripped from
adjacent quarry-workings now conceal the remains of
the homestead and associated enclosure that once
occupied the crest of a low rocky spur near the summit of
Cairney, 200 m SSE of the cairn No. 26. It is recorded ²
that the homestead was oval on plan and measured 52 m
from NE to SW by 41 m transversely within a low
earthen bank. In the middle of the N half of the interior
there were traces of a stance fro a round timber house
12 m in diameter, which was enclosed by a grass-grown
bank 1.3 m wide and 0.3 m high; the house was entered
from the SSE.
Immediately to the SW of the homestead there was
a sub-rectangular enclosure measuring 28 m by 26 m,
also within a slight earthen bank. Its purpose and
relationship to the homestead are not known.

852663 (Homestead) -- NS 86 NE -- August 1969
852662 (Enclosure)

205 Settlement, Cold Chapel. This settlement (Pl. 9A)
is situated 430 m NNE of Cold Chapel farmhouse, and at
a height of 250 m OD, on gently sloping ground near
the foot of the W slopes of White Hill. Oval on plan
(Fig. 38), it is bounded by what has been a massive
bank of earth and stones which encloses an area measur-
ing 78 m by 69 m; there is no trace of a ditch. Although
considerably denuded, the bank still stands to a maximum
height of 3.7 m externally and 2.1 m internally. The
three gaps in the bank all appear to be original entrances.
The interior, the level of which falls 9.1 m from E to
W, bears clear indications of later cultivation, especially
in the lower (W) half, but in the higher (E) half at least
nine crescentic house-platforms can be distinguished.

937251 -- NS 92 NW -- August 1975

1 As, for example, at Hayhope Knowe, Roxburghshire
(PSAS, lxxxiii (1948-9), 45-67).
2 OS Record Card NS 86 NE 2.

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