Description

The monument comprises the remains of a varied group of features: three curved ditches, several ring ditches, two rectilinear enclosures and a variety of other features including pits and gullies, representing the remains of settlements and barrows of different date. Radiocarbon dating of samples from pits indicates use of the site in the Bronze Age (c 2500-800 BC) and Iron Age (c 800 BC-AD 400). While most of the features probably derive from these periods, the rectilinear enclosures may be medieval or post-medieval in date. The remains lie buried beneath the ploughsoil and are visible as cropmarks captured on oblique aerial photographs. The monument lies at about 20m OD, occupying a level area of relatively high ground some 600m inland from the coast.

The two rectilinear enclosures define areas measuring 24m x 24m and 44m x 38m respectively. Outside the enclosures there are at least five ring ditches or penannular ditches, ranging from about 6m to 10m in diameter. Some are interpreted as small barrows; others as the remains of roundhouses. In addition, three curvilinear features measure between 14m and 24m across. One has been partly excavated and is 0.7m deep with near vertical sides and a flat base, tapering in width from 2.2m to 0.5m. Excavation has also indicated that a variety of pits and gullies lie in the vicinity of this feature, including a pit circle some 9m in diameter which surrounds a wide, shallow pit.

The scheduled area is irregular on plan to include the remains described above and an area around them within which evidence relating to the monument's construction, use and abandonment is expected to survive, as shown in red on the accompanying map. The monument was first scheduled in 1994, but the documents did not meet modern standards: the present amendment rectifies this.

Source: Historic Environment Scotland

Statement of Scheduling

The monument is of national importance because of its potential to make a significant addition to knowledge and understanding of rural settlement and burial in Scotland. The survival of rectilinear enclosures, barrows and potential houses in close proximity is rare. It offers high potential to compare settlement form and character over a long time period, and to examine the relationship between settlement and funerary remains. The monument's importance is enhanced by its association with the wider, very rich archaeological landscape of enclosures, unenclosed settlements and barrows in the lower Lunan Valley. This landscape forms an important concentration of evidence for social and economic change in later prehistoric and medieval Scotland. Our understanding of the distribution and character of prehistoric and later settlements and burials would be diminished if this monument was to be lost or damaged.

Source: Historic Environment Scotland

Sources

Bibliography

RCAHMS records the monument as NO64NE 16, 17, 18, 50, 51, 52. The Angus Sites and Monuments Record reference is NO64NE0044.

References

RCAHMS Aerial Photographs AN3227, AN3230, AN5490

Alexander, D 2005, 'Redcastle, Lunan Bay, Angus: the excavation of an Iron Age timber-lined souterrain and a Pictish barrow cemetery', Proc Soc Antiq Scot 135, 41-118.

McGill, C 2004, 'Excavations of cropmarks at Newbarns, near Inverkeilor, Angus', Tayside Fife Archaeol Jour 10, 95-118.

Source: Historic Environment Scotland