stirling-1963-vol-1/05_214

Transcription

No. 190 -- CASTLES AND TOWER-HOUSES -- No. 192
Thomas le fix Maucolum de Garthgeuerone is on
record in 1296. ¹

536953 -- NS 59 NW -- 8 October 1952

[Plan Inserted]
Fig. 69. Homestead Moat, Peel of Gartfarren (No. 189)

190. Homestead Moat (probable), Peel of Garchell.
A low mound, 600 yds. NE. of Garchell farmhouse and
at a height of 50 ft. O.D., is all that is now visible of the
earthwork known as the Peel of Garchell. The account
in the O.S. Name Book ² describes the mound as being
"an elevation about 4 feet in height and 85 feet square;
it stands in a level field and appears to have been formed
by earth cast from a ditch which can be traced on the
North, South and West sides. James Ramsay [tenant of
Garchell] states that he assisted to remove some founda-
tion stones and part of a staircase from the elevation,
also to cast earth from it into the ditch." This account
is valuable as a record of a process which was very
wide-spread at this period of large-scale land-
improvement, but of which descriptions are not often
to be found.
The description and situation of the earthwork suggest
that it was probably a homestead moat comparable to
the Peel of Gartfarren (No. 189). Iwyn de Garghille is on
record in 1296. ³

548948 -- NS 59 SW -- 8 October 1952

191. Homestead Moat (probable), Peel of Gar-
gunnock (Site). All the editions of the 6-inch O.S. map
mark the approximate site of the "Peel of Gargunnock",
though in slightly varying positions, in a field on the S.
side of the road from Stirling to Dumbarton, about a
quarter of a mile ESE. of Gargunnock Station. The
structure was already destroyed in 1795, ⁴ but if the state-
ment that "both a highway and a railway have been
carried right through its site" ⁵ is correct, it must have
lain a short distance N. of the positions shown on the
maps. It was probably a homestead moat, like the Peel
of Gartfarren (No. 189), and the earthwork at Ballan-
grew, ⁶ Perthshire, some six miles distant to the WNW.
(617988).
In Blind Harry's account of the deeds of William
Wallace, which appears to have been written in the
second half of the 15th century, there is a description of
an attack made upon the Peel of Gargunnock. ⁷ The
structure is there described as "a small peill" containing
"within a dyk, bathe closs, chawmer, and hall"; the
entrance was defended by a drawbridge.

c. 717948 -- NS 79 SW -- 16 February 1954

CASTLES AND TOWER-HOUSES

192. Stirling Castle. Stirling Castle (Fig. 86 and Pls. 53,
54, 55 A) is essentially the fortress that guards a vital
crossing-place on the River Forth. The natural import-
ance of the site has already been noticed (p. 4), and at
the beginning of the Middle Ages this may well have been
enhanced by the survival of some usable remains of the
Roman road (No. 124) that had formerly led to the
crossing. The Castle Rock, again, like its counterpart at
Edinburgh, is an ideal site for mediaeval, as also for pre-
historic, fortification, though in both cases mediaeval and
later building has obliterated all trace of earlier work. At
Stirling, in fact, no structure remains which can be
dated with confidence to before the later years of the
14th century.
The earliest reliable record of a castle at Stirling ⁸ is
found in the dedication of a chapel there by Alexander I,
and its endowment with tithes from his demesne lands
within the jurisdiction of Stirling. ⁹ This same king died
at Stirling, almost certainly in the Castle, in 1124. In

1 Cal. of Docts., ii (1272-1307), No. 823, p.205.
2 Drymen parish, p. 65.
3 Cal. of Docts., ii (1272-1307), No. 823, p. 205.
4 Stat. Acct., xviii (1796), 90.
5 P.S.A.S., ix (1870-2), 35.
6 Ibid., xl (1905-6), 21.
7 The Actis and Deidis of the Illustere and Vailzeand Campioun
Schir William Wallace, etc., S.T.S. (1889), iv, pp. 55 f., ll. 213 ff.
8 Too much importance should not be attached to the
occurrence of the place-name Struthlinn, under the years
995-7, in "The Prophecy of St. Berchan" (Anderson, A. O.,
Early Sources of Scottish History, i, 519).
9 Lawrie, Charters, CLXXXII.

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