Description

The monument comprises a cemetery of four barrows (burials originally covered by earthen mounds) and at least twenty-one individual graves that survive as buried archaeological features. They are visible as cropmarks on oblique aerial imagery. A dense group of eighteen of these grave cuts lie adjacent to the barrows and a dispersed group of at least three further graves lie approximately 60m to the north. Together, these features are thought to be the remains of burial activity dating to the early medieval period (AD 400-1000). A pair of enclosures are located to the northwest of the main concentration of burial features. The monument survives in low lying cultivated land, to the west of Chlenry Burn, between Loch Ryan and Luce Bay at approximately 30m above sea level. 

The round barrows are between approximately 6m and 9m in diameter and are visible in aerial photographs as lighter, circular features representing the ditch, the upcast from which would have been used to create the mound. No internal features are visible. The grave cuts are between 3m and 4.5m long by up to 1m wide. 12 of the 18 graves which are adjacent to the barrows are aligned with each other, northeast to southwest, with the remainder dispersed in the vicinity and to the north. The enclosures are sub-rectangular. The larger enclosure measures around 48m by 21m with projecting ditches on its southwestern side, the smaller enclosure measures around 21m by 15m.

The scheduled area is irregular. It includes the remains described above and an area around within which evidence relating to the monument's construction, use and abandonment is expected to survive, as shown in red on the accompanying map.

Source: Historic Environment Scotland

Statement of Scheduling

The national importance of the monument is demonstrated in the following way(s) (see Designations Policy and Selection Guidance, Annex 1, para 17):

a.   The monument is of national importance because it makes a significant contribution to our understanding or appreciation of the past. In the surviving long cists, the monument is likely to represent early medieval burial and religious practice. There are also the adjacent remains of burial within barrows, once visible as earthen mounds and this is suggestive of an earlier, prehistoric practice. It appears that the cist cemetery respects these earlier burial monuments, which may have been a feature of the landscape at the time of their creation. Taken together, these features represent burial practices with significant time depth, reflecting variety in religion and commemoration over time, in southwest Scotland. 

b.   The monument retains structural field characteristics in buried stratigraphic layers. The remains of four round barrows and at least 21 individual graves are visible in oblique aerial imagery. They have the potential to reveal construction materials and techniques, human remains and environmental evidence captured when the graves were cut. 

c.   The monument provides us with a rare example of two, co-located forms of burial - the diagnostic remains of prehistoric burial within four earthen mounds and an early medieval unenclosed cemetery, seen in parallel long cist graves. The placement of these burial features from different time periods suggests a continuity of use and that the monument may have considerable time depth.

e.   The monument has research potential which could significantly contribute to our understanding or appreciation of the past and specifically, how past communities dealt with death, burial and commemoration during the first millennium AD.

Assessment of Cultural Significance

This statement of national importance has been informed by the following assessment of cultural significance:

Intrinsic characteristics (how the remains of a site or place contribute to our knowledge of the past)

This monument has been recorded as cropmarks on oblique aerial photographs and survives as buried deposits within the ploughsoil. The imagery shows four circular features which represent the remains of burial monuments known as round barrows. They are between 6m and 9m in diameter and are positioned in two perpendicular pairs. Between these four barrows are 12 grave cuts, each oriented northeast to southwest and aligned in a single row. To the east and southeast of this alignment are a further six dispersed grave cuts and 60m to the northwest, a second dispersed group of four grave cuts is visible. The grave cuts are the likely remains of individual burials and with an individual length of between 3m and 4.5m, they are likely to indicate stone-lined graves or long cists. Excavated examples elsewhere in southern and southwest Scotland suggest a date range for these features between the fourth and eighth centuries AD, reflecting early Christian burial practice. The visible features do not inter-cut each other indicating that a period of burial where the position of existing graves was known and respected. To the immediate northwest of the cluster of burials, there are two further cropmarked features – sub-rectangular enclosures of uncertain function and date. However, they may be related as they appear to respect the burials.

In their original form, the round barrows would have been visible as earthen mounds overlying one or more burials and the graves, as linear, possibly stone-lined cuts in the ground. Round barrows have been dated to the Bronze Age (2,500 BC – 800 BC), Iron Age (800 BC – AD 400) and Early Medieval period (AD 400 – 1000), though some rarer examples dating to the Neolithic (4,100 BC – 2,500 BC) are also known. Monuments such as these often contain features that are not visible in aerial photographs and can have well preserved stratified layers of archaeological deposits. There is, therefore, good archaeological potential here for human remains and evidence for the construction technique of the ditches surrounding the earthen mounds and of the grave cuts within. There is also the likelihood of surviving artefacts, other archaeological and environmental materials here.

These deposits have an inherent potential to inform our understating of the practices associated with burial and commemoration during the early medieval period, reflecting Christian religious beliefs. There are two further buried features here, visible in oblique aerial imagery – enclosures with a square and a sub-rectangular plan form, both adding to the monument's overall archaeological potential. Taken together, these remains have the potential to provide information about the function and date of the burials and their relationship to each other. Study of the monument's form and construction techniques compared with similar cemeteries can enhance our understanding of the development sequence and overall distribution of this type of monument. 

Contextual characteristics (how a site or place relates to its surroundings and/or to our existing knowledge of the past)

The monument represents burial practice and commemoration in the early medieval period, in southwest Scotland. It is likely to belong to a much broader and relatively rare category of cemetery known as a long cist cemetery – some 47 of these cemeteries are recorded in Scotland, with the majority in eastern Scotland - across the Lothians, around parts of the Fife coast and close to Dundee city. More locally there are similar cemeteries at Challoch, 11km to the northwest (Canmore ref 81596), at Aird Cottage 4km to the west northwest (Canmore ref 82357) and 19km to the South at Terally (Canmore ref 61149). At Aird Cottage the cemetery is enclosed by a ditched feature.

There is an interesting diversity of burial practice here, between the parallel alignment of single burials, burials surmounted by earthen mounds and dispersed single burials in the vicinity, each apparently respecting the space of the other and together, in relatively close proximity. This may represent different phases of activity and is nevertheless a dense concentration of burials in one location. The alignment of the row of 12 burials northeast to southwest is suggestive of a Christian tradition where the body is laid to rest on an east to west alignment with the head at the west end.

The location for the cemetery is also interesting, at the lower edge of Glenwhan Moor and along a naturel northwest to southeast running routeway with predominant views westwards. The cemetery is within the wider area of the contemporary Christian religious centre at Whithorn.

Associative characteristics (how a site or place relates to people, events, and/or historic and social movements)

There are no known associative characteristics that contribute to this monuments national importance.

 

Source: Historic Environment Scotland

Sources

Bibliography

Historic Environment Scotland http://www.canmore.org.uk reference numbers CANMORE IDs 61701 and 61702 (accessed on 09/05/2023).

Local Authority HER/SMR References MDG1756, 1757 & 9191 (accessed on 09/05/2023).

Cowley D C, 2009, Early Christian cemeteries in south-west Scotland in, Murray J (ed), St Ninian and the early Christianity in Scotland. Papers from the conference held by The Friends of the Whithorn Trust in Whithorn September 15th 2007. British Archaeological Reports British Series 483. Oxford. BAR publishing.

Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments, 1997, Eastern Dumfriesshire: an archaeological landscape. Edinburgh. RCAHMS.

Canmore

https://canmore.org.uk/site/61701/
https://canmore.org.uk/site/61702/

HER/SMR Reference

MDG1756
MDG1757

Source: Historic Environment Scotland