Description

The monument comprises the remains of an enclosure visible in cropmarks and of probable later prehistoric date. It is located at around 95m above sea level on the summit of an unnamed hill, just east of the Lint Burn. The monument was first scheduled in 1991 but the documentation does not meet modern standards: the present rescheduling rectifies this.

The monument survives as a series of truncated features visible in cropmarks recorded on a series of oblique aerial photographs from 1984, 1990 and 1999. The main enclosure is irregular on plan defined by a single ditch that encloses an area around 95m N-S by 120m transversely. The ditch is up to 3m in width and there are breaks in the circuit on the W and S that may represent entrances. Experience from similar sites shows that further remains should survive that are not visible as cropmarks.

The area to be scheduled is irregular on plan, to include the remains described and an area around them within which evidence relating to their construction, use and abandonment may survive, as shown in red on the accompanying map. The scheduling extends up to but does not include the post-and-wire fence that marks the N boundary of the scheduled area. Specifically excluded is the water tank on the N side of the enclosure.

Source: Historic Environment Scotland

Statement of Scheduling

Cultural Significance

The monument's cultural significance can be expressed as follows:

Intrinsic characteristics

As a buried feature clearly visible in the form of a cropmark on recent aerial photographs, the monument is a good example of an enclosure, possibly a settlement, likely to be late 1st millennium BC or early 1st millennium AD in date, surviving well in an area of agricultural activity. Although the area has previously been cultivated, there is high potential for evidence relating to domestic structures and the activities undertaken within and around them to be preserved as buried deposits within and around the enclosure. Buried deposits within the ditches have the potential to provide evidence of the environment within which the enclosure was constructed. The ditch and other surviving negative features are also likely to contain deposits that can tell us about the economy of the inhabitants of the enclosure and surrounding elements, the date at which they were built, used and abandoned and what may have happened in and around the site subsequently.

Contextual characteristics

The monument belongs to a large and widespread class of later prehistoric enclosure sites found throughout Scotland. As such it has the capacity to contribute towards a better understanding of enclosures and enclosed settlements. The wider setting and context of these monuments can help us to understand their purpose and significance. The monument sits on the top of a hill and therefore has views in all directions.

The landscape of the Eye Water valley and surrounding area contains a variety of remains from the prehistoric period. The immediate vicinity of this site includes many later prehistoric settlements and enclosures of different forms. Along with other parts of the Scottish Borders where there is similar survival, such an extensive landscape of prehistoric remains offers a unique opportunity to assess the Iron-Age environment, society and economy and the relationships between the physical remains of the period. Despite this, very little work has been carried out in the area to this end, and the Eye Water sites are important as an excellent potential study area for such work, the results of which could then be utilised much further afield across Scotland.

National Importance

The monument is of national importance because it has an inherent potential to make a significant contribution to our understanding of the past, in particular later prehistoric enclosures and associated features. This contribution extends to their location within the landscape and the relationship between them, as well as the Iron-Age society that created and inhabited them. The loss of the monument would impede our ability to understand the nature of later prehistoric activity, not just in the Scottish Borders but across Scotland, as well as the value placed on such monuments by later communities.

Source: Historic Environment Scotland

Sources

Bibliography

RCAHMS records the monument as NT 96 SW 87.

Aerial photographs used:

RCAHMS (1984) NT96SW87 Oblique aerial view Archive number A22364.

Source: Historic Environment Scotland