Satellite Imagery
Satellite Imagery
HER: Highland HER MHG10718 (None)
NMR: NC 75 SW 9 (6363)
SM: 5632
NGR: NC 7199 5140
X: 271990 Y: 951400 (OSGB36)
This heavily-robbed broch stands on a steep-sided promontory which is defended on the most easily accessible side on the SW by twin ditches with a medial rampart. The broch measures about 7m in diameter within a wall between 3.7m and 4.3m thick, but displays no architectural features. The rampart of the earthwork barring access along the spur from the SW stands up to 2m high above the bottom of the flanking ditches, which are up to 8m in breadth; the inner contains the footings of a rectangular building. The interior is otherwise featureless and defined by no more than the crest of the slope; it measures about 70m from ENE to WSW by 34m transversely (0.11ha). The ditches stop short of the margin of the promontory on both the NW and SE, either of which mat mark the position of an entrance. The relationship between the broch and the outer works is unknown.
Citizen Science: ✗
Reliability of Data: Confirmed
Reliability of Interpretation: Confirmed
X: -466877 Y: 8058664 (EPSG: 3857)
Longitude: -4.194026301890071 Latitude: 58.432206953973065 (EPSG:4326)
Country: Scotland
Current County or Unitary Authority: Highland
Historic County: Sutherland
Current Parish/Community/Council/Townland: Farr
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: 45.0m
N/A
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: | None |
| Post Hillfort: | Possibly the construction of the broch |
None
| 1st Identified Written Reference (1867): | Noted (Horsburgh 1868, 272) |
| 1st Identified Map Depiction (1873): | Annotated 'Pict's House' on the 1st edition OS 6-inch map (Sutherland 1878, sheet 27) |
| Other (1909): | Description (RCAHMS 1911, 60, no.179) |
| Other (1960): | Outworks noted by Alison Young (1962, 189) |
| Other (1960): | Visited by the OS |
| Other (1979): | Visited by the OS |
| Other (1985): | Description and sketch-plan (Swanson 1988, 730-32, cited by MacKie 2007, 634-5) |
| Other (1993): | Scheduled |
Featureless apart from the broch
None
| None | ✓ |
| Spring | ✗ |
| Stream | ✗ |
| Pool | ✗ |
| Flush | ✗ |
| Well | ✗ |
| Other | ✗ |
The broch
| 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 | ✗ |
The broch
| APs Not Checked | ✗ |
| None | ✗ |
| Roundhouses | ✗ |
| Rectangular Structures | ✗ |
| Pits | ✗ |
| Postholes | ✗ |
| Roads/Tracks | ✗ |
| Other | ✓ |
See main summary
| 2: | Incomplete circuit |
| 2: | None |
Guard Chambers: ✗
Chevaux de Frise: ✗
| 1. Simple Gap (South west): | None |
| 2. Simple Gap (West): | None |
Two ditches with a medial rampart cutting off a promontory
| Area 1: | 0.11ha. |
| Total: | 0.11ha. |
Total Footprint Area: Noneha.
None
| ✗ | None |
| ✗ | None |
| NE Quadrant: | 0 |
| SE Quadrant: | 0 |
| SW Quadrant: | 1 |
| 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 | ✗ |
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 |
| ✓ | None |
Number of Ditches: 2
| ✗ | None |
Horsburgh, J (1868) Notes of Cromlechs, Duns, Hut-Circles, Chambered Cairns, and other Remains, in the County of Sutherland. Proc Soc Antiq Scot 7 (1866-8), 271-9
MacKie, E W (2007) The Roundhouses, Brochs and Wheelhouses of Atlantic Scotland c.700 BC-AD 500: architecture and material culture, the Northern and Southern Mainland and the Western Islands, BAR British series 444(II), 444(1), 2 V. BAR: Oxford
RCAHMS (1911) The Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments and Constructions of Scotland. Second report and inventory of monuments and constructions in the county of Sutherland. HMSO: Edinburgh
Swanson, C B (1988) A contribution to the understanding of brochs, Unpublished Ph D thesis. University of Edinburgh
Young, A (1962) 'Brochs and duns'. Proc Soc Antiq Scot 95 (1961-2), 171-98
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