Site type CULTIVATION REMAINS, FORT
Canmore ID 16307
Site Number NJ23NE 1
NGR NJ 2942 3930
Council MORAY
Parish MORTLACH
Former Region GRAMPIAN
Former District MORAY
Former County BANFFSHIRE

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Accessing Scotland's Past

The remains of a prehistoric fort occupy the top of Little Conval, a prominent hill with commanding views in all directions. It was defended by twin palisades, which enclose an area measuring about 200m by 120m.

Text prepared by RCAHMS as part of the Accessing Scotland's Past project at http://www.accessingscotlandspast.org.uk

Archaeological Notes

NJ23NE 1 2942 3930

(NJ 294 393) Camp (NR).
OS 6" map, Banffshire, 2nd ed., (1905)

A hill fort with internal measurements of 680 by 400ft. The innermost defences, which were incompleted, comprise a spread wall and marker trench. Outside this is a second marker trench, and a third line starts off 75ft outside the second which becomes a wall 6ft thick faced with large slabs. This ends among a group of shapeless enclosures which may be contemporary with the fort. A fourth line comprises a bank 110 yards long covering the N approach.
R W Feachem 1963.

An unfinished fort as described and planned by Feachem.
The group of 'shapeless enclosures' indicated by Feachem on the gentle slopes to the SE of the hill fort are the remains of a field system.
The fields, two of which measure about 22.0m by about 30.0m and about 42.0m by about 24.0m, are defined by positive and negative lynchets and low stony banks. The system is clearly contemporary with the fort.
Visited by OS (R L) 20 May 1967; Visible on OS air photograph 64:183:023

At Durn Hill [NJ56SE 4] the embryo rampart was aligned on the marker bank. The relationship between the alignments of marker and proposed defence are seen again at the unfinished fort on Little Conval, Banffshire (Feachem 1963), where two lines of defence were marked out with ditches, as at the postulated earlier phases at Durn Hill (fig. 4). The marker ditches were hewn through the sparse topsoil into the uppermost layer of rock, the spoil being dispersed downhill. Construction of permanent defences began on the inner line, on either side of an entrance. Stones probably gathered from the hill were heaped over the marker ditch, utterly obliterating it. In due course the stones would presumably have been formed into a rampart, but when work stopped no actual building had begun. Some idea of the manner in which the work would probably have progressed can, however, be seen at another unfinished fort not far away [NH67NE 1].
R W Feachem 1971.

Notes and Activities

Feachem, R (1963b) A guide to prehistoric Scotland, London
Page(s): 110-11 Held at RCAHMS E.2.FEA

Feachem, R W (1971) 'Unfinished hill-forts', in Hill, D and Jesson, M The Iron Age and its hill-forts: papers presented to Sir Mortimer Wheeler on the occasion of his eightieth year... Southampton
Page(s): 28 Held at RCAHMS E.9.FEA.P