caithness-1911/05_160

Transcription

INVENTORY OF MONUMENTS, ETC., IN COUNTY OF CAITHNESS. -- [Page] 83

PARISH OF LATHERON.

an Ogham inscription. It is a rectangular slab of Caithness sand-
stone, and mesures 3' in extreme height, 1' 5" in breadth, and
about 4" in thickness. The top and bottom are broken away, the
fracture at the top passing obliquely across the stone. The in-
scription runs the whole length of the stone on the left-hand side,
but is probably incomplete owing to the fracture. What remains
shows eighteen complete characters and possibly part of a nineteenth.
The sculpturing, which is partly in relief and partly incised, and
occupies the whole face of the stone, consists of the double rectangular
figure in relief, the upper and wider rectangle filled with double spiral
ornament arranged in C-shaped scrolls placed back to back, the lower
and narrower filled with an interlaced pattern; and below, incised
(1) a bird, (2) a fish, and (3) two horsemen (partly broken away).
The stone was discovered in 1903 by Mr. John Nicolson, Nybster,
who brought it to Sir Fancis Tress Barry, and the latter presented it
to the National Museum of Antiquities, Edinburgh, where it now is.
It is fully described and illustrated in an article by Dr Joseph
Anderson in the Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries quoted below.
See Antiquaries, xxxviii. p. 534 (illus.).

300. Constructions (remains), Burn of Houstry. - About 1 1/2 m. to
the NW. of Mullbuie, near the side of a burn, are the ruins of
sheiling bothies on the top of round green hillocks. The largest of
these hillocks, measuring some 50' X 62' in diameter, lying with its
longest axis E. and W., appears to have been the site of some earlier
construction. It has an elevation of some 5'. All over the surface
protrude large stones, many of them set upon end. The remains are
quite indefinite, but resemble the ruins (No. 280) covering the hillock
in the Moss of Whilk.
A short distance to the E. is an area measuring about 140' by 100',
surrounded by a single line of large blocks of stone not forming a
wall nor in their present position acting as a fence to keep animals
outside or inside the enclosure.
Further N. and some 2 1/2 m. NNW. of Mullbuie, at the S. end of
Loch a Cheracher flow, and to the E. of the source of the Allt Badain
Ghuirm, is visible the base of a turf bank along the edge of the flow,
forming a segment of a circle, with a chord of some 200 yards. The
surface on both sides, but especially on the concave face, is boggy.
The base of the bank is now some 12' wide and its elevation trifling.
Its purpose has probably been to prevent cattle wandering into the
flow.
O.S.M., CAITH., xxxii. (unnoted). Visited, 18th July 1910.

301. Construction (remains of), Langwell. - On the S. side of the
road up the Langwell Water from Langwell to Wag, and some 200
yards W. of the wall which divides the woodlands from the moor
beyond the garden, are the very confused remains of a construction.
Much stone has been removed from it, and its original character is
not apparent. It is known as "Langwell Tulloch."
O.S.M., CAITH., xlii. ("Pict's House"). Visited, 21st July 1910.

302. Sheilings (ruins of), Easan Burn. - On the top of the S. bank
of the Easan Burn, above the road bridge, and about 1/2 m. N. of Camster