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MHG7328 - Possible Remains of Cairn, Loch Vatachan

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NC01SW 8 0214 1158
A turf-covered, heavily quarried stony mound. Original size conjectural but approx 13m diameter. Poss remains of cairn.
Visited by OS (AA) 17 July 1974.

On W of public road to Achiltibuie there is a farmstead comprising two buildings, the disturbed footings of what may be a third, and an area of rig cultivation. It is likely that this site is related to some of cultivation remains that lie to E of road. There is no sign of a cairn recorded by OS in 1974.
Two of buildings, both much reduced and set roughly at right angles to one another, lie on S edge of grass-covered ground between road and Loch Raa.NW building is better preserved, though robbed of stone (ACHIL94 550), it measures about 10.6m N to S by 5m transversely over faced-rubble walls 0.7m thick and up to 0.25m high. Third building, which lies in deep heather to S of old river course that divides site in two, measures 10.6m NW to SE by 5.3m transversely over collapsed, rubble walls 1.2m thick, with an extension on NW 3.3m long (ACHIL94 551). The grass-covered ground to N of buildings displays the faint traces of plough-rig between 3m and 5m wide.
To N of the old stream-course, E of the public road, and enclosing a plot of grass-and-bracken-covered ground beside the loch, there are two roughly parallel banks, 20m and 30m apart, which on plan describe a semi-circle about 85m across internally. A third bank runs from the S end of the outer enclosure-bank until it reaches the burn (NC 0232 1143), 170m to the SE, and a small enclosure or pen is built on the exterior of the inner bank (NC 0221 1164). There is an area of plough-ridges, measuring 5m to 7m between the furrows, within the outer of the two banks on the S (NC 0219 1157), and a few small cairns are scattered across the interior.
This site appears to have grown into a small farm from a phase as a shieling. May's survey of 1758 (SRO, RHP 85395) depicts an unlabelled area, which may indicate its use either as a shieling or as a piece of outfield. The 1st edition of the OS 6-inch map depicts a building on a NW-SE axis on the N of the Allt Lochan Sgeirich (Cromartyshire 1881, Sheet IIIA), which may be the southernmost of the buildings (ACHIL94 551) on the site, and a head-dyke with an arm leading off to the SE that matches the outer of the two enclosure banks and the bank leading to the SE that were mapped during survey
(ACHIL94 550-1)
Visited by RCAHMS (PJD) 10 August 1994

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Location

Grid reference	Centred NC 0213 1158 (14m by 14m) (2 map features)
Map sheet	NC01SW
Geographical Area	ROSS AND CROMARTY
Civil Parish	LOCHBROOM

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