Latest News

October 2006

Applecross Broch-  Working in partnership with Applecross Archaeology, HAS archaeologists led community volunteers to begin excavations on the Iron Age broch overlooking Applecross Bay in the local campsite. 

 

                           

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Overall view of Applecross broch excavation.

 

September 2006

 

Community Projects:

 

  Learnie Caves - Working with local enthusiasts and volunteers led by Simon Gunn, we explored several occupation layers in a cave on the raised beach of the Moray Firth near Rosemarkie.

 

 

                   Excavations inside the cave.

  

 

Cromarty House Garden- Cromarty House occupies the site once home to a medieval castle.  This site lies on a brae east of present-day Cromarty.  However, on Pont's 17th c. map, Cromarty is shown as lying close to the castle with no buildings on the gravel spit the town occupies today. 

   With the help of local volunteers, we aimed to prove a theory that Cromarty, in its medieval days, originated at the base of the brae on which Cromarty House now sits and later expanded westwards.  Today, Cromarty East Church, the town's medieval church, lies at the end of Church Street, which ends abruptly here and turns at a sharp and unnatural right angle.  We proposed that the medieval town's road ran from the base of the brae and met up with this end of Church Street. 

    We dug two trenches at the base of the brae, in the Cromarty House gardens.  Our results yielded much information about the former gardens, but we did not uncover remains of a medieval road.  However, it is highly likely that our road lies outside the garden walls and we just haven't found it...yet...we hope to continue the investigation in the future.

 

Remains of a garden feature, Trench 1, Cromarty House Garden.

 

 

 

   

August 2006

 

    Cromarty Townlands Barn- Dating to 1690, Townlands Barn was home to Cromarty's local minister until later being used as a barn and milk parlour.  In recent years, the building has been derelict and subject to vandalism until the Highland Buildings Preservation Trust received a grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund to fund restoration and conservation efforts with the hope to restore the house to its former glory.   HAS was there for the initial stages of excavation to more fully reveal its fascinating history.

Horse wheel in Townlands Barn front garden.