Archaeologists from GUARD Archaeology Ltd, working for Scottish Water, have uncovered the remains of one of the earliest houses in East Ayrshire. Dating to around the early Neolithic period (3,500-4000 BC), these archaeological remains were uncovered in countryside near Kilmarnock while Scottish Water was working on an ongoing £120M project to upgrade the water mains network between Ayrshire and Glasgow.

Eight areas of archaeology were observed by the GUARD Archaeologists, who were monitoring the excavation works for the new pipeline. These included some prehistoric burnt spreads and pits but of particular note was the discovery of early Neolithic carinated bowl fragments in a number of post-holes forming part of a rectangular building near Hillhouse farm. This rectilinear hall, which measured 14 m in length and 8 m across, belongs to a type of house built by the first farming communities in Scotland.

‘Heavily truncated by millennia of ploughing, only the deepest parts of some of the post-holes survived, arranged in a rectangular plan and containing sherds of early Neolithic pottery, hazelnut shell and charcoal,’ said GUARD Archaeology excavation director Kenneth Green. ‘The width and depth of these post-holes indicated that they once held very large upright timber posts, suggesting that this building was once a large house, probably home to an extended family or group of families.’

Up until this time, during the earlier Mesolithic period (c. 8000-4000 BC), Scotland was inhabited by small groups of hunter gatherers, who led a nomadic lifestyle living off the land. The individuals that built this Neolithic house were some of the earliest communities in Ayrshire to adopt a sedentary lifestyle, clearing areas of forest to establish farms, growing crops such as wheat and barley and raising livestock such as cattle, sheep, goats and pigs.

‘The pottery recovered from the Neolithic house are sherds of Carinated Bowl, one of the earliest types of pottery vessels ever to be used in Britain’ added Kenneth Green. ‘Traces of milk fat have been found in other carinated bowls found elsewhere in Scotland. Carinated Bowls are distributed across Scotland but very few have been found in the west so Hillhouse represents an important discovery.’

Further post-excavation analyses of the pottery charcoal and environmental samples taken during the excavation may reveal the precise date when the house was occupied and provide other insights that will improve our understanding of the spread of farming settlements across Neolithic Scotland.

GUARD Archaeology Ltd are returning to Paisley Abbey on 18 September 2017.

A substantial and well-built stone drain linked to the monastic precinct of Paisley Abbey runs through the park and gardens to the south of the Abbey and close to the River Cart. Previous investigations of the archaeological context of the drain, examining the ground around it, uncovered the remains of cobbled surfaces, stone built walls and a stone-built oven along with artefacts including medieval pottery. The Wee Dig is now looking at a previously unexplored part of the grounds in attempt to unlock some of the mysteries of Paisley Abbey’s medieval past.

A geophysics survey using resistivity will first be carried out. Using the result of this geophysical survey, two trenches will be excavated to uncover what lies beneath.

Come along and join in! The excavation will run over six consecutive days (Monday 18 September to Saturday 23 September 2017) from 10.00-16.00. The training will be hands on with a range of tasks to suit all ages and abilities.

The Wee Dig Project 2017, part of the Year of History, Heritage and Architecture, is managed by Renfrewshire Council and is supported by the Heritage Lottery Fund ‘Stories, Stones and Bones’ fund. Please note that there will be no access to the drain itself.

Newly published research by GUARD Archaeology has revealed the complex history of a turf and stone-built medieval building. Sherds of pottery obtained from the floor of the structure suggest it was in use during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries AD. However, its construction is similar to other excavated buildings dated to the early medieval period. Radiocarbon dates obtained from several features and deposits ranged from the Bronze Age, through the Iron Age to the medieval period. The structure is an uncommon survivor of medieval rural settlement that is rarely excavated in Scottish archaeology.

In 2013, GUARD Archaeology Ltd in conjunction with Amey and on behalf of Scottish and Southern Energy conducted an archaeological evaluation on an area of ground proposed as part of the expansion of the Kintore Sub-Station, south-west of Kintore, Aberdeenshire. The work exposed the remains of a large rectangular enclosure with an adjacent small building. Further excavation and a topographic survey were undertaken between June and August 2014.

The rareness of the Kintore medieval building is predominantly due to the lack of identification of them in the landscape, the result of their construction using perishable materials such as clay and turf, and changes in land-use which have led to their destruction. Often the stones from these buildings have been systematically removed over time, or the buildings replaced with new structures, or adapted to different uses. The survival of the Kintore building, despite being partially damaged and robbed, might be due to the marginal nature of the ground it sits on, which is very boggy in places and contains a large amount of stone, both above and below ground, which inhibited ploughing that might otherwise have removed all traces of the building.

The wide range of radiocarbon dates obtained, from the second millennium BC to the second millennium AD, might appear to suggest long-lived occupation of the site. However, based on the latest of the radiocarbon dates and fragments of a Scottish Medieval Redware jug found within it, the building appears to have been abandoned post-fifteenth century AD. The lack of evidence of any earlier structures or artefacts relating to the early medieval and prehistoric dates indicates that their presence might be due to other factors, such as the use of (older) peat as a fuel or building resource. Peat deposits are known to exist locally, therefore its use as a fuel and possible building material is not an unreasonable supposition.

Better preserved medieval buildings, such as at Pitcarmick in Perthshire, retain clear divisions between a living end containing a hearth, and byre end with a central drainage slot. No such internal arrangements were apparent at Kintore but soil micromorphology analysis of the soils within the building suggest that there were differences between floor deposits at either end. The west end was associated with domestic activities and the east end was richer in livestock dung, which may indicate the internal division of the house. While there was no central drain within the byre east end of the building, this lay at a lower level than the west end, with the slope aiding drainage if animals were housed there.

The full results of this research, ARO26: The complex history of a rural medieval building in Kintore, Aberdeenshire by Maureen C. Kilpatrick has just been published and is now freely available to download from the ARO website – Archaeology Reports Online.