LiDAR 1m DTM Hillshade
Satellite Imagery
LiDAR 1m DTM Hillshade
Satellite Imagery
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HER: The West of Scotland Archaeology Service 10889 (None)
NMR: NT 03 NW 35 (48665)
SM: None
NGR: NT 0157 3657
X: 301575 Y: 636572 (OSGB36)
This promontory work occupies a low-lying position on the steep N bank of the River Clyde, in the angle between the river and a minor unnamed burn that joins it from the NNE. The defences are drawn in broad arc across the NE and E approaches, comprising two widely-spaced ditches on divergent lines. The inner, which ranges from 4m to over 8m in breadth, in effect describes a D-shape on plan, and encloses an area measuring about 100m from WNW to ESE along the river bank by 50m transversely (0.39ha). Allowing for the presence of an internal rampart, the interior, which is featureless apart from a possible palisade trench that detaches itself from the inner lip of the ditch on the W, would have extended to about 0.32ha. The inner ditch itself, however, may represent at least two periods of construction. The main evidence for this is seen where the ditch displays its greatest breadth on the W side of what is probably the entrance in the middle of the arc on the NE. While the ditch appears to gradually expand towards the entrance, a lobe projects its outer edge into the gap on this side, suggesting that this broad mark hides the remains of two ditches, one re-cutting the other. Likewise an irregularity in the line of the ditch adjacent to the river bank on the E may indicate that in one scheme there was an entrance causeway here, while in the other the ditch was carried through to the river. The outer ditch does not seem to form a complete enclosure and is notable for for the causeways that break its W end into three or four short segments; in an Iron Age context this would be regarded as evidence that perhaps this outer work was unfinished, but the possibility that this is the remains of a Neolithic causewayed enclosure (RCAHMS 1997, 115) should not be discounted, though it has yet to be shown conclusively that such monuments were constructed in Scotland. The surrounding landscape here, however, has a notable concentration of Neolithic sites and monuments and in this same field the cropmarks of a possible pit-defined cursus have been identified extending away from the outer ditch on the NE.
Citizen Science: ✗
Reliability of Data: Confirmed
Reliability of Interpretation: Unconfirmed
X: -396761 Y: 7481717 (EPSG: 3857)
Longitude: -3.5641602856125654 Latitude: 55.61279321895324 (EPSG:4326)
Country: Scotland
Current County or Unitary Authority: South Lanarkshire
Historic County: Lanarkshire
Current Parish/Community/Council/Townland: Biggar
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: 198.0m
N/A
The morphology of the outer work has led to comparisons with Neolithic causewayed enclosures elsewhere (RCAHMS 1997, 115), but in the absence of excavation, there are neither stratified artefacts nor radiocarbon dates to provide a chronology for the defences.
Reliability: D - None
| Pre 1200BC | ✗ |
| 1200BC - 800BC | ✗ |
| 800BC - 400BC | ✗ |
| 400BC - AD50 | ✗ |
| AD50 - AD400 | ✗ |
| AD400 - AD 800 | ✗ |
| Post AD800 | ✗ |
| Unknown | ✓ |
| Pre Hillfort: | Possible Neolithic element in the enclosure |
| Post Hillfort: | Ploughed flat |
Recorded by CUCAP in 1968 and 1974, and by the RCAHMS Aerial Survey Programme 1988, 1992, 1993, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2005 and 2006
| 1st Identified Written Reference (1968): | First photographed by CUCAP in 1968 |
| Other (1970): | Visited (RCAHMS 1978, 155, no.323) |
| Other (1972): | Visited by the OS |
Featureless
But it backs onto the riverbank
| 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 | ✗ |
None
| No Known Excavation | ✓ |
| Pits | ✗ |
| Postholes | ✗ |
| Roundhouses | ✗ |
| Rectangular Structures | ✗ |
| Roads/Tracks | ✗ |
| Quarry Hollows | ✗ |
| Other | ✗ |
| Nothing Found | ✗ |
None
| No Known Geophysics | ✓ |
| Pits | ✗ |
| Roundhouses | ✗ |
| Rectangular Structures | ✗ |
| Roads/Tracks | ✗ |
| Quarry Hollows | ✗ |
| Other | ✗ |
| Nothing Found | ✗ |
None
| 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
| 7: | There are multiple gaps in the outer ditch and an incomplete ditch |
| 2: | None |
Guard Chambers: ✗
Chevaux de Frise: ✗
| 1. Simple Gap (North east): | Possibly displaying evidence of two phases |
Two ditches cutting off a promontory
| Area 1: | 0.39ha. |
| Total: | 0.39ha. |
Total Footprint Area: Noneha.
None
| ✗ | None |
| ✗ | None |
| NE Quadrant: | 2 |
| SE Quadrant: | 0 |
| SW Quadrant: | 0 |
| NW Quadrant: | 1 |
| Total: | 2 |
| Partial Univallate | ✓ |
| Univallate | ✗ |
| Partial Bivallate | ✓ |
| Bivallate | ✗ |
| Partial Multivallate | ✗ |
| Multivallate | ✗ |
| Unknown | ✗ |
| Partial Univallate | ✗ |
| Univallate | ✗ |
| Partial Bivallate | ✗ |
| Bivallate | ✗ |
| Partial Multivallate | ✗ |
| Multivallate | ✗ |
Not visible on the surface; palisade trench revealed by cropmarks.
| None | ✗ |
| Earthen Bank | ✗ |
| Stone Wall | ✗ |
| Rubble | ✗ |
| Wall-walk | ✗ |
| Evidence of Timber | ✗ |
| Vitrification | ✗ |
| Other Burning | ✗ |
| Palisade | ✓ |
| Counter Scarp Bank | ✗ |
| Berm | ✗ |
| Unfinished | ✓ |
| Other | ✗ |
None
| 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 |
| ✓ | The outer ditch peters out in a series of pits |
Number of Ditches: 2
| ✗ | None |
RCAHMS. (1978) The Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland. Lanarkshire: an inventory of the prehistoric and Roman monuments. HMSO: Edinburgh
RCAHMS. (1997) Eastern Dumfriesshire: an archaeological landscape. HMSO: Edinburgh
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