LiDAR 1m DTM Hillshade
Satellite Imagery
LiDAR 1m DTM Hillshade
Satellite Imagery
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HER: Scottish Borders 57086 (None)
NMR: NT 62 SW 1 (57086)
SM: 1712
NGR: NT 6241 2491
X: 362410 Y: 624910 (OSGB36)
This unusual fort is situated on a ridge that lies in a bend of the Ale Water opposite Ancrum. The fort occupies the SW tip of the summit, where the ground falls away steeply down to the river on the SW and SE, and on the NW into a shallow gully, and comprises an oval inner enclosure accompanied by two courts formed between widely-spaced outer walls on the gentle approach from the NE. The inner enclosure measures about 63m from NE to SW by 50m transversely (0.25ha) within a wall from 2.2m to 3m in thickness, with massive facing-stones visible both inside and out. An outer wall apparently springs from the inner on the SW and encircles the weaker W and NW flanks, returning to the NW side of the inner of two enclosed courts on the NE. The courts are both trapezoidal, and enclosed by similarly constructed walls, the plan suggesting that they have been successively added to the fort, though the junctions of the wall are buried in rubble. The inner measures internally a maximum of 50m from NW to SE by 21m transversely (0.09ha), and the outer 62m by 25m respectively (0.15ha). There are two entrances, one on the E, approached through the two courts, each of which has a gap in the wall adjacent to its E corner, and the second piercing both walls on the W, though in 1949 RCAHMS investigators speculated that the latter may have been to facilitate the cultivation at a relatively recent date of the otherwise featureless interior.
Citizen Science: ✗
Reliability of Data: Confirmed
Reliability of Interpretation: Confirmed
X: -289080 Y: 7462765 (EPSG: 3857)
Longitude: -2.5968519730012005 Latitude: 55.51652347987507 (EPSG:4326)
Country: Scotland
Current County or Unitary Authority: Scottish Borders
Historic County: Roxburghshire
Current Parish/Community/Council/Townland: Ancrum
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: 107.0m
N/A
This fort usually appears in lists of 'nuclear forts', with its upper 'citadel' and outer courts, and is thus identified as an early medieval caput. However, in the absence of excavation, there are neither stratified artefacts nor radiocarbon dates to confirm such an interpretation
Reliability: D - None
| Pre 1200BC | ✗ |
| 1200BC - 800BC | ✗ |
| 800BC - 400BC | ✗ |
| 400BC - AD50 | ✗ |
| AD50 - AD400 | ✗ |
| AD400 - AD 800 | ✗ |
| Post AD800 | ✗ |
| Unknown | ✓ |
| Pre Hillfort: | None |
| Post Hillfort: | The interior has been cultivated and there has been stone-robbing |
| Morphology/Earthwork/Typology: | None |
Photographed in 1993 by RCAHMS Aerial Survey Programme, and more recently by kite (rstrathie posted on Canmore)
| 1st Identified Map Depiction (1859): | Annotated Camp on the 1st edition OS 25-inch map (Roxburgh 1863, sheet 14.12) |
| Earthwork Survey (1949): | Plan and description (RCAHMS 1956, 58-9, no.16, fig 94; RCAHMS RXD 85/1-3) |
| Other (1960): | Scheduled |
| Other (1967): | Resurveyed at 1:2500 by the OS |
| Other (1995): | Re-Scheduled |
Featureless
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 | ✗ |
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 | ✗ |
NO APPARENT FEATURES
| APs Not Checked | ✗ |
| None | ✓ |
| Roundhouses | ✗ |
| Rectangular Structures | ✗ |
| Pits | ✗ |
| Postholes | ✗ |
| Roads/Tracks | ✗ |
| Other | ✗ |
See main summary
| 2: | None |
| 2: | None |
Guard Chambers: ✗
Chevaux de Frise: ✗
| 1. Simple Gap (East): | Penetrates all three walls on this side |
| 2. Simple Gap (West): | Pierces both walls but may be secondary |
Massively constructed walls
| Area 1: | 0.25ha. |
| Total: | 0.25ha. |
Total Footprint Area: 0.78ha.
None
| ✗ | None |
| ✓ | None |
| NE Quadrant: | 3 |
| SE Quadrant: | 1 |
| SW Quadrant: | 2 |
| NW Quadrant: | 2 |
| Total: | 3 |
| 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: None
| ✓ | There are two trapezoidal annexes or courts formed between the widely-spaced walls traversing the ridge on the NE, the outer apparently butted onto the inner, and the latter onto the fort wall, though the detail of the junctions is not visible beneath the grass-grown rubble. The inner measures internally a maximum of 50m from NW to SE by 21m transversely (0.09ha), and the outer 62m by 25m respectively (0.15ha). The main entrance to the fort approaches through the courts from the E, via well-defined gaps in their walls adjacent to the E corners. |
RCAHMS (1956) The Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland. An inventory of the ancient and historical monuments of Roxburghshire: with the fourteenth report of the Commission, 2v. 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