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Publication Account

Date 2007

Event ID 587237

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Publication Account

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/587237

NM84 1 TIREFOUR CASTLE (‘Tirefuar’)

NM/8675 4291

This probably solid-based broch is a conspicuous stump of masonry, visible from afar (it appears on the marine maps as a useful landmark for sailors) and overlooking the sea. It stands on a conical knoll at the north-eastern end of a rising rocky ridge with steep slopes on all sides except the south-west; from this direction the approach to the broch is quite easy.

Description

Level 1. The wall may well be a solid one (see ‘Level 2’), with an average thickness of 4.5m (15 ft), and it encloses a Central court about 12.2m in diameter. It has not been surveyed by the author to test its closeness to a true circle. The wall still stands 3.0m high in several places and is 4.9m on the south-east where the batter is marked, having an angle of 1 in 4. The basal courses contain several massive stones. The area around the main entrance is badly dilapidated.

The passage faces west-south-west, along the easiest approach, and contains some debris; it is 1.4m wide at each end but, though the door-frame is unclear, it may be at 90cm (3 ft) from the exterior. There are no signs of any guard cells although the sides of the passage are well enough preserved for any doorways in them in the inner two- thirds of its length to be visible. The inner face of the wall is much more dilapidated than the outer, although standing up to 3.5m in the south-west.

From about 8-10 o’clock is visible what seems to the author to be a secondary wall built around the interior; it is now visible as a turf-covered ledge about 60cm (2 ft) wide and rising to about 1.5m above the present grassy surface of the court. It may be about 2.5m above the original floor and seems much too wide for a scarcement, although the Commission interprets it as such. At one point there is a break in this wall and what seems to be a built face of ponderous stones – presumably the primary wallface – is visible behind it. However if there is a true scarcement behind there are no signs of it on the exposed wallface.

At some stage the broch has been cleared of much of its debris, inside and out; judging from some of the untouched brochs in Sutherland, for example, Tirefuar should be full of stone rubble and its outer wall largely buried by it. Whether the stones were cleared away in some early attempt at exploration or simply to obtain building material is unknown. There are no apparent doorways into the wall at ground level.

The thickness of the wall varies from about 4.0 – 4.3 (13-14 ft) on the east to about 4.6 – 5.8m (15-19 ft) on the north and south [4]; it is uncertain how much should be subtracted from these measurements to allow for the thickness of the secondary wall. The slightly sub-circular shape of the Central court may be caused by these irregularities.

Level 2. An upper mural gallery is clearly visible in places on the wallhead, two lengths of it (starting at about 8.30 and 1 o’clock) being still covered with its lintel roof. Looking into the broken end of the former section it is not possible to see the lintels of any gallery below. Neither is it possible to be sure whether the present rubble floor of the gallery – which is fairly level – is original (signifying a solid wall core below) or material which has tumbled in. More investigation would be needed to check this. From 3 - 5 o’clock the outer face of this gallery stands by itself and is exposed to a height of about 1.2m (4 ft).

Outer defences: there is a short forework – a boulder-faced rubble wall with a gateway in the middle of it – running across the ridge about 6m south-west of the broch which bars the direct approach to the entrance. Another cross wall is at about the same distance from the broch on the north-east.

Discussion

Without further excavation it is not possible to be sure about some of the structural features visible in this broch. If the “scarcement” is in fact a secondary wall – as the author is inclined to believe – then it probably conceals at least one doorway in the primary wall, that leading to the stair, part of which is presumably still preserved. If it is a primary scarcement then any entry to a stair should be higher up in Level 2.

A good example of a late ‘La Tène’ bun-shaped rotary quern is known from the island and is kept at a farm not far from the broch. It is possible that this was discovered inside the broch when it was cleared out [6].

New excavations

Since 2002 a multi-disciplinary project has been in progress on Lismore [7] and in 2005 new excavations started at the broch, although so far they have been confined to the outer end of the entrance and to the ground between it and the first outer wall. Some Iron Age material has already been recovered. Of some interest too – in view of what was said earlier about the rotary quern – is the discovery of a classic Fintry quern at the site of the near by dun at Park (NM/887459).

Sources: 1. NMRS site no. NM 84 SE 1: 2. Christison 1889, 375 and 427 ff.: 3. Young 1962, 190: 4. RCAHMS 1975 , 75-6, no. 147, fig. 44 and pl. 10, A-D: 5. Ritchie and Harman 1985, 134: 6. MacKie 2002b: 7. Redhouse et al. 2002. 8. Discovery and Excavation in Scotland 2005. There are more references in [1].

E W MacKie 2007

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