The Later Iron Age in Britain and Beyond by Unknown

Author:Unknown
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: SOCIAL SCIENCE / Archaeology
ISBN: 9781782975526
Publisher: Casemate Publishers & Book Distributors, LLC
Published: 2006-12-20T00:00:00+00:00

Fig. 7. Radiocarbon dates for multivallate enclosures in Perthshire and Angus.

Although the radiocarbon revolution has, in general allowed us to push back the dating of hillforts, sometimes even into the Bronze Age, most multivallate enclosures excavated in this area since 1978 have yielded dates between 800–400 cal. BC. There are hints, however, that some of the sites may have continued in use – or been reoccupied – in the later first millennium BC, although the relevant radiocarbon dates (Fig. 7) were mostly obtained before it became possible to date small samples such as burnt seeds, and so must be treated with appropriate caution. AMS dating should in the future enable us to obtain extensive series of dates from these sites with a minimum of taphonomic complications associated with their interpretation.

At the multivallate terrace-edge enclosure of North Mains, Strathallan, an oak post, apparently burnt in situ, was radiocarbon dated to 390–110 cal. BC (GU-2681). No other radiometric dates are yet available from excavated cropmark ‘forts’ in Perthshire, but similar enclosures in Angus provide useful comparative data. At Mains of Edzell, recent excavations on a trivallate enclosure yielded a series of radiocarbon dates falling mainly between 800–400 cal. BC, but these are from material in secondary ditch fills, and thus not entirely helpful in determining when the site was constructed, although the excavator argues that it was before 400 BC (Strachan et al. 2003). A bivallate enclosure at Hawkhill, also excavated by the Field School, yielded no material suitable for radiocarbon dating (ibid.). The dates from the large multivallate enclosure at Brown Caterthun, Angus, are mostly between 800–400 cal. BC, but indicate some occupation later in the millennium (Dunwell and Strachan forthcoming). The lowland multivallate enclosure at Cairnton of Belbegno (just over the Aberdeenshire border), first excavated by Sir Walter Scott in 1796, and again by L.M.M. Wedderburn in 1973, has dates of 810–400 cal. BC (N-1376) for a timber beam resting on the rampart foundation, and 400 cal. BC–cal. AD 60 (N-1318) for twigs from a destruction deposit at the same location (Wedderburn 1973). The implication is that the excavated ‘forts’ were primarily in use in the period covered by the radiocarbon plateau, but there is no statistical reason why they should all be placed in the earlier part of this range, and a sufficient minority of later dates to suggest some activity in the later first millennium BC.

Fig. 8. Dun Knock multivallate enclosure cropmark, which has been interpreted variously as later prehistoric or Pictish (Crown copyright, RCAHMS).

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