From the red phone-box at the road junction in Strathtay village, walk aling the road, east (slightly downhill) for less than 50 yards then turn left and walk up the track. After 70-80 yards, keep your eyes peeled for the footpath that runs up the slope into the tgrees (don’t head to the house in front of you). After a half-mile you reach the gorgeous old Tullypowrie farmhouse on your left; keep walking uphill for another 300 yards until your reach a large tree on your left, above which, sat on some very low walling, you’ll see a small upright stone.
Archaeology & History
Faint cross on western face
This little-known early christian carved stone, sitting on the vague remains of an old Roman Catholic church, located on what local folks used to call “the route to the stones” (meaning to the Clachan an Diridh, much to the minister’s considerable disdain), has had less said of it than the more ancient stone circle a little further up the footpath. But then, not much is known of either the carving or the church itself, whose remains can barely be seen amongst the grasses. But the upright ‘cross’ at least proclaims itself to the eye.
On our recent visit here, the crosses (on both side of the stone) were somewhat faint, as my photos show. But it wasn’t always this way. During a visit to nearby Aberfeldy in September 1900, the antiquarian Dave Landsborough (1901) found himself ambling about “among the ruins of a small hamlet” that was the olde settlement of Tullypowrie and came upon this little-known monument. He subsequently wrote an excellent description of the stone, which cannot be equalled. “The cross,” he told,
Landsborough’s sketch
“is of the rudest character, consisting of a schistose slab 30 inches in length, 11⅜ inches in width at the top, about half an inch wider at the bottom, and about 4½ inches in thickness. It is roughly squared at the top and sides, but at the bottom the base is unsquared, one side being longer than the other. On both faces of the slab a cross is formed by a shallow incised sinking, a little more than an inch in breadth, with circular sinkings slightly deeper than the rest of the outline at each corner of the shaft and summit of the cross, and at the intersections of the arms with the shaft and summit. The cross on the east face of the stone has its top almost level with the top of the slab, but the shaft does not reach nearly to the bottom. The top part of the cross above the arms is 4½ inches high by 4½ inches in width. The arms reach across the whole width of the slab, and the shaft is little more than the length of the part above the arms, the base being somewhat rounded. Below the termination of the shaft are two slight circular sinkings almost in line with the perpendicular outlines of the sides, but at unequal distances from their terminations, the one being 1½ inches and the other 2½ inches below the similar sinkings which mark the corners of the shaft. The cross on the west face of the slab is in every way similar, except that the shaft is longer, reaching to a length of 10½ inches below the arms, and the circular sinkings at the top are nearly effaced. It has, however, the curious feature of a slight cut-off at about the same length as the shaft of the other cross, but the circular sinkings occur at the top and bottom, and at the intersections as in the case of the other cross.
“The slab is not fastened in a socket, but is kept nearly erect leaning against a large stone, while smaller stones keep it firm at the back. I have since been told by the Rev. Mr McLean of Grandtully that the place where it stands is the site of an old and very little chapel, the south wall of which may still be recognised by its remaining foundations.”
Tullypowrie cross looking SDixon’s old photo
On the other side of the burn from here was the great Whooping Cough Well, with the heathen Clach na Buidseach against the wall of Tullypowrie Farm just below (subsequently moved to the field west of the cross). These sites (and others nearby) and the animistic traditions associated with them, probably had something to do with the positioning of the church here, and the cross would be the attempt to give a Christian veneer to usurp the more archaic natural practices. We don’t know that for sure, but it’s more than likely. The old Logierait schoolmaster James Kennedy (1927) makes constant references to the animistic lore of the region, which was legion until quite recently.
No additional lore, sadly, is known of this old cross, which is deemed to be medieval in origin. Both Mitchell (1923) and Dixon (1925) make mention of the monument in their respective guidebooks, but add no further information.
References:
Dixon, John H., Pitlochry, Past and Present, L. Mackay: Pitlochry 1925.
Kennedy, James, Folklore and Reminiscences of Strathtay and Grandtully, Munro Press: Perth 1927.
Landsborough, David, “Rubbings of both Faces of an Erect Incised Cross-slab, at Tullypowrie, near Grandtully, Perthshire,” in Proceedings Society of Antiquaries, Scotland, volume 35, 1901.
Mitchell, Hugh, Pitlochry District: Its Topography, Archaeology and History, L. Mackay: Pitlochry 1923.
Park up at the red phone-box in Strathtay village (by the road junction) and walk east along the road (slightly downhill) for less than 50 yards, then turn left and walk up the track. 70-80 yards up, keep your eyes peeled for the distinct footpath on your right (don’t head up to the house) that runs into the trees and keep walking uphill for literally ½-mile where you’ll reach the gorgeous overgrown scented orchard of Tullypowrie farmhouse on the left. Keep walking along the path past the farm and, if you fancy, cross the burn (stream) anywhere hereby. The well is on the other side of the burn, somewhere…..
Archaeology & History
We ventured up here recently to look at several sites, but when we came to find this long lost well we were hindered severely by the mass of vegetation that was teeming with ticks—so thought it most sensible to come back here again at the end of winter when we’d have a clean slate of landscape to look at. (the ticks have got fucking awful in this neck o’ the woods in recent years!) It has almost fallen out of history, with no one writing about the place for more than a hundred years, yet it was a place of considerable importance in the folk traditions of Strathtay.
In some previously unpublished notes written by the historian Charles Robertson sometime at the beginning of the 20th century, he told of a lady from Pitlochry called Mrs Anderson who informed him of an important water source known locally as Sput na-fruith-chasd which,
“comes spouting out of a high rock on the east side of the Tullypowrie Burn opposite Tullypowrie farm, and was resorted to of old for the cure of whooping cough. The sufferer who came here and drank of the water always got better too.”
It was described by the Logierait schoolmaster James Kennedy (1927) as one of “the three most important (wells) in the Tay Valley”—and there are a lot of wells in the Tay Valley!
There’s a slight discrepancy regarding the exact location of the well: whilst Mr Robertson’s notes told that it was found “opposite Tullypowrie farm”, in Hugh Mitchell’s (1923) survey of local antiquities he told that,
“On the oppsite side of the burn from the mill there is a drip well, the water from which was for long regarded as a certain cure for whooping cough”—
which would place the well a hundred yards or so further upstream. (the very low-lying walls of the mill can just be discerned a short distance above the farmhouse) I’m sure that a good search of the area after Winter has laid the vegetation to rest will tell us one way or the other precisely where this curative well is hiding.
Across the burn from the well is the barely visible ruins of an old church: Roman Catholic according to tradition, with a singular short carved cross standing on the low remains of its eastern wall. Close to this, but now in the field a few hundred yards west, was the curious bullaun stone known as Clach na Buidseach, or Witchcraft Stone. This bullaun would seem to have been used in rites related to the Whooping Cough Well, but the precise nature of these rites has been lost.
References:
Dixon, John H., Pitlochry, Past and Present, L. Mackay: Pitlochry 1925.
Kennedy, James, Folklore and Reminiscences of Strathtay and Grandtully, Munro Press: Perth 1927.
Mitchell, Hugh, Pitlochry District: Its Topography, Archaeology and History, L. Mackay: Pitlochry 1923.
Various ways to get here, but it’s probably easiest if you’re coming via Aberfeldy. From here, go over the river bridge to Castle Menzies and Weem, but turn right once you’ve crossed the bridge and follow the road parallel to the river for just over 3 miles (4.9km) where you’ll reach a tiny road on your left, going uphill. You can park the car 150 yards up, on your right – then walk uphill (don’t drive any further). Walk up the road for just over half-a-mile (0.95km) and take the right turn; go along here for 300 yards where the pond appears and keep walking along the same road for another 250 yards till you reach a cottage by a small crossroads. From here, walk up (left) for another 300 yards where, near the top of the field, a large boulder sits close to the fence. You’ve arrived!.
Archaeology & History
Drumchanachan carving
On the way back down from a bimble to the beautiful and haunted Loch Derculich, Naomi and I stumbled upon this large stone just off the track below Lurgan farmhouse and found there to be a number of cup-marks on its sloping upper surface. Naomi was really truly excited! 🙂
On its northwestern surface there’s is a distinct scattering of cup-marks: one in particular near the middle of the stone that’s been deepened in more recent times, as if it was ready to be blown-up and destroyed but, once realised it was a stone of the fairy folk, the operation was terminated and the stone left here to live! Thankfully…
Close-up of cupsDeep lines of cups
It’s a pretty basic design, consisting of at least eleven cup-marks, mainly running in a line upwards along its westernmost side, following the edge of a natural ridged contour. Of the two topmost cups, one of them may have a carved line running to it with a faint semi-circle then emerging from the line around the edge of the cup. But it’s faint—if it’s real—and the daylight was fading when we came here so this and any other design elements that may exist weren’t too easy to see. Hopefully I’ll get back up here pretty soon and see if there’s anything else hiding beneath the aged shadows.
It’s a wonderful arena above Edradynate, with countless other ancient sites peppered across the landscape hereby…
Like many of the Craig Hill carvings, this takes some finding when the heather’s deep… If you can locate the Craig Hill hut circle (there are actually several of them close to each other), face uphill (looking at the trees) and then from the hut circle walk diagonally to your right (northeast) and walk up the slope for 30-40 yards. A large boulder is in front of you and, just past it at the edge of a small rock-face, a fallen tree is your marker. Just a few yards above and past this is an earthfast elongated stretch of rock. You’ll find it…
Archaeology & History
Some cups & 2-in-a-ring
On my visit to this carving I arrived near the end of the day. Within the hour, beneath an already cloudy grey sky, night had fallen; and so, obviously, my assessment of this carvings design was somewhat hampered…
It’s one of several quite separate petroglyphs that almost collide with each other on adjacent rock faces. Etched across this, an elongated slightly convex stone, we find a series of cup-marks in no particular order, mainly running along the topmost section of the stone. Others fall away at the edges, with what seemed like one or two at the more northeastern end of the stone. However, due to the poor lighting when I came here, I struggled to make out the full design and so probably missed some important elements. I’ll update this if/when I visit it again – or if a fellow antiquarian visits the spot and sends in some good images.
From Kenmore village, just as you’re going out of the village towards Aberfeldy (A827 road), turn right as if you’re going on the minor road on the south-side of Loch Tay. Almost immediately on this road, turn left and take the tiny, steep road uphill towards Amulree. After 2½ miles uphill, the road begins to level out and a small loch is on your left (north). Just past it, on the same side, a track runs onto the moors. Walk along here for nearly a mile where the track splits: keep to your left and the track follows the line of walling. Now’s the hard bit: after literally ⅔-mile, walk downhill and cross the burn (stream), then less than 50 yards up the slope on the other side, zigzag around…
Archaeology & History
Craig Hill circle looking SW
Overlooking a small (unnamed) burn immediately to the right and a large wide marshy hollow to the front, is this small and seemingly singular hut circle, in a good state of preservation, surrounded by the scattered mass of cup-and-ring stones—some complex, some very plain—all over this moorland slope. It’s a very long journey to take just to visit a single hut circle, but I’d assume that you’d be wanting to see the petroglyphs surrounding it too—so mebbe have a look at this whilst you’re fondling the rock art!
Internally this is quite a small circle, measuring barely 5 yards (east-west) by 6 yards (north-south), seemingly with its entrance on the north. Its small size suggests it was constructed for the use of just one person; two at the very most. The structure is still in very good condition considering its age (possibly Bronze Age), with minimal damage apart from Nature’s wind and weathering. The circle is made up primarily of a number of large rocks with many filling stones, with the walling being a yard or so wide all round. In all likelihood, the rest of the building would have been made of timber, with a typical tented roof. It’s an excellent spot to base yourself to explore all the cup-and-ring stones on these slopes. Perhaps, just perhaps, this might have been a shaman’s hut, looking over the ancestral images on the rocks hereby…. ♥
Take the long steep zigzag road from Kenmore to Amulree, and just where the road begins to level out, park up near the isolated hut by the roadside at the side of the lochan. Just past here, a track on your left takes you onto the moors, past the lochan. Nearly a mile along the track splits: bear to the right, uphill slightly, then it’ll wind downhill and you’ll pass another track on your right. Ignore it, keep walking along and where you find a grassy little passing-place on your right—stop! Now walk uphill, onto the moor, through the heather for 175 yards and the land has levelled out. Look around!
Archaeology & History
Cupmarks from above
I came across this very basic carving when checking out a couple of others close by and found that it hadn’t been recorded before. It’s nothing special to look at, but is an outlier of the main Craig Hill cluster of carvings a few hundred yards to the west. The design consists of at least two cup-marks that have been etched near the top of the rock, although when I wet the stone it seemed as if a third one was next to the other two, as if in a line. The sun was at its peak when I found it, which meant that I couldn’t get any decent photographs to illustrate this—even when I watered the olde thing! It’s another carving that will only be of interest to the real petroglyph fanatics amongst you.
Cup-Marked Stone (destroyed?): OS Grid Reference – NN 8575 4901
Also Known as:
Clachmore
Archaeology & History
The Clach Mhor, or the Big Stone, is all but forgotten as an antiquarian relic in Aberfeldy. It’s history is somewhat piecemeal. First described in Hugh MacMillan (1884)’s essay on local cup-and-ring stones, he told that:
“A short distance above the village of Aberfeldy, where General Wade’s old road emerges from the houses, a huge stone, called the Clach Mhor, lies on the left-hand side in a slanting position half erect, as if supported by the garden wall of which it forms a part. …In all likelihood it originally stood erect, and formed one of a group of similar stones, its companions having been broken up in the formation of the road. …On the upper face there are some small cup-markings, not quite so well formed as usual, owing to the hardness of the material… The fact that they occur on only one side of the stone, and are scattered indiscriminately all over its surface, are sufficient to convince any one who is skilled in the subject that they are genuine specimens of prehistoric sculpture.”
Nearly thirty years after this initial description, MacMillan (1901) found that it had previously been a part of The Tullich stone circle, and following its destruction the Clach Mhor was moved and used as “part of a garden wall on the old military road passing along its base.”
More than fifty years later, the Aberfeldy historian N.D. Mackay (1954) told that up to 1910 the Clach Mhor was a conspicuous object, standing “as it were overlooking and to some extent overhanging the roadway down near the Square.” However, it
“was blasted and broken up in 1910 in the course of road widening operations, but a considable part of it was built into, and still forms the lower corner of, the garden boundary wall, nearest The Square, of the house which bears its name, ‘Clachmhor’. Its present position is slightly east of the site it occupied when I first knew it and, unless Wade’s men did actually move it, the site it occupied for centuries.”
Mackay also mentioned what he called the “indentations” on the stone which MacMillam deemed as cup-marks, but he pointed out that one Rev. John MacLean “believed they were made by the levers, jacks, etc, of (General) Wade’s men” when they cut the road into Aberfeldy in the 18th century, whilst
“A third solution was given by the son of a one-time local strong man called Big Robert, “What a strong man my father was,” he said, “he lifted that stone. Don’t you see the marks of his fingers on it?””
It’s not known what became of the Clach Mhor and whether it remains hiding in some walling, or whether it has met its demise….
References:
Mackay, N.D., Aberfeldy Past and Present, Town Council: Aberfeldy 1954.
Stone Circle (destroyed): OS Grid Reference – NN 857 489
Archaeology & History
In an early essay on the rock art around Aberfeldy, Hugh MacMillan (1884) remarked on what he thought was a tumulus on the southern slope above the town and where a large old petroglyph once lived. Subsequently (MacMillan 1901), in his beautiful artistic foray through upper Tayside, he revised his earlier remarks telling that:
“On the side of a high, tree-covered hillock, rising up abruptly behind the central part of Aberfeldy, called the Tullich, there was once a Druidical circle, one of the huge stones of which, called the Clachmore, forms part of a garden wall on the old military road passing along its base.”
The circle was mentioned in Mackay’s (1954) excellent work, albeit in the past tense, and he could add no more to it other than his memory of the whereabouts of the Clach Mhor (as it was more accurately known), on which were numerous cup-markings. (Note: the grid-reference to this site is an approximation)
Folklore
In bygone times the people of Aberfeldy observed the celebration of Samhain, the old pre-christian New Year’s Day—a.k.a. Hallowe’en—on November 11th. Interestingly for us, “bonfires were numerous and there was always a great blaze on the Tullich,” said Dr John Kennedy. (1901) Considering the small area of The Tullich, it would be unusual if such festivities did not have some relationship with the stone circle. Samhain relates primarily to the passing over of the dead in the cycle of the year: the spirits of the ancestors moving through the worlds. If this circle had such a relationship with the bonfires, it may have been a ring cairn and not a free-standing stone circle.
References:
Kennedy, John, Old Highland Days, Religious Tract Society 1901.
Mackay, N.D., Aberfeldy Past and Present, Town Council: Aberfeldy 1954.
From Aberfeldy town centre, take the A826 Crieff Road uphill for 275 yards then turn right up the Urlar Road. It’s a long uphill walk from here, up the private road, through and past Urlar Farm and along the track; making sure you keep to the west-side of the burn – don’t cross over it! Beyond the farm, the fields open up ahead of you into the distant hills. Keep along the track until, after a few hundred yards, on the left by the waters, the first small copse of trees appears. (if you reach the bothy, you’ve gone way to far) Here, walk towards the waters and you’ll see good-sized boulder sticking out of the ground and overlooking the burn below. That’s it.
Archaeology & History
This faded but decent cup-and-ring design, cut into an overhanging rock where you’d sit and dangle your legs, was first described by George Currie (2009) who, in his typically minimalist style told that it “bears 17 cups, 4 of which have single rings.” There may be more to it, but some of the stone is heavily covered in vegetation and on my visit here, the summer heat overwhelmed my ability to gain a complete picture of the surface.
The Urlar Burn (4) carvingFaded design in bright sun
Most of the design is near the western earthfast end of the stone. A long natural scratch in the rock, seemingly enhanced by the hand of man, separates at least three shallow cup-marks on one side (north) from the greater mass of the design on the other —which is where all the cup-and-rings can be seen. One of the rings is incomplete, whilst another has a natural crack running up to its outer edge, which may have been played around with slightly when the carving was first made.
I liked it here – and spent an hour or so under the bright sun before the heat pushed me away, to bathe in the pool below for a while…. Check it out when you’re looking at the other carvings in the neighborhood—the nearest of which are just up the slope on the other side of the track, 230 yards to the north: the Black Burn (2) and (3) carvings…
Folklore
Some cup&rings close-up
Although there’s nothing specific about this stone, the burn to the side of the carving was haunted by an old urisk in times gone by: an elemental creature from Scottish fairy lore who inhabited lonely streams and waterfalls. The urisk of Urlar Burn was known as Brunaidh an Easain (his brother, Peallaidh, of greater renown, lived in the gorge of Moness close to Aberfeldy) and this spot may have been one of his abodes. Urisks are associated in some places with cup-marked stones, in which offerings of milk were given to placate them — and this is a good site for any urisk to look over his winding waters….
References:
Currie, George, “Perth and Kinross: Dull: Urlar Burn 1-4,” in Discovery & Excavation Scotland (new series), volume 10, 2009.
Take the A826 Crieff Road uphill for 275 yards then turn right up the Urlar Road. It’s a long uphill walk from here, up the private road, through and past Urlar Farm and along the track (keeping to the west-side of the burn), past the impressive Urlar Burn (8) carving, until you eventually reach the bothy, 3¼ miles (5.2km) up from where you first turned off the A826. Walk 70 yards past the bothy then into the heather on your left where a large couch-shaped boulder stands. The carved rock is a couple of yards on the floor in front of you.
Archaeology & History
An unimpressive faint cup-marked stone consisting of between two and five shallow cups that are difficult to make out unless lighting conditions are good – and even then they’re troublesome! It was first noted by George Currie (2009) how described it simply as: “a rock 2.0 x 1. x 0.2m between Urlar Burn and Hill Park track bears five cup marks.” There are much more impressive carvings in this neck o’ the woods that you’ll want to see ahead of this one!
Folklore
Shallow cups: top-middle; centre-middle
Although there’s nothing specific about this stone, the burn to the side of the carving was haunted by an old urisk in times gone by: an elemental creature from Scottish fairy lore who inhabited lonely streams and waterfalls. The urisk of Urlar Burn was known as Brunaidh an Easain (his brother, Peallaidh, of greater renown, lived in the gorge of Moness close to Aberfeldy) and was likely to have lived further downstream from here. They are associated in some places with cup-marked stones, where offerings of milk were given to placate them.
References:
Currie, George, “Perth and Kinross: Dull: Urlar Burn (3),” in Discovery & Excavation Scotland (new series), volume 10, 2009.
