Description

The monument comprises at least five prehistoric settlements, pre-improvement settlement and isolated houses, enclosures, field systems and cairns, a four poster stone circle, ring cairns and two Medieval stone bank figures.

To the west is a dispersed group of three simple embanked round houses on platforms, one overlain by a pre-improvement house and enclosure. A field bank within this settlement makes a semi-circle detour as if to avoid a no longer visible structure.

Near the middle of the ridge are three houses of Dalrulzion type. Two of them form a close knit pair and the third is 50m to the east. To the north east are two possible ring cairns, one with traces of kerb, and to the N a four-poster. 150m further east is another pair of Dalrulzion type houses, one overlain by a simple embanked round house and seemingly later than a partially preserved round house. The latter also underlies a complicated group of embanked round houses seemingly of three periods. Some 10m further east is a small ring cairn with internal and external kerbs. 15m to the SE again is a similar, but kerbless, ring cairn.

On the SE slope of the hill are at least five round houses on platforms scooped into the side of the hill. Two at least have boulder banks edging their upper rims, and most have banks edging their lower rims. One is overlain by a pre-improvement house and another by a small building.

On the south side of the ridge are pre-improvement settlements including at least fifteen separate structural complexes, a patch of medium rig, and field walls. Three of the complexes overlie prehistoric houses. The complexes include both small and large houses, one of the latter has a probable kiln at the west end, and two separate enclosures. At least one of the longer house complexes is multiperiod. 370m west of the summit of Strone Hill is the Abbots Cross. It consists of stone banks forming an equal armed cross. Roughly 120m S of this is a hillside figure constructed in the same way consisting of a long cross bar with a vertical member running up hill from its centre, and two stone banks of similar length depending roughly at the quarter points of the cross bar.

The field banks include at least nine elements running NS parallel to each other at irregular intervals, joining with curvilinear elements. There are fragments of at least four banks running NW. There are 129 or more small cairns in the area proposed for scheduling.

Source: Historic Environment Scotland

Statement of Scheduling

The monument is of national importance as an extraordinarily rich and varied prehistoric and pre-improvement landscape. It includes a prehistoric platform settlement, and Dalrulzion and simple embanked round houses in stratigraphical relationship to each other. Near both pairs of Dalrulzion type houses are pairs of ring cairns, and by one of the latter is a small four-poster stone circle.

The one certain and three probable ring cairns are of national importance to studies of later prehistoric funerary monuments, and are of particular interest because without the kerbed example and the similarity (except for lack of a well defined kerb on the other three) the latter might well have been dismissed as a partly robbed clearance cairn. Only one other ring cairn has been recognised in Angus, at Meams. This example is much larger, and their apparent absence may be due to difficulty in distinguishing them from robbed cairns.

The prehistoric part of the site therefore includes domestic, funerary and ritual elements and is of national importance to studies of later prehistoric house types, of social organisation, of the relationship between funerary and domestic structures, of the date and purpose of four-poster stone circles, and of the history of agriculture.

The pre-improvement settlements include structures ranging from well built stone walled multi-cameral houses and well built free standing enclosures, through turf and stone built farm complexes with attached enclosures, to small isolated turf and stone unicameral structures. Their propinquity will allow comparisons and contrasts, strengthened by the multiperiodicity of at least two of the larger houses. They are of national importance to studies of pre-improvement settlements.

The field banks may belong with the prehistoric or pre-improvement settlements. Their propinquity to both should allow comparative studies including pollen analysis, which may lead to their relative dating. Their similarities and differences to the open ended fields on Hill of Menmuir and the rectangular fields W of the White Caterthun, Balhall, make them of national importance to the studies of early agricultural systems in eastern Scotland.

Source: Historic Environment Scotland

Sources

Bibliography

RCAHMS records this site as NO25NE 18.

Source: Historic Environment Scotland