LiDAR 1m DTM Hillshade
Satellite Imagery
LiDAR 1m DTM Hillshade
Satellite Imagery
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HER: East Lothian Council MEL1689 (None)
NMR: NT 67 SE 5 (57798)
SM: 5767
NGR: NT 6649 7447
X: 366491 Y: 674471 (OSGB36)
The site of this fort lies on the summit of Spott Dod, which forms a secondary summit on a ridge dropping down NE away from The Chesters (Atlas No. 3913). Probably oval on plan, the defences have been photographed on a single occasion in 1977, when parchmarks in grass revealed traces of a complex system of causewayed ditches and palisade trenches forming the NE and SE sides of the enclosure. And though the marks fade away on the N and SSW, one of the ditches extends a sufficient distance onto the steep NW flank of the hill to be confident that the defences probably formed a complete circuit. Thus defined, the enclosure represented by that ditch measures about 150m from NE to SW by 120m transversely (1.4ha), though the interiors of the two or three palisaded perimeters visible within its line are considerably smaller. An evaluation carried out in 1983 by Roger Mercer recovered evidence of two ditches, the inner some 2m in breadth by 2m in depth and containing a complex sequence of recut fills, and the outer no more than 1m and 0.8m broad and deep respectively. Palisade trenches were set 2m to the rear of each ditch, while within the course of the inner there were at least three other lines of palisading, one comprising a double row of posts. Two radiocarbon dates from charcoal at the base of one of the recuts in the inner ditch and from the palisade trench immediately within it demonstrate that the enclosure is Iron Age, but little else.
Citizen Science: ✗
Reliability of Data: Confirmed
Reliability of Interpretation: Confirmed
X: -282565 Y: 7550878 (EPSG: 3857)
Longitude: -2.5383202526926496 Latitude: 55.96211968090237 (EPSG:4326)
Country: Scotland
Current County or Unitary Authority: East Lothian
Historic County: East Lothian
Current Parish/Community/Council/Townland: Spott
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: 185.0m
N/A
Old radiocarbon dates of 770-370 BC from the inner ditch, and 720-170 from the palisade immediately within its line, are probably sufficiently reliable that this is the remains of an Iron Age enclosure, in which the defences were predominantly of timber, comparable to Corsehope Rings (Atlas No.3724) and Doon Hill (Atlas No.3910).
Reliability: C - Low
| Pre 1200BC | ✗ |
| 1200BC - 800BC | ✗ |
| 800BC - 400BC | ✓ |
| 400BC - AD50 | ✓ |
| AD50 - AD400 | ✗ |
| AD400 - AD 800 | ✗ |
| Post AD800 | ✗ |
| Unknown | ✗ |
| Pre Hillfort: | None |
| Post Hillfort: | None |
| C14: | Two old radiocarbon dates |
None
| 1st Identified Written Reference (1977): | First photographed by the RCAHMS Aerial Survey Programme |
| Excavation (1983): | Directed by Roger Mercer (1983a ; 1983b, see RCAHMS MS360/1) |
| Other (1993): | 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 | ✗ |
Palisade trenches
| 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 | ✗ |
Assemblage of 24 pieces of flint, eight of them worked
| 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 | ✗ |
None known
| 0: | None |
| 2: | None known |
Guard Chambers: ✗
Chevaux de Frise: ✗
Two causewayed ditches and at least five palisades
| Area 1: | 1.4ha. |
| Total: | 1.4ha. |
Total Footprint Area: Noneha.
None
| ✗ | None |
| ✗ | Only the ditches are included here |
| NE Quadrant: | 1 |
| SE Quadrant: | 2 |
| SW Quadrant: | 0 |
| NW Quadrant: | 0 |
| 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 trenches revealed by cropmarks
| None | ✗ |
| Earthen Bank | ✗ |
| Stone Wall | ✗ |
| Rubble | ✗ |
| Wall-walk | ✗ |
| Evidence of Timber | ✗ |
| Vitrification | ✗ |
| Other Burning | ✗ |
| Palisade | ✓ |
| Counter Scarp Bank | ✗ |
| Berm | ✗ |
| Unfinished | ✗ |
| Other | ✗ |
At least five palisades and two shallow ditches
| 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 |
Mercer, R (1983a) 'Spott Dod (Spott p), crop-mark enclosure'. Disc Exc Scot (1983), 19
Mercer, R (1983b) Excavations at Spott Dod, Near Dunbar, 1983. Unpublished report (RCAHMS MS360/1)
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