Satellite Imagery
Satellite Imagery
HER: Dumfries & Galloway MDG2770 (None)
NMR: NX 43 NW 8 (63132)
SM: None
NGR: NX 4356 3507
X: 243560 Y: 535070 (OSGB36)
This small promontory work is situated on the exposed SW coast of the Machars and its extent has evidently been severely reduced by erosion, now measuring no more than 0.04ha in extent internally. The ground drops into the promontory from the NE and consequently the bank drawn across its neck, which in excavation was 3m thick and up to 0.6m high and was fronted by a steep-sided external ditch 3m broad and over 1.5m deep, does not form an impressive barrier when approached from the landward side. The entrance lay between the eastern terminal of the rampart and the cliff-edge on the E. Prior to excavation, the interior, which measured about 28.5m from NE to SW by 24m transversely when described by the OS in 1973, contained two scooped platforms, both of which seem to have been the stances for round-houses. In 2004 excavation of the platform at the seaward tip of the promontory revealed a complex fourfold sequence in which an earth and stone wall had been replaced in timber and the floor had been relaid on several occasions. The five c-14 dates, which broadly span the period 360 BC - AD 60 come from this sequence, but in some instances probably from contexts with mixed charcoal assemblages. Apart from a number of coarse stone tools, the finds include three lead beads, which are very unusual items from any Iron Age sites in Scotland.
Citizen Science: ✗
Reliability of Data: Confirmed
Reliability of Interpretation: Confirmed
X: -492969 Y: 7301225 (EPSG: 3857)
Longitude: -4.4284193701125645 Latitude: 54.68632691312481 (EPSG:4326)
Country: Scotland
Current County or Unitary Authority: Dumfries & Galloway
Historic County: Wigtownshire
Current Parish/Community/Council/Townland: Whithorn
None
| Extant | ✓ |
| Cropmark | ✗ |
| Likely Destroyed | ✗ |
None
| Woodland | ✗ |
| Commercial Forestry Plantation | ✗ |
| Parkland | ✗ |
| Pasture (Grazing) | ✓ |
| Arable | ✗ |
| Scrub/Bracken | ✗ |
| Bare Outcrop | ✗ |
| Heather/Moorland | ✗ |
| Heath | ✗ |
| Built-up | ✗ |
| Coastal Grassland | ✓ |
| Other | ✗ |
None
| Contour Fort | ✗ |
| Partial Contour Fort | ✗ |
| Promontory Fort | ✓ |
| Hillslope Fort | ✗ |
| Level Terrain Fort | ✗ |
| Marsh Fort | ✗ |
| Multiple Enclosure Fort | ✗ |
| Hilltop | ✗ |
| Coastal Promontory | ✓ |
| Inland Promontory | ✗ |
| Valley Bottom | ✗ |
| Knoll/Hillock/Outcrop | ✗ |
| Ridge | ✗ |
| Cliff/Plateau-edge/Scarp | ✗ |
| Hillslope | ✗ |
| Lowland | ✗ |
| Spur | ✗ |
Dominant Topographic Feature: None
| North | ✗ |
| Northeast | ✗ |
| East | ✗ |
| Southeast | ✗ |
| South | ✗ |
| Southwest | ✓ |
| West | ✗ |
| Northwest | ✗ |
| Level | ✗ |
Altitude: 25.0m
N/A
Five C14 dates from contexts bracketing a fourfold sequence in a single round-house within the interior, but by Toolis's own commentary 'do not illuminate the stratigraphic sequence very well' (2007, 301). No dates from the perimeter, though it appears stratigraphically as an addition to an already occupied settlement.
Reliability: B - Medium
| Pre 1200BC | ✗ |
| 1200BC - 800BC | ✗ |
| 800BC - 400BC | ✗ |
| 400BC - AD50 | ✓ |
| AD50 - AD400 | ✗ |
| AD400 - AD 800 | ✗ |
| Post AD800 | ✗ |
| Unknown | ✗ |
| Pre Hillfort: | None |
| Post Hillfort: | None |
| C14: | None |
Named in 1849 for the 1st edition of the OS 6-inch map (Wigtownshire 1850, sheet 37), and described in 1870 as 'covering 1/2 acre' (M'Kerlie 1870, 489), the first real depiction is in 1894 on the 25-inch (Wigtownshire 1895, sheet 35.15), subsequently clarified in 1906 (Wigtownshire 1908, sheet 35.15). It escaped the RCAHMS County Inventory of 1912. It was re-surveyed by the OS at 1:2500 in 1973 and evaluated for coastal erosion in 1996 (Toolis 2003, 46-7), subsequently leading to a programme of geophysical survey and excavation in 2003-4 (Toolis 2003-4).
| 1st Identified Map Depiction (1849): | Named in Gothic type on the 1st edition OS 6-inch map (Wigtownshire 1850, sheet 37) |
| Other (1894): | 25-inch depiction (Wigtownshire 1895, sheet 35.15) |
| Other (1973): | Resurveyed at 1:2500 by the OS |
| Earthwork Survey (1996): | Toolis 2003, 46-7, fig 5 |
| Geophysical Survey (2003): | and evaluation Toolis (2003) |
| Excavation (2004): | Toolis 2004 |
Two stone-walled round-houses
None
| None | ✓ |
| Spring | ✗ |
| Stream | ✗ |
| Pool | ✗ |
| Flush | ✗ |
| Well | ✗ |
| Other | ✗ |
None
| No Known Features | ✗ |
| Round Stone Structures | ✓ |
| Rectangular Stone Structures | ✗ |
| Curvilinear Platforms | ✗ |
| Other Roundhouse Evidence | ✗ |
| Pits | ✗ |
| Quarry Hollows | ✗ |
| Other | ✗ |
Four phases identified within one of the round-houses
| No Known Excavation | ✗ |
| Pits | ✗ |
| Postholes | ✓ |
| Roundhouses | ✓ |
| Rectangular Structures | ✗ |
| Roads/Tracks | ✗ |
| Quarry Hollows | ✗ |
| Other | ✗ |
| Nothing Found | ✗ |
Content unknown
| No Known Geophysics | ✗ |
| Pits | ✗ |
| Roundhouses | ✗ |
| Rectangular Structures | ✗ |
| Roads/Tracks | ✗ |
| Quarry Hollows | ✗ |
| Other | ✓ |
| Nothing Found | ✗ |
Three lead beads. Saddle quern. Coarse stone tools
| No Known Finds | ✗ |
| Pottery | ✗ |
| Metal | ✓ |
| Metalworking | ✗ |
| Human Bones | ✗ |
| Animal Bones | ✗ |
| Lithics | ✗ |
| Environmental | ✗ |
| Other | ✓ |
None
| APs Not Checked | ✓ |
| None | ✗ |
| Roundhouses | ✗ |
| Rectangular Structures | ✗ |
| Pits | ✗ |
| Postholes | ✗ |
| Roads/Tracks | ✗ |
| Other | ✗ |
See main summary
| 1: | None |
| 2: | None |
Guard Chambers: ✗
Chevaux de Frise: ✗
| 1. Simple Gap (North east): | At eastern end of rampart |
Rampart and external ditch cutting off the promontory.
| Area 1: | 0.04ha. |
| Total: | 0.04ha. |
Total Footprint Area: Noneha.
None
| ✗ | Clearly heavily eroded |
| ✗ | None |
| NE Quadrant: | 1 |
| SE Quadrant: | 0 |
| SW Quadrant: | 0 |
| NW Quadrant: | 0 |
| Total: | 1 |
| Partial Univallate | ✓ |
| Univallate | ✗ |
| Partial Bivallate | ✗ |
| Bivallate | ✗ |
| Partial Multivallate | ✗ |
| Multivallate | ✗ |
| Unknown | ✗ |
| Partial Univallate | ✗ |
| Univallate | ✗ |
| Partial Bivallate | ✗ |
| Bivallate | ✗ |
| Partial Multivallate | ✗ |
| Multivallate | ✗ |
None
| None | ✗ |
| Earthen Bank | ✓ |
| Stone Wall | ✗ |
| Rubble | ✗ |
| Wall-walk | ✗ |
| Evidence of Timber | ✗ |
| Vitrification | ✗ |
| Other Burning | ✗ |
| Palisade | ✗ |
| Counter Scarp Bank | ✗ |
| Berm | ✗ |
| Unfinished | ✗ |
| Other | ✗ |
Reported to have had a rubble cap which had collapsed into the ditch (Toolis 2004)
| None | ✗ |
| Earthen Bank | ✓ |
| Stone Wall | ✗ |
| Murus Duplex | ✗ |
| Timber-framed | ✗ |
| Timber-laced | ✗ |
| Vitrification | ✗ |
| Other Burning | ✗ |
| Palisade | ✗ |
| Counter Scarp Bank | ✗ |
| Berm | ✗ |
| Unfinished | ✗ |
| No Known Excavation | ✗ |
| Other | ✗ |
| ✗ | None |
| ✓ | None |
Number of Ditches: 1
| ✗ | None |
M'Kerlie, P H (1870) History of the lands and their owners in Galloway, , vol.1 Edinburgh
Toolis, R (2003) 'Carghidown (Whithorn parish), promontory fort', Discovery Excav Scot 4, 51
Toolis, R (2004) 'Carghidown (Whithorn parish), promontory fort', Discovery Excav Scot 5, 40
Toolis, R (2007) 'Intermittent occupation and forced abandonment: excavation of an Iron Age promontory fort at Carghidown, Dumfries and Galloway'. Proc Soc Antiq Scot 137, 265-318
Atlas of Hillforts:
Wikidata:
This work is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0
and should be cited as:
Lock, Gary and Ralston, Ian. 2024. Atlas of Hillforts of Britain and Ireland. Available at: https://hillforts.arch.ox.ac.uk
Document Version 1.1