Category: Cairns, Tombs, Tumuli

For those who may not know, the terms ‘cairns’ and ‘tumuli’ are just prehistoric tombs. Another word we find as we move further north into Scotland is ‘cist’, which has a similar affiliation. A cairn is a pile of loose rocks and stones, which tends to be erected over a single or multiple burial or cremation – though without excavation we can never be sure which one it’s gonna be! A tumulus meanwhile (‘tumuli’ is the plural) is a heap of earth piled up over a burial or cremation. Small cairns and tumuli tend to cover single graves; whilst larger ones can have multiple burials therein. However we sometimes find that huge tombs have only one or two burials/ cremations inside. In such cases it’s likely that the people entombed there were of considerable importance: perhaps a tribal chief, a king, a queen, or powerful shaman. In many places across northern Britain, where there’s a profusion of cairns/tumuli we tend to find a good examples of prehistoric rock art, or cup-and-ring stones.

Caravan Park, Blair Drummond, Stirlingshire

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Tumulus: OS Grid Reference – NS 7253 9906

Also Known as:

Canmore ID 46065
Old Farm

Getting Here

Caravan Park burial mound

Along the A84 Stirling-Doune road, watch out for the minor Cuthill Brae road to the caravan park. Go up and into Blair Drummond caravan park (ignore the old grumpy southern-type fella who tells you “this is private”), right into and through the walled area where the caravans are situated. Out the other side is a children’s playground— and the very large mound to your left with a tree on top (and a children’s slide built on it) is the burial mound in question.

Archaeology & History

Tumulus from the southeast

This comes as something of a surprise when you first set eyes on it. It’s big! (bigger than I expected anyway!) Seemingly on its own, rising from the level ground and surrounded by cultivated land, there were probably others of its kin close by, but the closest that we know about is 1.5km to the east; although the standing stone of Boreland Hill a few hundred yards west might have had some relevance….

This tumulus may be the one noted by Charles Roger (1853) in his visit to the area. He spoke of the now denuded burial mound to the east (in the Safari Park), but also told that,

“Within the park are two other tumuli, one situated in the garden, of a conical form and measuring 92 yards in circumference and about 15 yards in height…”

Blair Drummund tumulus on 1866 OS-map

This mound is more 15 feet in height than yards, but the other measurement is close—and it does seem to be in the right area.

There is much greater certainty in J.G. Callander’s (1929) account. He was fortunate in being part of the excavations undertaken here by Sir Kay and Lady Muir in 1927-28 and gave a damn good account of what went on:

“The mound is not quite circular, as it measures about 75 feet in diameter from north to south and about 65 feet from east to west, its height being about 15 feet. Before the excavations were started it seemed as if the monument consisted entirely of earth, but before the examination was completed it was found that it contained a small cairn of stones, heaped over a grave formed of large slabs arid boulders which undoubtedly was the primary interment.

“Commencing at the south-south-eastern edge of the mound, a trench driven in towards the centre, revealed the presence of a short cist which had apparently been disturbed at some previous time. A large block of stone formed the northern end and a large slab the east side. A smaller slab lay at the south end and another on the west side, but as the latter was too short to fill the space, a larger slab lay obliquely between it and the large stone at the north end. There was no appearance of a cover stone. The length of this grave was 3 feet 3inches, its breadth 3 feet, and its depth 2 feet 3 inches. The longer axis lay practically north and south. No traces of human remains or relics of any sort were found here. This was evidently a secondary burial sunk into the mound as far as the original surface of the ground, and covered with about 4 feet of soil at the centre.

“As the trees interfered with further excavations at this part, another trench was cut in from the northern arc as far as the centre of the mound, where an undisturbed cist, formed of large rough slabs and a cover stone, was encountered. Although this grave was considerably larger in length, breadth and depth than any of the numerous short cists that I have examined, I think it should be classed with them rather than with the large cist-like chambers sometimes found in long cairns. It was formed of two side and two end slabs. The sides were roughly parallel, but the slab at the southern end was placed obliquely so that the length of the grave was 4 feet 6 inches on the east side and 4 feet on the west side. The general breadth was 3 feet at the floor, and the depth 4 feet. Both side slabs converged towards the top. As the slabs on the east side and at the ends were not so high as that on the west, the spaces between them and the cover stone were carefully built up with smaller stones. A slight vacancy between the slabs at the south-east corner was filled in a similar fashion. A small cairn of clean stones without a mixture of soil had been heaped up over the cist, covering the lid to a depth of about 9 inches: the diameter of the cairn at the base was not ascertained. The depth of earth above the summit of the cairn was about 8 feet. But for a layer of a few inches of earth on the floor the cist was empty. Nothing was found except some small unburnt fragments of human bone, very much decayed, and a few teeth. Some small fragments of charred wood were found in making the trench and in the grave, but whether it was charred by natural carbonisation or by burning was not determined.

“In making the trench just before the grave was reached, but at a higher level, a small portion of the cutting edge of a stone axe was found. It had no evident connection with the cist, and may have happened to be lying about amongst the soil that was piled up over the grave.

“As there remained a space on the top of the mound which could be excavated without destroying any of the trees, it was examined. About 1 foot under the surface a cinerary urn was found in an inverted position. The base had been crushed in, and the wall was full of cracks into which tree roots had penetrated. On taking it out the vessel was found to have originally been about half-filled with cremated human bones. These after examination were reinterred in the mound. No other relics were found in the urn.

“The vessel, which is formed of buff-coloured clay with a tinge of red in places, is a cinerary urn of the cordoned variety belonging to the Bronze Age. It is encircled at the widest part, about 3½ inches below the lip, by a raised moulding or cordon, and about 3 inches lower down by another. The greater part of the vessel was recovered, but as the basal portion was completely crushed, it is impossible to ascertain the height of the vessel or the width of the base when complete. It measures 10¾ inches in external diameter at the mouth and 11⅞ inches at the widest part: what remains of the wall is 13 inches in height. The rim, which is unusually thin for a vessel of this class, is only ⅜-inch in thickness, and it is bevelled downwards towards the interior. The space between the upper cordon and the rim is the only part which is decorated, and here there is a row of large triangles, alternately plain and filled, with a reticulated design, bordered above and below with a single marginal line, all formed by pressing a twisted cord on the clay before it was fired.”

Protected tumulus, damaged by slide

The burial mound is still in a reasonably good state of preservation… on the whole… There is however, a slightly worrying note: this tumulus is a protected scheduled monument but despite this it has, as of late, been quite deliberately built upon. When Penny Sinclair and I visited the nearby Christ’s Well recently (out of season), an unhelpful grumpy man working or living there told us we were “not allowed on the site – it’s private.” We thought he was joking and I laughed that, “This is Scotland!” He repeated his words. A week later, Paul Hornby and I revisited the Christ’s Well and then took to see this large burial mound – only to find that a children’s play area had been built right up to, and upon, the northwestern part of the monument. This is in contravention of legal regulations to build upon Scheduled Monuments, as:

“The area to be scheduled encompasses the mound and an area around it in which traces of associated activity may be expected to survive.”

This has been violated.

If you like your prehistoric burial mounds, this is well worth having a look at.

References:

Callander, J. Graham, “A Bronze Age Burial Mound at Blair Drummond, Perthshire,” in Proceedings Society of Antiquaries Scotland, volume 63, 1929.
Roger, Charles, A Week at Bridge of Allan, Adam & Charles: Edinburgh 1853.
Royal Commission on the Ancient & Historical Monuments of Scotland, Archaeological Sites and Monuments of Stirling District, Central Region, Society of Antiquaries of Scotland 1979.

Broadgate, Strathblane, Stirlingshire

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Chambered Cairn (destroyed): OS Grid Reference – NS 5674 7938

Also Known as:

Canmore ID 44453

Archaeology & History

A once-impressive large prehistoric long cairn could be found close to the grid-reference given here, whose existence and destruction was recorded, thankfully, by local antiquarians in the 18th and 19th centuries respectively. There are remains of other prehistoric sites in and around the spot—including the standing stones of both Broadgate Farm and Strathblane Church—close to which Mr J.G. Smith (1866) described,

“towards the end of last century a mound was levelled at Broadgate near this spot, and many stone coffins, each containing an urn full of earth and burnt bones, were found.”

Smith himself refers to the lengthier description of the mound’s destruction in Ure’s History of Rutherglen (1793), in which the site was described as

“an ancient burying place, the origins of which is unknown, was 60 yards in length, 14 feet in height, and of a considerable breadth. It was composed of gravel, and lay east and west. In the bottom were a great many coffins of stone, placed in a row, and separated from one another by a single flag. Every coffin contained an urn, that was full of earth and burnt bones. Beside each urn was a pillar about 3 feet in height, and 8 inches in thickness. They were fragments of basaltic five-sided columns, a few rocks of which are found in the parish. Most of the pillars are built in a dyke adjoining to the church. The urns on being touched fell in pieces.”

Due to the seemingly extravagant lay-out of this cairn, Audrey Henshall (1972) took the site to be a chambered tomb of some considerable importance. She was probably right! In her magnum opus (1972) on the subject she wrote:

“The description of the ‘cists’ suggests a segmented chamber of Clyde type, but the mound composed of gravel (instead of being a cairn) suggests a natural feature. A long mound, probably natural, exists on Broadgate Farm in which a restricted excavation produced a cist of Bronze Age type. Possibly the Strathblane mound was similar; it may have contained a segmented chamber (…where a chamber has been built into a natural mound), or it may have contained cists of later type for single burials.”

Subsequent explorations by the Royal Commission (1963) and local historians to find any remains of the site have proved fruitless.

References:

Henshall, Audrey S., The Chambered Tombs of Scotland – volume 2, Edinburgh University Press 1972.
Royal Commission on the Ancient & Historical Monuments Scotland, Stirling – volume 1, HMSO: Edinburgh 1963.
Scott, J.G., “Inventory of Clyde Cairns,” in Megalithic Enquiries in the West of Britain,Liverpool University Press 1969.
Smith, John G., The Parish of Strathblane, James Maclehose: Glasgow 1886.
Ure, David, The History of Rutherglen and East Kilbride, Glasgow 1793.

Long Man’s Grave, Abernyte, Perthshire

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Tomb: OS Grid Reference – NO 2218 3153

1867 OS-map of the site

Also Known as:

Canmore ID 30663
Hoolmyre
The Lang Man’s Grave
MacBeth’s Grave

Archaeology & History

A little-known, but once important site in the mythic history of Scotland, this Long Man’s Grave was said to be the spot where MacBeth—described by Aitchison (1999) as “Scotland’s foremost King”—died. It would seem that any remains of the stone which once stood here has gone. When Robert Chambers (1827) told of the site, he said that

“At the bottom of Dunsinnan Hill, on the east side, and near the west end of a drystone wall which runs along the side of the road from Baledgarno, is a large stone about eight feet in length, beneath which MacBeth is said to have been interred. It is usually called the Lang Man’s Graff, probably from a supposition that the stone was made to suit the length of the deceased.”

More than fifty years later when the Scottish historian Thomas Hunter (1883) wrote about the site, he thought that it had probably been a prehistoric one, telling that

“The tumulus, on being examined, proved to be a druidical stone that had toppled over, and no relic was discovered that could throw light on the tradition.”

Long Man’s Grave on 1867 6-inch map

Site of the Long Mans Grave

The site was shown on the earliest OS-maps of the region (as highlighted here), but we don’t know for certain about the exact nature of the site. Although a bunch of lads from the Royal Commission popped along to see the place in 1969 and proclaimed (without excavation) that the stone was “probably a ‘grave slab’ and not a “standing stone” which has toppled over”, we have to treat their words with caution. Close by are the remains of Bronze Age stone circles; above us we have the prehistoric hillfort of Dunsinane, with even older neolithic remains being found within it; and we also have neolithic rock art remains nearby; other prehistoric tombs, and plenty more besides…

Folklore

Echoing the early folklore of the site as narrated by local people, Hunter (1883) told that,

“the tradition of the district is that MacBeth, finding it impossible to escape from MacDuff, threw himself from the top of the (Dunsinane) Hill, was killed upon the rocks, and buried at the ‘Lang Man’s Grave’.”

References:

Aitchison, Nick, MacBeth – Man and Myth, Sutton: Stroud 1999.
Chambers, Robert, The Picture of Scotland – volume 2, William Tait: Edinburgh 1827.
Hunter, Thomas, Woods, Forests and Estates of Perthshire, Henderson, Robertson & Hunter: Perth 1883.
Melville, Lawrence, The Fair Land of Gowrie, W.Culross 1939.
Pennant, Thomas, A Tour in Scotland and Voyage to the Hebrides – volume 2, London 1776.
Royal Commission on Ancient & Historical Monuments, Scotland, South-East Perth: An Archaeological Landscape, HMSO: Edinburgh 1994.
Sinclair, John, The Statistical Account of Scotland, 1797 – volume 11: South and East Perthshire, Kinross-shire, EP: Wakefield 1976.

Glen Cochill Cairnfield (01), Little Dunkeld, Perthshire

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Cairns: OS Grid Reference – NN 9035 4145

Getting Here

Two of at least five cairns hereby

Take the A826 road south out of Aberfeldy, uphill, till you reach the White Cairn or Carn Ban, then follow the dirt-track for 700 yards onto the moors until you reach the Glen Cochill Circle 1. From here, look at the large stone atop of the very notable rounded hillock barely 50 yards east (at NN 90367 41478) and meander on the slopes immediately below it on the south and west. If the heather’s grown back, you don’t stand a chance!

Archaeology & History

As far as I’m aware, despite there being some brief notes of cairnfields in and around the rich prehistoric arena of Glen Cochill, I can find no data indicating that the five small single cairns a short distance south and southeast of the Glen Cochill Ring (01), have been described before.

Cairn 1 – looking north

Cairn 2 – looking north

Deeply embedded into the peat, they are only visible when the heather has been burnt away, as highlighted in the accompanying photos. Each cairn is of roughly the same size and structure: 2-3 yards across and only a couple of feet above ground-level, consisting of the traditional small rounded stones, each probably constituting a single burial or cremation.

Cairn 4, below the hilltop rock

Of at least five cairns that we found here (there may be others beneath the covering heather), it was very notable that they’re on edges of a rounded pyramidal hillock, whose top is surmounted by a large pointed stone – probably a glacial erratic. We looked at this rock in the hope of finding some cup-markings, but there were none. However, it seemed as if the cairns and this crowning stone were related to each other, as if rites for the dead were proclaimed here for those in the tombs. It may sound silly, but go there and take a look at it yourselves – before the heather grows back. Just as a priests today, and shamans throughout history, have used an altar or plinth to make commemorations to the dead, so this crowning stone may equally have been used. It makes sense. And, as if to add validating ingredients: if we look east, past the crowning stone and across the River Cochill, we see the great rocks in the forest known as Creag a Bhaird, or the Crag of the Bard, from whence orations and tales were known to be told… But that’s another site with its very own story…

Acknowledgements: Once again, thanks must be given to Mr Paul Hornby for his help in finding these sites.

Judge’s Cairn, Dunblane, Perthshire

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Cairn: OS Grid Reference – NN 73944 05618

Also Known as:

The Big Cairn
Canmore ID 24661
Dalbrack

Getting Here

Along the A820 road between Dunblane and Doune, from the Dunblane-side, take the very first minor road on your right a few hundred yards after you’ve come off (or over) the A9 dual-carriageway. Go all the way to the very top of this long and winding road for several miles, until you reach the gate which prevents you going any further. Walk up the slope on your left (west) and you’ll see the large grassy mound a coupla hundred yards ahead of you. That’s it!

Archaeology & History

Highlighted on the first Ordnance Survey map of the area in 1862, this is a large rounded prehistoric cairn of some considerable size, whose position in the landscape allows for an impressive 360° view way into the distance in several directions—a deliberate ingredient, no doubt, when it came to building this probable tomb. I say “probable”, as there has never been a dig (not an ‘official’ one anyway) into the heart of this overgrown rocky mound.

More than 60 feet in diameter at its greatest and 6 feet high, with a circumference of 67 yards (61m), the top of the mound has been disturbed and, clearly, has been dug into at some time in the distant past—but archaeohistorical accounts are silent on this matter. The first description of the Judge’s Cairn seems to have been in Peter Stewart’s (1839) notes on the local antiquities of Dunblane, where he described it most simply as:

“The Judges Cairn, yet undispersed, a circular heap of rough mountains stones covered with furze, on the farm of Bowie, barony of Kilbride.”

Along with the Ordnance Survey lads who came here in 1862, all subsequent visits gave rise to only short notes about the place. Odd, considering its size and distinct vantage point. And yet it remains hidden from view unless you come from the north, from whence that archetype of a fairy mound raises itself above Nature’s fair body into the eyes of any ambling wanderer…. A wonderful place to sit and dream for a while…

Folklore

We enquired with a local whose family had been resident here since the mid-18th century about the name and folklore of the site, but he said he knew of nothing. However, in earlier times it was said to be a place where the local sheriff held court and dispensed justice. Mr Mackay (1984) told that the site “has been connected with the Judge’s Seat at Severie” nearby. It seems possible that, as “it is just outside the parish boundary” between Doune and Dunblane, this may have been a moot site in ancient times, from whence laws were dispensed. Old perambulation records may, perhaps, prove fruitful…

References:

Barty, Alexander, The History of Dunblane, Eneas MacKay: Stirling 1944.
Mackay, Moray S., Doune – Historical Notes, Forth Naturalist: Stirling 1984.
Royal Commission on the Ancient & Historical Monuments of Scotland, Archaeological Sites and Monuments of Stirling District, Central Region, Society of Antiquaries of Scotland 1979.
Shearer, John E., “Prehistoric Man and Prehistoric Remains in Britain,” in Transactions of the Stirling Natural History & Archaeological Society, 1907.
Stewart, Peter G., Essay on the Dunblane Mineral Springs, Hewit: Dunblane 1839.

Cromlix Lodge, Dunblane, Perthshire

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Long Cairn: OS Grid Reference – NN 7617 0671

Also Known as:

Bracklin Burn
Canmore ID 73465

Getting Here

Long line of the cairn, looking S

Take the B8033 north out of Dunblane and, immediately out the other side of Kinbuck, as you cross the river, take the first track on your left to Cromlix. Keep right along here to Cullings and beyond, till you reach the edge of the forestry plantation. Go left instead of going into the trees and, instead, follow the edge of the woodland for about 750 yards. You’ll see the land rise up on the other side of the stream and the huge length of stones thereby. That’s it!

Archaeology & History

Main axis of the cairn

Not included in any major archaeology tomes, this giant long prehistoric pile of rocks—probably constructed in neolithic times—sits along the edge of a natural ridge, out of sight of all but the lone wanderer and the birds. Aligned ESE to WNW, this huge monument measures more than 61 yards (56m) in length and is 12 yards across at its present widest section. Much of the tomb has been severely robbed for stone in making the local walling: two of which emerge out of the structure itself—one running directly downhill from its larger eastern edge, and a more extensive wide line of walling running west and northwest for quite some distance. This western section of walling has the hallmarks of being constructed as far back as the Iron Age, which may be when the initial destruction of the chambered cairn first started. But, until we get an excavation here, we won’t know for sure.

Portion of the central mass of stones

Western wall leads to the cairn

The next closest tomb of any great size is the Judge’s Cairn, 1½ miles (2.4km) to the southwest. Clusters of smaller single cairns exist about nearly a mile northwest, with prehistoric settlement traces accompanying them—but nothing seems in immediate attendance to this Cromlix giant.

Other sites, obviously, await discovery in this area. We know that a spring of water roughly 50 yards east of here was used by so-called ‘witches’ in earlier centuries, for both healing and sympathetic magick. Whether this tradition ever had any relationship with the cairn is difficult to say.

References:

Royal Commission Ancient & Historical Monuments of Scotland, Braes of Doune: An Archaeological Survey, Edinburgh 1994.

Giant’s Grave, Tweedsmuir, Peeblesshire

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Tumulus (destroyed): OS Grid Reference – NT 0925 2410

Also Known as:

Canmore ID 48535

Archaeology & History

Giant’s Grave & Stone on 1865 OS-map

Marked on the 1865 OS-map as a “tumulus”, it was destroyed by some idiot in 1818 due to some basic lacking; but we can see from the old map how close it was to the Giant’s Stone on the south-side of the River Tweed, to which it may have had an archaeological connection with. When it was destroyed, the New Statistical Account in 1845 described there being a six-foot long stone coffin (cist) beneath the tumulus, containing the usual burial urn.

Folklore

When the 18th century writer Alexander Pennecuik (1715) wrote about this old tomb, he narrated the tradition of the site as told him by the local people, telling:

“….upon the head of a burn on the south side of Tweed, stands the old-house of Hawkshaw, belonging (to) Porteous, from a numerous race of Ancestor’s Chiefs of that surname. Over against the foot of Hawkshaw-Burn in a Kairn beside the High road is the Giants Grave, so called from a huge and mighty Fellow, that robbed all on the way, but was at length from a Mount in the over side of the River supprised and shor to Death as Tradition goes.”

References:

Pennecuik, Alexander, A Geographical, Historical Description of the Shire at Tweeddale, John Moncur: Edinburgh 1715.
Royal Commission on the Ancient & Historical Monuments, Scotland, Peeblesshire – volume 1, Aberdeen University Press 1967.

Law Knowe, Niddrie, Edinburgh, Midlothian

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Tumulus (destroyed): OS Grid Reference – NT 3076 7177

Archaeology & History

Long since gone, this little-known burial mound could once be seen not far from the old mansion of Niddrie House. The only reference I’ve found of it is in Thomas Whyte’s (1792) early essay on the parish of Liberton, where he told:

“East from the house and plantations, and on the north side of the public road, is a rising ground, or tumulus, called the Law Know, where, in more early times, judgment was dispensed, and where, probably, certain acknowledgments were made, by those who held of the baron or family. It is of a circular form. And this is the cafe with all places of the same kind. For they were considered as emblems of the sun, that great object of Druidical worship.”

The site appears to have been destroyed when the Industrialists blasted their quarry here and, as historians well know, quarrymen are dreadful when it comes to making notes of anything! Any additional info on this place would be good….

References:

Whyte, Thomas, “An Account of the Parish of Liberton in Midlothian, or County of Edinburgh,” in Archaeologica Scotica, volume 1, 1792.

Beinn na Caillich cairn, Broadford, Skye

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Chambered Cairn: OS Grid Reference – NG 6291 2377

Getting Here

Henshall’s plan of Beinn na Caillich tomb

From Broadford town, head northwest outta town up the A87 for a mile, turning left and stopping by the electricity station just 100 yards along. Follow the line of cables down, SE, through the trees, dead straight for about 600 yards (crossing the large stream about halfway) till you notice an open gap through the trees on your right where, 40 yards in, there’s a large circular arena which has been kept aside amidst which a scattered mound is clearly visible. In this opening in the trees…this is where the tomb/s rest…

Archaeology & History

Sited a mile east on lowlands beneath the shadow of Beinn na Cailleach mountain, with its host of heathen legends and lore, is reputed to be the prehistoric remains of an important ancestral burial site, under dominion of the cailleach’s eye. In Audrey Henshall’s (1972-2) magnum opus she describes the remains of what may be two separate tombs here as “difficult to interpret”; even “questioning whether they do in fact represent the ruins of a chambered cairn” as has been ascribed. The site is still included in the Canmore survey, where they cite the same reference as I do here, but add no additional data to Henshall’s query. There is obviously something to be seen here, but until excavation of the site has been done, the exact nature of what lies here cannot be clarified. Miss Henshall wrote:

“There is a setting of stones forming about a third of the west side of a circle which would have a diameter of about 30ft if complete; its greatest N to S measurement is 23ft. The stones are thin slabs 4 to 5in thick, up to 3ft 6in long, set on their long sides and projecting up to 2ft above the turf. The stones have probably been reduced in size due to natural fracturing as the stone readily flakes away. Within this setting, which might be interpreted as the kerb of a cairn, there is a rise of about 1ft above ground level and the grass grows greener, but except for this and a number of boulders lying about the site, there is no sign of cairn material. This is curious as there is no obvious reason for removing it.

“Inside the ‘kerb’ there is a horse-shoe setting of five similar slabs, just visible except for two on the S side which project 1ft 2in due to some peat on their N side having been removed. The enclosed area is 7ft wide by 7ft 6in long, open on the E end. On this side, 14ft from the W end of the setting, is a larger stone, set on end, 2ft 8in high. This might be regarded as a portal stone except that it is set opposite the centre of the open end of the horse-shoe setting, and there is a low thin slab projecting westwards from the middle of its W face. E of this there lie a number of flat slabs and boulders, the larger (some measuring 3ft 8in by 3ft and 4 by 2ft) marked on the plan, but they do not suggest the form of the original structure.

“A stone is set radially to the kerb, 15ft 8in to the N. It is on its long edge, 4ft 11in long and 2ft 2in high. Twenty eight feet S of the kerb there is a circular setting of small boulders, 6ft 6in across inside, and part of another concentric setting can be traced 6ft outside these.”

References:

Henshall, Audrey, The Chambered Tombs of Scotland – volume 2, Edinburgh University Press 1972.

Tongue House, Tongue, Sutherland

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Chambered Cairn: OS Grid Reference – NC 5926 5862

Also Known as:

Canmore ID 5325

Getting Here

Tongue House chambered cairn amidst the trees

I approached this by walking along the B8438 road northwest out of Tongue village, towards the road-crossing over the Kyle of Tongue. There’s a small tiny road on the right (easily missed) nearly a mile out, just as the road starts to bend, which leads you down to Tongue House. Go along here for about 325 yards (300m) and just as the road bends to the left, walk into the woods. Keep straight forward, following the low-level stream, and when you see the buildings ahead of you, veer diagonally upslope until you hit the large Tongue Burn. Cross this and walk uphill to the tree-covered knoll ahead. You’re there!

Archaeology & History

…and again, looking north

From the descriptions I’d read of this site, I wasn’t expecting much at all—but it was much better than I anticipated, and in a beautiful woodland setting too. Admittedly the site is much overgrown, but the overall size, edges and outline of the tomb is easily discernible. In pacing across it, from outer-edge to outer-edge, it measured 18 yards by 19 yards across. All round the edges are many overgrown tumbles of smaller rocks which obviously had been part of the cairn in previous centuries; but it is primarily defined by the larger earthfast rocks at the very top of the natural knoll in the trees, all of them covered in deep mosses.

The site was first mentioned in James Horsburgh’s (1870) survey of the region. He explored a small section of the monument and, upon digging, found a chamber therein—defined by Audrey Henshall (1963) as “a single compartment chamber”—telling us:

“A little to the south of Tongue House, and near the fountain head that supplies it with water, there is the chamber of a cairn of the same description as that near Skelpick, but rather smaller; on clearing it out, I found that one of the large upright stones had two holes bored artificially a short way into each of its sides, but not quite opposite, the holes were about 3 inches diameter.”

However, these internal structures have not been seen since and in Henshall & Ritchie’s (1995) catalogue of Sutherland’s giant tombs, there is some confusion over the definition of the structure itself, questioning whether or not it was indeed a chambered tomb.

“The ‘chambered cairn’ is a circular stone structure overgrown with small trees and covered in leaf-litter and moss. A kerb about 15m in diameter can be traced for much of the circuit. The kerb is of unusually substantial and closely-set boulders which have the appearance of the base of a massive wall such as is inappropriate for a dun or a broch rather than a cairn. The interior is filled with loose stones including some quite large boulders, roughly to the level of the top of the kerb. There is no indication that these boulders have formed part of a neolithic chamber or that the structure was a cairn. There seem to be three possibilities: that the structure is not Horsburgh’s cairn; that the structure is that which he investigated but that he was mistaken in regarding it as a chambered cairn; that the writers are mistaken in identifying the structure as a ruined broch or dun.”

Despite this, the general consensus today is that the monument is indeed a chambered cairn.

References:

Henshall, Audrey S., The Chambered Tombs of Scotland – 2 volumes, Edinburgh University Press 1963 & 1972.
Henshall, Audrey S. & Ritchie, J.N.G, The Chambered Cairns of Sutherland, Edinburgh University Press 1995.
Horsburgh, James, “Notes of Cromlechs, Duns, Hut-circles, Chambered Cairns and other Remains, in the County of Sutherland“, in Proceedings Society of Antiquaries, Scotland, volume 7, 1870.
Royal Commission on Ancient & Historical Monuments, Scotland, Second report and inventory of monuments and constructions in the county of Sutherland. HMSO: Edinburgh 1911.