From Callander head east along the main A84 road and nearly 300 yards past the entrance to the Keltie Bridge caravan park, take the tiny road on your left (north) and barely 100 yards along turn right and go up here for exactly 1 mile. Walk up the track from here and follow the directions to find the Black Park (1) cairn; and then the nearby small Black Park (2) cairn. From here you need to walk north-east round the small rounded hillock in front of you, and cross a small burn (stream) up to the next small grassy rise. Altogether this is about 200 yards from the Black Park (2) cairn. On this grassy rise lives the Black Park (3) cairn!
Archaeology & History
As with its compatriot Black Park (2) cairn 200 yards southwest, this can be hard to see. It’s an overgrown small singular cairn (it looks like a tumulus now) of no great note to look at: probably the resting spot of an individual or just a small family. Measuring some 5-6 yards across and less than a yard high at the most, its easily missed unless you’re really mean to find it. More impressive are the ones on the hill immediately above you to the east. Head there next!
References:
Royal Commission Ancient & Historical Monuments, Scotland, Braes of Doune: An Archaeological Survey, RCAHMS: Edinburgh 1994.
When the Grey Cairn above Balnabroich, Kirkmichael, was explored in the second-half of the 19th century by John Stuart (1865) and a number of local labourers, they found the floor of the tomb had been paved with a number of large boulders. Near its centre, along with finding remains of charred wood, they moved some of the rocks and,
“On turning over the stones a circular disc of stone with a hole in the centre was found, as also a small boulder with a cup on its flat face.”
Grey Cairn at sunfall
He made no further remarks about the carving and no intimation that it was removed, so we must presume it is still there, at the botton of the cairn. Any visitors to the site might want to have a look at the massive scatter of surface stones that make up the cairn to see if any further cup-marks exist on them. It’s not uncommon to find them on such giant tombs.
Folklore
A very curious folktale was known of the cairn in the 19th century, whose theme is recognized at numerous other prehistoric sites, but the mythic creature involved here is very much different from the ones we’re used to. Mr Stuart told that,
“The popular belief is that a mermaid is buried beneath it. This mermaid used to throw stones at people who were coming from church at Kirkmichael, and she could only be seen through a hole in the knot of the pine tree. At last she was chased to the hill at Balnabroch on her flight to the waters of Loch Marech, on the other side of the hill, and there killed, when the Grey Cairn was raised over her.”
References:
Royal Commission on the Ancient & Historical Monuments of Scotland, North-East Perth: An Archaeological Landscape, HMSO: Edinburgh 1990.
Stuart, John, “Account of Excavations in Groups of Cairns, Stone Circles and Hut Circles on Balnabroch, Parish of Kirkmichael, Perthshire,” in Proceedings Society Antiquaries, Scotland, volume 6, 1865.
Acknowledgements:Huge thanks for use of the Ordnance Survey map in this site profile, reproduced with the kind permission of the National Library of Scotland.
Along the A924 Strathardle road, a couple of miles south of Kirkmichael, about 100 yards south of the Balnabroich standing stone, look out for the dirt-track that runs up the slope on the east side of the road. Go up here, past Stylemouth house and further up the track where it opens out into the fields. Keep heading up the same track and you’ll notice on the near skyline a few hundred yards ahead of you, a mass of stones with a tree growing out of it. That’s the Grey Cairn; and about 75 yards below it, just to the right-side of the path low down in the grasses, you’ll see this hut circle.
Archaeology & History
In an upland area that is literally teeming with ancient remains, this is a good place to start if you’re wanting a day out exploring. It’s the best and easiest of the hut circles to find and is a good indicator of what to look for when you’re seeking out the others close by. This particular prehistoric house has been noted in various books and essays: firstly by the great Scottish antiquarian John Stuart (1868) in his overview of the great mass of sites hereby, saying simply:
“A hut circle on the south-west of the Grey Cairn was dug into around the entrance, in the belief that in this situation articles would probably have been thrown out, but with no result. In the centre, charred wood and minute fragments of bones were found.”
Looking from aboveArc of walling north to east
The great Christian MacLagan (1875) came to survey the area shortly after Stuart’s visit, making a series of sketches of some of the circles. She noted fourteen huts hereby, but it’s not totally clear which of them is this particular “hut 9”. It seems to have been her hut circle no.13, which she told “has a central chamber 40 feet in diameter, and its wall is 10 feet broad.” This is pretty close to our modern measurements. From outer wall to outer wall, its east-west axis measures 47 feet, and its north-south axis measures 49 feet. The most notable section of the walling is on is northern and eastern sides where it is deeply embedded into the ground.
When you’re sitting in this hut circle, eating your sandwich or drinking your juice, remember that thousands of years ago someone was doing exactly the same thing in the place where you’re now sat!
Just 70 feet away is hut circle no.10 in this cluster; whilst above this is the massive pile of stones of the Grey Cairn; and the smaller earth-covered mound above you to the right is another prehistoric burial. A small stone circle is on the moorland level beyond that… There’s plenty to see here.
References:
Coutts, Herbert, Ancient Monuments of Tayside, Dundee Museum 1970.
Harris, Judith, “A Preliminary Survey of Hut-circles and Field Systems in SE Perthshire”, in Proceedings Society Antiquaries, Scotland, volume 114, 1984.
MacLagan, Christian, The Hill Forts, Stone Circles and other Structural Remains of Ancient Scotland, Edmonston & Douglas: Edinburgh 1875.
Royal Commission on the Ancient & Historical Monuments of Scotland, North-East Perth: An Archaeological Landscape, HMSO: Edinburgh 1990.
Stuart, John, “Account of Excavations in Groups of Cairns, Stone Circles and Hut Circles on Balnabroch, Parish of Kirkmichael, Perthshire,” in Proceedings Society Antiquaries, Scotland, volume 6, 1865.
Thorneycroft, Wallace, “Observations on Hut Circles near the Eastern Border of Perthshire, north of Blairgowrie,” in Proceedings Society Antiquaries, Scotland, volume 67, 1933.
Acknowledgements:Huge thanks for use of the Ordnance Survey map in this site profile, reproduced with the kind permission of the National Library of Scotland.
From Kirkmichael to the Balnabroich standing stone, take the same directions as if you’re heading up to the Balnabroich hut circle (9). Just over 20 yards NNW of it, on the other side of the faint footpath that takes you to the Grey Cairn, look closely at the ground and you’ll see a broken oval of stones in the grasses.
Archaeology & History
This can be difficult to see in poor light, and I found it easier to look at from above, closer to the Grey Cairn.
Hut remains, circled
It’s one of the twenty (known) hut circles in this archaeologically rich neck o’ the woods. Nothing special to look at, but it is perhaps 4000 years old! This one seems to have been listed by Christian MacLagan (1875) as her hut circle no.12 and which she described briefly, telling that “the central chamber of this circle is 36 feet in diameter, and the surrounding wall is 15 feet broad.” Much of the walling would seem to have been stripped away considerably since MacLagan’s time. The faded remains of its entrance can be seen on its southwestern side.
References:
Coutts, Herbert, Ancient Monuments of Tayside, Dundee Museum 1970.
Harris, Judith, “A Preliminary Survey of Hut-circles and Field Systems in SE Perthshire”, in Proceedings Society Antiquaries, Scotland, volume 114, 1984.
MacLagan, Christian, The Hill Forts, Stone Circles and other Structural Remains of Ancient Scotland, Edmonston & Douglas: Edinburgh 1875.
Royal Commission on the Ancient & Historical Monuments of Scotland, North-East Perth: An Archaeological Landscape, HMSO: Edinburgh 1990.
Stuart, John, “Account of Excavations in Groups of Cairns, Stone Circles and Hut Circles on Balnabroch, Parish of Kirkmichael, Perthshire,” in Proceedings Society Antiquaries, Scotland, volume 6, 1865.
Thorneycroft, Wallace, “Observations on Hut Circles near the Eastern Border of Perthshire, north of Blairgowrie,” in Proceedings Society Antiquaries, Scotland, volume 67, 1933.
Acknowledgements:Huge thanks for use of the Ordnance Survey map in this site profile, reproduced with the kind permission of the National Library of Scotland.
Take the same directions as if you’re going to visit the large Black Park (1) cairn, and from here look down the slight boggy slope to your right (east) and, across the other side of a small burn (stream) you’ll see a slightly raised grassy knoll. A curved dyke is to its left (west) side. You’re there!
Archaeology & History
This small cairn, barely two feet high at the most, and five yards across, is deemed as a possible Bronze Age cairn on Canmore and in the Royal Commission (1994) report of the area. There is certainly a pile of small stones here, but it may be a clearance cairn (I hope I’m wrong). Only an excavation will tell us for sure.
References:
Royal Commission Ancient & Historical Monuments, Scotland, Braes of Doune: An Archaeological Survey, RCAHMS: Edinburgh 1994.
Less than a mile east of Callander on the main A84 road, nearly 300 yards past the entrance to the Keltie Bridge caravan park, take the tiny road on your left (north) and barely 100 yards along turn right and go up here for excatly 1 mile (give or take a few yeards) where track goes into the forest on your left and you can park-up here. Walk up the track into the silence for just under a mile where, as the track splits and you kink to the right, a gate appears. On the other side of the gate, turn immediately left, almost walking back on yourself, just above the curving waters of a burn, through boggy reeds, keeping to the fence-line until, less than 300 yards along, you’ll reach what you’re looking for.
Archaeology & History
Black Park (1), looking W
This reasonably large cairn and its neighbours (Black Park [2], [3], [4] and [5]) would appear to be relatively new discoveries as I can find nothing about it prior to the Royal Commission’s 1994 survey. They are even absent from Moray MacKay’s (1953) excellent work on the area! Hence, descriptions of it are scant and visitors to the place are few indeed (we did meet a local who knew about the old tomb, but said that nothing was known about it); but it is, nonetheless, a fine, albeit denuded and very overgrown cairn, living today amidst a quiet mass of reeds and surrounded by boggy ground—so make sure you’ve got your boots on!
Internal line of stoneworkBlack Park (1), looking SE
At its height, today, it stands less than four feet tall and measures roughly 16 yards across at its widest. Through one section of the tomb there runs a raised line of stonework that almost looks like internal walling, which may have been where a chamber once existed. It’s been hollowed out by someone in the not-too-distant past but, as I said, there are no records of such a thing, so whether or not that was a chamber or merely a fortuituous collapse of stone in a straight line, we can’t really say. Along its more northern edges there seems to be a small raised wall of stone defining its edge, although once again it requires a more discerning examination to work out whether this is part of its original facade, or is a result of some of the stone mass falling to the edges.
Visit the old place and sit with its silence for a while…
References:
Royal Commission Ancient & Historical Monuments, Scotland, Braes of Doune: An Archaeological Survey, RCAHMS: Edinburgh 1994.
Cup-and-Ring Stone: OS Grid Reference – NT 200 522
Also Known as:
La Mancha
Archaeology & History
Simpson’s 1867 drawing
This is what I’ve come to term dyslexic cup-and-rings, due simply to the fact that it’s a cup-and-ring stone carving, but the cup in the centre hasn’t been carved out or pecked away. They’re rare – but for some odd reason, a small cluster of them occurs in this part of lowland Scotland. The Drumelzier carving 13 miles SSW is one; the Carnwath carving 14 miles west is another; 14 miles to the south, the multiple-ringed carving in the Woodend cairn had no defined pivotal cup; and in Childe & Taylor’s (1938) short piece on the Hawthornden petroglyphs near Roslyn (less than 10 miles northeast), they noted—like Simpson & Thawley (1972) years later—the peculiarity of “the complete absence of cups”, akin to Lamancha’s carved rings. (although we should be cautious about the archiac nature of the Hawthornden carvings)
The carving here was first mentioned by one of the great petroglyphic pioneers James Simpson (1866; 1867):
“A broken slab, about two feet square, covered with very rude double rings and a spiral circle, was found by Mr Mackintosh, at La Mancha, in Peeblesshire, in digging in a bank of gravel. There were some other large stones near it; none of them marked. Possibly this stone, therefore, is sepulchral in its character.”
Lamancha carving (G. & A. Ritchie, 1972 )
Eoin MacWhite (1946) was somewhat sceptical of Simpson’s “sepulchral” association, simply due to there being no account of a burial here. But in Simpson & Thawley’s (1972) survey of passage grave art, they thought the Lamancha carving was from “a possible cist slab.” We might never know for sure one way or the other.
The carving ended up living in Edinburgh’s National Museum where it should, hopefully, still be on display. As a result of this, it received the attention of the Royal Commission doods who gave a good description of the design in their Peeblesshire Inventory (1967). They state that it
“is irregular in shape and has maximum dimensions of 2ft 6in by 1ft 10in; it averages 4in in thickness. The markings, which have all been formed by the pecking technique, occur mainly on one face, the most common symbol being single or double rings. There are four complete double-ring symbols, in which the outer rings measure from 5in to 7in in diameter, and the inner rings from 2in to 4in. Round the margin of the face there are the broken arcs of five more double-ring symbols and of five single rings and one small V -shaped figure. As well as the ring markings there is a double-spiral, each lobe of which measures about 4in in diameter. In one lobe the spiral has two and a half turns and in the other only one turn. In addition, in a space which is otherwise free of markings, there is an area, about 4in square, heavily pitted with punch-marks measuring one-eighth of an inch across and one-sixteenth of an inch in depth. A remarkable feature of the stone is that three incomplete single ring symbols have been made on one edge. They have been formed by the same technique and measure 3in across; as in all the other symbols, the grooves themselves measure about half an inch in width and about one-eighth of an inch in depth.”
McWhite, Eoin, 1946 “A New View on Irish Bronze Age Rock-Scriblings”, in Journal Royal Society Antiquaries, Ireland, vol. 76, 1946.
Morris, Ronald W.B., “The Cup-and-Ring Marks and Similar Sculptures of South-West Scotland,” in Transactions of the Ancient Monuments Society, volume 14, 1967.
Morris, Ronald W.B., “The Cup-and-Ring and Similar Early Sculptures of Scotland; Part 2 – The Rest of Scotland except Kintyre,” in Transactions of the Ancient Monuments Society, volume 16, 1969.
Morris, Ronald W.B., The Prehistoric Rock Art of Southern Scotland, BAR: Oxford 1981.
Ritchie, Graham & Anna, Edinburgh and South-East Scotland, Heinnemann: London 1972.
Royal Commission on the Ancient & Historical Monuments, Scotland, Peeblesshire – volume 1, Aberdeen University Press 1967.
Simpson, D.D.A. & Thawley, J.E., “Single Grave Art in Britain,” in Scottish Archaeological Forum, no.4, 1972.
Simpson, J.Y., “On Ancient Sculpturings of Cups and Concentric Rings,” in Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries, Scotland, volume 6, 1866.
Simpson, James, Archaic Sculpturings of Cups, Circles, etc., Upon Stones and Rocks in Scotland, England and other Countries, Edmonston & Douglas: Edinburgh 1867.
Travelling north along the A823 Glendevon road (between Muckhart and Gleneagles), barely 2 miles after Muckhart, on your right you’ll see the large Castlehill reservoir. Park here. Across the waters is the large Down Hill—which the hillfort crowns. So, just walk back the way you came along the road for nearly 600 yards and then turn left to walk onto the other side of the water, round to the very end of the track and then up the path into the trees. Walk along this winding path for 300 yards until you reach the track that takes you (left) up to Downhill Farm. One way or the other, past there, just stagger up to the top of the hill!
Archaeology & History
SW wall from rampart
My only visit here was a short one – when some pretty awesome freezing gales were nearly throwing me off the top once I’d got up there! Twas incredible! On my way to the top, nearly there, on its western side, I stopped and looked each side of me as it looked as if a long overgrown line of embankments was running roughly north-south. It seemed very vague and hillforts aren’t my subject, so with the help of the wind throwing me everywhere, I made my my final zoom to the summit, only to be intruded upon again, perhaps 50 feet from the top by another similar-looking embanked ridge—this time with some stones along it and which I was pretty sure were earthworks, or ramparts as they’re known. And so it turned out to be.
Once on top, the views are superb! But I couldn’t really take it in on my short visit here as the freezing wind was truly incredible and I could barely stand upright. And so I briskly followed to the quite notable stone-walled edges of the main prehistoric “enclosure” and walked round the edges as best I could, hoping that at least one or two of the photos I was taking weren’t too blurred.
Views from aboveSW wall & central structure
The interal “settlement” portion of the hillfort is quite large, obviously, allowing for a good number of people to live here (regardless of the wind!). It’s roughly oblong in shape, aligning northwest to southeast, measuring in length a maximum of 78 yards from outer wall to outer wall, with a maximum width of 30 yards (SW to NE). The collapsed walling is still quite extensive and visible above the long grasses almost all the way round the entire structure, averaging one or two yards across. Near the centre of the fortress is a large pile of stones that seemed to have been a structure of some kind, but when i was here I didn’t hang around for too long to inspect it as I was, by now, bloody freezing! It didn’t seem to be a walker’s cairn, but we need another gander to work out what it might have been.
Northern arc of wallingNW line of walling
Curiously this site has had little said about it in archaeo-tomes and to my knowledge, no excavations have happened here. Incredibly, the place wasn’t even recognised as a prehistoric site in official records until the Royal Commission (1963) told of it being “discovered during the survey of marginal lands (1956-58)”! Its very name derives from the word dun, or fort (Watson 1995) and as the place-name writer found out, it was first mentioned in 1542, as Donehill, and many times thereafter in various documents.
Anyhow—check the place out. It’s mightily impressive and the views from the top are excellent. Just avoiding going up there in a freezing gale!
References:
Hogg, A.H.A., British Hill-Forts: An Index, BAR: Oxford 1979.
Royal Commission on the Ancient & Historical Monuments Scotland, Stirlingshire – volume 1, HMSO: Edinburgh 1963.
Watson, Angus, The Ochils: Placenames, History, Tradition, PKDC: Perth 1995.
Acknowledgements:Huge thanks for use of the Ordnance Survey map in this site profile, reproduced with the kind permission of the National Library of Scotland.
Cup-and-Ring Stone (removed): OS Grid Reference – NT 12364 32627
Also Known as:
Drumelzier Carving
Archaeology & History
Position of stone in cairn
A carving that was located at the edge of a cairn on a knoll on the east-side of the River Tweed, this is an odd design that now lives in Edinburgh’s central museum: odd, inasmuch as the design looks as if it’s a typical cup-and-ring carving, yet none of the cups on this stone were ever hollowed or pecked out, and so the “cups”, so to speak, are actually small rings (if that makes sense!). There are a number of similar unhollowed “cups” on other carvings that are found associated with prehistoric tombs, so perhaps this aspect was something of a burial trend—amongst a very small tribal group, perhaps… It’s an element that was remarked upon in Simpson & Thawley’s (1972) examination of petroglyphs in neolithic tombs that were called “passage grave style” carvings: a sort of dyslexic cup-and-ring design no less! The intriguing thing about this carving is that it’s one in a small cluster of dyslexic cup-and-rings that are found in this part of Scotland—in an area where rock art itself is pretty scarce. Which begs the question: was it a local tribal style? Anyhow…
The carving was first uncovered when J.H. Craw (1930) excavated the aforementioned cairn, finding therein a number of cists. There’s speculation that the petroglyph might originally have been a covering stone for one of the cists, but we don’t know for sure. Craw described the carving as follows:
Craw’s 1930 sketchRon Morris’ 1981 sketch
“The ring-marked slab…measures 3 feet by 2 feet by 6 inches. It lay at the north side of the cairn (highlighted in sketch, PB), outside the encircling ring, but may originally have been the cover of cist No.2. On the upper side are five shallow ring-markings, four being double and one single. The former measure 3 inches to 4 inches in diameter, and the latter 1¾ inch. The figures are thus much smaller than in typical cup-and-ring-marked stones, and the lines are only ¼ inch in width. The only similar markings known to me are on a slab which I found a number of years ago near the site of several former cairns, and forts at Harelawside near Grant’s House, Berwickshire. The stone is now in our Museum.”
The “museum” in question being Edinburgh’s National Museum (I don’t know if it’s in a box somewhere or on public display, which is where it needs to be). If anyone can get a good photo of this carving, please send it to us or add it on on our Facebook group.
Morris, Ronald W.B., “The Cup-and-Ring and Similar Early Sculptures of Scotland; Part 2 – The Rest of Scotland except Kintyre,” in Transactions of the Ancient Monuments Society, volume 16, 1969.
Morris, Ronald W.B., The Prehistoric Rock Art of Southern Scotland, BAR: Oxford 1981.
Ritchie, Graham & Anna, Edinburgh and South-East Scotland, Heinnemann: London 1972.
Royal Commission on the Ancient & Historical Monuments, Scotland, Peeblesshire – volume 1, Aberdeen University Press 1967.
Simpson, D.D.A. & Thawley, J.E., “Single Grave Art in Britain,” in Scottish Archaeological Forum, no.4, 1972.
Acknowledgements:Huge thanks for use of the Ordnance Survey map in this site profile, reproduced with the kind permission of the National Library of Scotland.
Less than a mile east of Callander on the main A84 road, nearly 300 yards just past the entrance into the Keltie Bridge caravan park, take the tiny road on your left (north) and barely 100 yards along where a small crossroads can be said to exist, go straight forward up the tiny single-track road ahead of you. Literally 0.62 miles, or 1km up, park on the right-side of the road where a small grassy track runs up the slope. From here, you need to keep walking up the road itself, bearing right just past the small bridge and, about 350 yards along you’ll see a notable rise in the field on your right less than 100 yards in. Head straight for it!
Archaeology & History
Despite this being a very basic simplistic design, I’m somewhat disappointed in myself as (for once!) I didn’t indulge myself in the soaking muddy ground and peel back the dung-infested turf to see the entire surface of this stone and, as a result, didn’t see the carving in its entirety. I’d have got soaked and been covered in shit, but that’s my usual course of action anyhow. But this time we were visiting an antique centre and book-dealer straight afterwards, so for once I couldn’t play in the mud. Damn those neat and tidy folk!
It’s nowt special to look at in all honesty, but it’s in a good state of preservation as it was seemingly uncovered in pretty recent times beneath the curious large mass of loose stones right next to it. The stone mass gives the impression of it being a ruined cairn, but seems more likely to be a clearance cairn that was piled up, quite fortuitously, next to the cup-marked rock.
The carving consists of eight cup-marks (not all shown in these photos): five large and prominent, one not so prominent, and two that are small and very shallow. The more distinct cups would seem to have been worked and re-worked many times, obviously possessing a practical nature of some sort. As we can see in the photos, four of the larger cups stand out, whilst the small ones can be difficult to see. I need to go back here sometime and clear the rest of the stone to see if there are more cup-marks underneath the soil. Check it out for yourself when you’re looking at the nearby cairns at Ballachraggan and beyond.
References:
Main, Lorna & Page, R., “Easter Brackland, Stirling,” in Discovery & Excavation Scotland, volume 2, 2001.
