REPORT OF MEETINGS FOR 1906 25 



assigned the title of Burgh or Broch.* In every instance of 

 such there has been found a tower, enclosing a court-yard 

 whose walls are practically perpendicular, but whose exterior 

 surface slopes inwards at a considerable angle, giving the 

 building the appearance of a truncated cone. The walls are 

 wide at the base, and near the ground are generally burrowed, 

 and divided by horizontal slabs to supply apartments, after 

 the manner of sleeping berths on board ship. Higher up are 

 shallower recesses, which may have done duty for cupboards. 

 All are lighted from the interior by openings looking into 

 the court-yard, which appears never to have been covered. 

 The only opening to the outside is the doorway, always on 

 the level of the ground, low and narrow, and leading by a 

 passage to the open space without. Such being the chief 

 characteristics of the Broch, or Pictish tower, of which upwards 

 of five hundred examples still remain, though only five are 

 found South of Argyll and Inverness, it is important to notice 

 three points of difference claimed by Mr Turnbull as distinctive 

 of the one in question. ( 1 ) It is the largest Broch in existence ; 

 (2) it is surrounded by important earthworks; and (3) it is 

 allied with other buildings which evidently belonged to it. 

 And in illustration of these points a few details may be 

 submitted. On a platform, facing the North and North-East, 

 and about 400 feet below the summit of Cockburn Law, is 

 traceable an enclosure, which measures roughly 200 yards 

 from East to West, and 100 yards from North to South in 

 its greatest breadth, and which is formed of earthen ramparts 

 and ditches. On the North and North-East, where the ground 

 is more inaccessible by reason of the steep banks of the river, 

 there is only a single ditch between two comparatively low 

 ramparts ; but on the other sides there are two very deep 

 ditches, and correspondingly high ramparts, which even now 

 in some places measure from 12 to 15 feet in depth, and 

 from 15 to 25 feet in width. Its principal entrance lies on 

 the East side, and is composed of a passage or roadway, 

 bounded on both sides by walls, and paved with flat irregularly 



* The word is familiar to North-country folk in its application to a 

 nimbns which at times encircles the moon, and is interpreted as 

 forecasting foul weather. 



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