Tag: Bridge of Tilt

Loch Moraig, Bridge of Tilt, Blair Atholl, Perthshire

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Hut Circles:  OS Grid Reference – NN 9047 6722

Getting Here

Hut circle, outlined

Along the B8079 road in Blair Atholl village, take the minor road signposted to the Bridge of Tilt.  After half-a-mile, where the road splits, keep to the right and head further uphill and, where the almost-track-like road splits again another quarter mile up, bear to the right again and just keep going uphill for nearly two miles until your reach the large car-park on the left.  Park here.  Note the long straight line of walling on the top-side of the car-park that runs to the NW.  Walk along the other side of the wall and, after 100 yards, you go down the marshy dip and, once it rises up onto the small rise, truly truly truly keep your eyes peeled to see what lays beneath your feet.  They’re there – honestly!

Archaeology & History

As the years drift by, the remains of these two hut circles—separated barely ten yards from each other—have become increasingly difficult to see.  Upon our visit here, the hillside vegetation was at its lowest at the end of the Winter, yet it was still difficult to see them clearly, even when we stood right in them!  The land here is marshy and it’s spreading more and more into the soil, slowly but surely taking these old circles back to Earth, where all things return….

It’s there, under your nose!

The circles—and their half-dozen companions on the far-side of the wall—were shown to the archaeologist Margaret Stewart in the 1960s by the farmer at Monzie, who made notebooks of various places and traditions in this area.  Both of them are between 12 and 13 yards across, with the outlining walls that define them still thankfully visible above ground level—just!  The hut circle that’s closest to the modern wall is more oval-shaped than its circular companion, both of whom have their respective doors or entrances on the southwestern sides—but these were equally difficult to make out when we came here.

To be honest, if you’re wanting to see the hut circles, I’d head for those on the other side of the wall, two or three hundred yards to the west, which are much easier to find and are in better condition.

Acknowledgements:  To my awesome Naomi – for getting us up here.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian

Monzie, Bridge of Tilt, Blair Atholl, Perthshire

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Cairn:  OS Grid Reference – NN 90266 68032

Getting Here

Approaching Monzie cairn

Along the B8079 road in Blair Atholl village, take the minor road signposted to the Bridge of Tilt.  After half-a-mile, where the road splits, keep to the right and head further uphill and, where the almost-track-like road splits again another quarter mile up, bear to the right again and just keep going uphill for nearly two miles until your reach the large car-park on the left.  Park here and then take the dirt-track to the farm (truly friendly helpful folk) where, in the field to the rear of the buildings, a large unmissable mound rises up!

Archaeology & History

This is a bit of a beauty!  Hiding away on the southern edges of the Cairngorms we find this huge archetypal burial mound, 35 yards across and all but covered nowadays in deep layers of soil.  But it looks good.  When you walk onto its crown, about twelve feet up, you see and feel beneath you the scattered mass of small rocks and stones that comprise the monument as a whole, from top to bottom.  On its south-western side, the cairn is lower and elongated: this is due, on the whole, to where field clearance stones were pushed up against the monument many decades ago, making that side of it look bigger than it originally was.

Naomi on top for size!
Monzie cairn, looking W

Curiously perhaps, no archaeological attention of any worth has been give to the site apart from the usual estimates of its size and a guesstimate of it being neolithic or Bronze Age in nature (an easy thing to suggest).  On top, just beneath the grasses, is what may be the section of a small cist, but this may just be a fortuituous formation.  Excavation is required!  It’s one of a small number of old cairns and tombs in this locale, but this seems to be the biggest — unless, of course, the lost but legendary Carn Deshal, less than a mile to the south, stood larger…

Acknowledgements:  To my awesome Naomi – for getting us up here.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian