stirling-1963-vol-1/05_142

Transcription

No. 119 -- ROMAN MONUMENTS -- No. 122
was seen from the air and photographed by Dr. St.
Joseph. ¹ The course of the ditch was located by probing,
and the resulting survey showed that the camp was
rectangular on plan and measured 500 ft. in length from
N. to S. by 470 ft. transversely. The W., S. and E. gates
with their tutuli were located by the probe, but the N.
gate could not be found with certainty as the subsoil at
this part of the field was uniformly soft, owing to the
presence of an extensive shallow depression.
The camp, which must originally have extended to
about 5·4 acres, lies on level ground except at the SE.
corner, where it occupies the lower part of the NW. slope
of a knoll 30 ft. in height. The knoll was included within
an annexe attached to the SW. part of the camp. As the
land immediately W. of the camp provides an extensive
level site upon which the camp might have been built,
it must be assumed that the site beside the knoll was
chosen deliberately, possibly so that the summit of the
knoll could be used as a position for watching or signalling
clear of surrounding woods.
This camp, the one at Milnquarter (No. 119), and two
other similar works outside Stirlingshire, have been
described and their purpose discussed elsewhere. ²

943788 -- NS 97 NW (unnoted) -- 4 February 1955

119. Roman Temporary Camp, Milnquarter (Site).
This camp is situated on comparatively level ground
270 yds. SE. of Milnquarter farmhouse and a quarter
of a mile S. of the Antonine Wall. No trace of the
structure can now be seen on the surface, and its presence
was only revealed when part of the outline, in the form
of a crop-marking, was observed from the air and photo-
graphed by Dr. St. Joseph. ³ An adjacent corner appeared
on a pair of National Survey air-photographs, ⁴ and with
these aids the exact position of the camp was located on
the ground by means of probing. The camp is rectangular
on plan and measures 540 ft. in length from NW. to
SE. by 420 ft. transversely, the internal area being
about 5·2 acres. The NW., NE. and SE. gates, with
tutuli, were found by probing, but the SW. gate lies
under a railway embankment. This camp, a similar one
at Little Kerse (No. 118), and two others outside Stirling-
shire have been described and their purpose discussed
elsewhere. ⁵

825794 -- NS 87 NW (unnoted) -- 27 January 1955

120. Roman Temporary Camp, Dalnair (Site). This
camp is situated in the field between Dalnair farmhouse
and the cottages marked as Cheapside on the O.S. map,
at a distance of half a mile SW. of Seabegs Place and
70 yds. S. of the Antonine Wall. No traces remain on
the ground, but the NW. side of the camp, including an
entrance with a tutulus, the N. and W. rounded angles,
and stretches of the SW. and NE. sides were observed
from the air and photographed by Dr St. Joseph in
1957. ⁶ The camp measures about 400 ft. in width, but
its length cannot yet be determined as the SE. side
does not appear on the photographs: it may have been
comparable in size to those at Tollpark, ⁷ Milnquarter
(No. 119) and Camelon (F on Fig. 46).

810790 -- NS 87 NW (unnoted) -- 10 December 1957

121. Roman Temporary Camp (probable), Tower
(Site). The remains of this structure were observed by
Gordon ⁸ "at a place called The broken Tower" which
was situated "opposite to the Kirktown of Calder" and
two miles from the Roman fort at Balmuildy on the
opposite side of the River Kelvin. The identification
of this place with the farmhouse now called Tower
(No. 323), half a mile W. of Torrance, is confirmed by
Edgar's map, ⁹ on which the full name "Brokentower"
appears. The structure is described by Gordon as a
"large square Encampment" consisting of a single
rampart measuring about 11 ft. in width and a ditch
measuring "somewhat more". It "measured about
1500 Foot", probably in length, though it is not clear
to which dimension Gordon is here referring. The large
size and rectangular shape of the structure, combined
with the fact that "Though in some Places it is much
demolished and flat, 'tis however very analagous with
that of Burnswork", suggest very strongly that, at Tower,
Gordon recognised the characteristics of a Roman
temporary camp similar to those in Annandale which he
had been the first to notice. ¹⁰ No trace of the structure
can now be distinguished on the ground.

c. 6174 -- NS 67 SW (unnoted) -- 19 June 1954

122. Roman Forts and Temporary Camps, Camelon
(Sites). The Roman forts at Camelon (Fig. 46, A and B)
lie three-quarters of a mile N. of the Antonine Wall, on
the line of the Roman road that ran through what is now
Stirlingshire to Ardoch and beyond. Occupying the
corner of a plateau composed of glacial sand and gravel,
the site faces almost level ground on the S. and W., but
on the N. and E. it is protected by a steep scarp which
falls 50-60 ft. to the flat carseland of the River Carron.
At some time in the past the river had meandered round
the foot of the scarp, but its present bed is at a distance
of a quarter of a mile to the N. Precisely where its course
lay in Roman times is not known, nor has the position
of the Roman bridge been determined ¹¹ : there can, how-
1 Nos. D 22, Q 39, Q 40, DH 36 in the C.U.C.A.P.
2 P.S.A.S., lxxxix (1955-6), 329 ff. and fig. 3.
3 Nos. MP 66, 68, 70 and MT 12 in the C.U.C.A.P.
4 CPE/SCOT/UK 256, 5331-2.
5 P.S.A.S., lxxxix (1955-6), 329 ff, and fig. 2.
6 Nos. VY 17 and WB 82 in the C.U.C.A.P.
7 P.S.A.S. , lxxxix (1955-6), 329 and fig. 1.
8 Itin. Septent., 21.
9 Published in Nimmo's History, ed. 1777.
10 P.S.A.S., xxxiii (1898-9), 201.
11 For a discussion of the problem see No. 124.

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