Dun Ardtreck Visit

Dun Ardtreck

Visited on 9/5/17

For archaeology notes and a plan of the Dun, see the previous post on Dun Ardtreck  

A short walk from the parking spot near NG338354, room for two carefully parked cars only! 

Helpful signposts directed us from there to the track through gates and onto the moorland.  A less friendly, but perhaps necessary, sign was on a final gate - to the effect that any dogs worrying sheep would be shot!


 The Dun soon comes into view (NG33503581)

Dun Ardtreck has been the subject of much controversy among archaeologists.  Is it a D shaped semi broch (Mackie)? Is it a full circular broch where sea erosion has caused part of the walls to fall into the sea (Harding and Martlew)?  Is it simply a variant of the complex roundhouse class (Armitt)?

The last visible stone in one of the "legs" of the D

My own feeling is that it is a D shaped broch (aka semi broch)  as I believe the walls flatten out a little towards the sea and there does seem to be evidence of a wall at the edge of the cliff.  Whether being a D shape makes it a semi broch – Mackie style - or a variant of a complex roundhouse class – well I wouldn’t know but I am not at all sure that the two ideas are contradictory anyway except insofar as Mackie believed the semi broch could have been a prototype of the full brochs.  

 Dun Ringill, Dun Grugaig Glenelg and Dun Ruigh Ruaidh near Loch Boom are other examples of semi brochs according to Mackie. (We visited Dun Ringill in July 2016 ( dun ringil)  and Dun Grugaig in May 2016  (no write up for that part of the trip)

"Guard cell"

Part of an outer wall?

One of the door checks

Detail of stone work

Dun Ardtreck is certainly situated in a highly defensive position

One of the finds at the site was a Roman military style axe - now housed in the Huntarian museum.  The axe wasfound in the phase three deposits.  Such a find is very unusual in remote Highland sites and one possible explanation, offered by Mackie, is that it came directly from the Roman fleets of the governor Agricola's campaign around 80Ad.  Perhaps a gift to the local chieftain?

From the Dun we continued towards the light house and looked at the deserted township at Ardtreck Point.  The township must have been deserted some time ago as the OS map of 1881 ( 6" sheetXXX111) shows five un-roofed buildings. However, we saw more than five and Canmore states that the1969 current edition of the OS 1:10560 map shows fourteen un-roofed buildings and three enclosures.

Dun Ardtreck meaning:
The Dun takes its name from the township at Ardtreck Point   Forbes suggests the name could be derived from Aird Bhreach - meaning speckled point.

References:

Armit, I. (1996) The archaeology of Skye and the Western Isles. Edinburgh 


Forbes, Alexander Robert, (1923)  Place names of Skye and Adjacent Islands (digitised by SMO http://www.smo.uhi.ac.uk/files/PDFs/00915325_Place_Names_of_Skye.pdf.

  Harding, D. W. (2004) , The Iron Age in Northern Britain: Celts and Romans, Natives and Invaders, Routledge, London & New York

Mackie, Euan, Aspects of the origins of the brochs of Atlantic Scotland,retrieved 15/5/17

Mackie, Euan, Excavations at Dun Ardtreck (2000)

(retrieved 5/5/17)

Mackie, Euan, Dun an Ruigh Ruadh, Loch Broom  http://www.euppublishing.com/doi/pdfplus/10.3366/gas.1980.7.7.32, retrieved 15/5/17

Martlew, R. (1982 )The typological study of the structures of the Scottish brochs, in Proc. Soc. Antiq. Scot. 1981-82. vol. 112: 254-76.  Quoted in Mackie above.

 

Indoor meeting, 22 Mar 16

Tuesday 22nd March 2016

To those of you who made it today (14) thanks for coming to those who didn't make it, sorry you missed it- I really enjoyed the meeting - so much enthusiasm, knowledge and lots of different opinions.

We didn't have time to cover all the issues raised..we could do with a meeting simply to define what we think a broch is!  Then another to discuss building techniques - look at Ann's model in closer detail, and at the broch plans, then another to talk about roundhouses and their contribution to the picture, and so on .......

Thanks to David and Christine for bringing along the fascinating DVD.. the section that was built is still there, beside the Forestry car park at Strathyre - see it on Streetview here: https://goo.gl/maps/db9jx4UcSqp

Thanks to Ann for bringing her model.  We'll look at it again when we look at compare designs of different brochs

Thanks to Judy for bringing the stuff about roundhouses.

So what did we manage to get through and maybe agree on?

If we don't agree on what a broch is then we can't agree on how many there are...but Euan MacKie reckons there are 104 and he knows a wee bit more than we do.

Brochs are unique to Scotland -mainly in the North and islands (but there are circular towers in other countries cf nuraghi)

Part of roundhouse tradition - - simple low walled roundhouse  led to complex  roundhouses  then brochs and sometimes wheelhouses

Overall roundhouse tradition dates from 700BC to 100 AD.  Few brochs have been excavated using modern methods and there are few radio carbon dates to confirm but most brochs in the later years of first millennium BC.

Who built them? This fascinates me -- any comments welcome.  The first information I can find is that a chap called Pytheus sailed around UK around 320 BC - that's about the right time.  He didn't differentiate between the various different peoples living here but called them all Pretannike.  The word originates in the ancient p Celtic word for "cut" or "shape" and perhaps refers to the custom of tatooing. (cf later the Picts) The word later became "Britain" . 
 

 Fast forward a few hundred years to 83 AD and Ptolomy's maps describing our area as inhabited by the Ebudae (cf Hebrides)


So what do you think?  Itinerant builders?  Incomers imposing their style on locals?  or simply the tatooed locals?