LiDAR 1m DTM Hillshade
Satellite Imagery
LiDAR 1m DTM Hillshade
Satellite Imagery
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HER: The West of Scotland Archaeology Service 10869 (None)
NMR: NT 03 NW 16 (48644)
SM: 2618
NGR: NT 0385 3659
X: 303859 Y: 636595 (OSGB36)
This earthwork, which encloses a low hillock in low-lying ground, is traversed from NNW to SSE by the road from Biggar to Hartree. Nothing is visible of the perimeter on the E side of the road, though RCAHMS investigators identified its course on vertical aerial photographs, while to the W twin ramparts with a medial ditch some 8m in breadth can be traced round the flanks of the hillock. Oblique aerial photographs, however, show the ditch turning back quite sharply adjacent to the road on the N, as indeed it was depicted by David Christison about 1889 (316-17, fig 16), suggesting that rather than being the circular enclosure some 76m in internal diameter postulated by the RCAHMS (1978, 145, no.272, fig 87), it is in fact oval, its E side approximating roughly to the line of the road. If this is correct, the interior measures about 80m from N to S by 55m transversely (0.4ha). The interior is featureless and the position of the entrance is unknown.
Citizen Science: ✗
Reliability of Data: Confirmed
Reliability of Interpretation: Confirmed
X: -392726 Y: 7481848 (EPSG: 3857)
Longitude: -3.5279218787419073 Latitude: 55.61345675290586 (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: 205.0m
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: | Ploughed down and overridden by a public road |
Photographed from the air by William Hanson in 1998 (Hanson and Sharpe 1998), and by RCAHMS Aerial Survey Programme in 1989, 1995 and 2014.
| 1st Identified Map Depiction (1854): | Description by George Irving (1854, 13) |
| 1st Identified Map Depiction (1858): | Annotated Camp on the 1st edition OS 25-inch map (Lanark 1864, sheet 34-13) |
| Earthwork Survey (1889): | Sketch-plan and description by David Christison (1890, 316-17, fig 16) |
| Earthwork Survey (1959): | Plan (RCAHMS LAD 152/1) |
| Other (1967): | Scheduled |
| Earthwork Survey (1972): | Plan reviewed and description (RCAHMS 1978, 145, no.272, fig 87; RCAHMS LAD 152/2) |
| Other (1972): | Resurveyed at 1:2500 by the OS |
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 | ✗ |
None known
| 0: | None |
| 2: | None known |
Guard Chambers: ✗
Chevaux de Frise: ✗
Twin ramparts with a medial ditch
| Area 1: | 0.4ha. |
| Total: | 0.4ha. |
Total Footprint Area: Noneha.
None
| ✗ | None |
| ✗ | None |
| NE Quadrant: | 0 |
| SE Quadrant: | 0 |
| SW Quadrant: | 2 |
| NW Quadrant: | 2 |
| Total: | 2 |
| 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: 1
| ✗ | None |
Christison, D (1889-90) 'Forts, Camps, and Motes of the Upper Ward of Lanarkshire'. Proc Soc Antiq Scot 24 (1889-90), 281-352
Irving, G V (1855) 'On ancient camps of the upper ward of Lanarkshire', J Brit Archaeol Ass 10 (1855), 1-32
Hanson and Sharpe, W S and L (1998) 'Upper Clyde Valley Landscape Project, cropmark sites'. Disc Exc Scot (1998), 89
RCAHMS (1978) The Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland. Lanarkshire: an inventory of the prehistoric and Roman monuments. 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