Home / Community Matters / Community Projects / Time Travellers / Sites to Date

List of Sites to Date

TIME TRAVELLERS
List of Sites to Date
Those marked in bold feature in the site visits and workshops with local schools and community groups
If you are interested in contributing information and stories about any of the sites listed, or suggest a site we have missed, please contact Shona Arthur either by tel 01667 458 531 or Email shona.arthur@highland.gov.uk!  All contributions are acknowledged by the Time Traveller's Project.

1)  Clava Cairns (site visit & workshop with Cawdor Primary)

FURTHER LIST OF PROPOSED MAP REFERENCES (information to be expanded)

Mesolithic to Macbeth

Moyness ring cairn - community council site, visually unexciting.  One damaged ring cairn (ploughing, roadworks), no particular info

Clava Cairns - impressive site, unique significance, national importance, type of site only exists in this area, 3 big monuments, atmospheric, lots of stories, links to early religion, folk lore etc

Auldearn church - associations with Robert Bruce, Earl of Ross, Pictish times, Columba (dedicated to St), important Royal, religious site, also Isabel Gowdie, witchcraft

Barevan church - nr Cawdor, early church site, ruins (foundations, ref Cawdor heritage)

Burghead - impressive remains of Pictish fortifications, Pictish royal connections, the well with carving of Burghead Bull

Sueno's stone - inside glass case in Forres, late 10^th C or early 11^th C. Depicts battle, possibly one in which one of the Scottish Kings was killed.  Battle site nearby?

Dunearn - hill fort towards southern boundary of Nairnshire, name suggests connection to name 'Nairn' ( Or Inbhir Narainn Or Irish connection to 'Erin' Or Alder trees growing on riverbank giving name (Narainn = alder) 

Princess stone - Situated on Glenferness Estate (?).  May be relocated to Museum.  May not be accessible. Viking or Pictish princess connections?

Shian hillock - Cairn on road to Grantown, difficult access.  Shian is Gaelic name for faeries, the good people (called so to avoid offence and retribution)

Levrattich Cairn - burial, Bronze age or late Neolithic (first farmers 3000 BC)

Garblies Cairn - burial, Bronze age or late Neolithic (first farmers 3000 BC)

Littlec Urchany - stone circle, religious significance Bronze age or late Neolithic (first farmers 3000 BC)

Dun Evan - Iron age fort, 500 BC to AD

Cantraydoune Cairn –-burial, Bronze age or late Neolithic (first farmers 3000 BC)

Kebbuch Stone - pictish stone, situated nr Ardersier yard.  Poor condition

Aitnoch round house and field system - Iron age settlement

Arrwood cairn- burial, Bronze age or late Neolithic (first farmers 3000 BC)

Brackla farm - enclosure, roman pottery remains.  Did they come this far?  Is it evidence of Roman marching camp.  Known for distinctive V-shaped ditches.  Controversial suggestion that there’s one near Redcastle.  Roman fleet certainly came up this far north 1^st C AD (Agricola)

Castle Findlay - vitrified fort, Iron age fort, 500 BC to AD

Easter Clune - cists, ring cairn, Bronze age or late Neolithic (first farmers 3000 BC

Easter Delnies - settlement

Geddes house ring ditches - settlement

Howford - ring ditch, indicates settlement of farming activity

Kinchyle - ring ditches, enclosures, pits, barrow (mound). Indicates settlement of farming activity.

Knockanbuie  -ring ditch. Indicates settlement of farming activity

Little Penick - enclosure, indicates settlement of farming activity

Meikle Geddes - ring ditch?

Muckle Geddes - carved stone ball (in National Museum of Scotland, found in 19^th C) thought to be symbols of power or office or exchanged as gifts.  A number found over the years.  Perhaps originated in Bronze age.

Normans to Nemesis

Raitt castle - out Grantown Road near quarry.  A Hall House or Hall Castle.  Built cearly to mid 13^th C, during time of comparative peace by family Cheyne of Norman origin.  Sided with Edward 1^st during Wars of Independence and ultimately lost family land (pinched land in first place probably granted by David 1^st! or one of his successors).  Stories  a ghost of a young woman background?  Foundation stone burial?

Kilravock Castle - Previously owned by the Roses (back to middle ages?) Currently home to Champion Beech Tree. Did bonnie Prince Charlie dine here the night before Culloden Battle? 

Cawdor - Owned by Campbell’s (from middle ages, or was it 15^th C) until 18^th/19^th C.  Old Celtic saints bell still there, rung to gather the faithful pre bell tower.

Cawdor Church -

Cantraydoune motte - a mound upon which a Norman castle once stood in the 12^th C (access poor, through farmer?)

Inshoch castle -

Nairn Castle - nothing remains.  Specific site unknown but there is a Castle Square on the High Street and a Town House sitting on Castle Square which suggests possible location.  Nairn became a Royal Burgh some time around 1200.  Castle occupied by English during the wars of independence.  Was attacked by William Wallace and burnt.  Also, perhaps, by Robert Bruce.
Residence of First Sheriff of Nairn (anglo-norman) appointed around 1200.  Duties of Kings representative.

Moyness castle - Near Auldearn, near ring cairn, no remains.  Mary Queen of Scots may have stayed here on her way to Inverness on a royal visit.  A local nobleman had been defying her.  Upon her arrival in Inverness he denied her admittance to Inverness Castle.  He was beheaded for his cheek.

Culloden - Site of infamous battle of 1746 when Scot fought Scot during Jacobite Uprising.  Charles Edward Stewart sought to reclaim the throne for his father King James (would have been 8^th) but others saw it as an opportunity to break the union with England and the Gaels saw it as a last chance to save Gaelic civilisation.  Catholics and Episcopalians saw it as a chance end the discrimination imposed by the Presbyterian Church.

Auldearn battlefield - 1640 battle during the Civil War.  When Charles 1^st fell out with the English Parliament and the Scottish Covenanters he tried to abolish parliament in England and impose episcopalianism in Scotland civil war erupted.  Scottish Covenanters allied with the English parliamentarians against the Royalists.

Specific battle story - The Marquis of Montrose had originally signed the national covenant basically rejecting the religious reforms of Charles 1^st but when the Covenanters took up arms against the king (God’s anointed) he felt things had gone too far and changed sides.  He set aboput raising an army for the king in Scotland, drawing heavily on the Highlands as some clans were catholic and many were episcopalians. 

Montrose won a famous battle at Auldearn as his far smaller force defeated the opposition through skilful and daring leadership.

Loch of the Clans (Loch Flemington) – furthest point the Jacobites reached on their march toward Nairn where they planned to mount a surprise night attack on the Duke of Cumberland who was spending the night there.

Balblair - The Redcoats pre- Culloden Battle encampment.  Now Nairn industrial estate.  

Jacobite grave.  Blackmill - a gravestone marking the site where an injured Jacobite died as he tried to make his way home after the battle.  The monument was erected by Canadian descendants earlier this century.

Ardclach Bell tower and church - an example of a detached bell tower as the church was unusually down in a hollow.  Also used as a watchtower during the 17^th C to warn Moray against cattle raids from the Highlands.  The lower room was used as a prison..check

Wade Military Road - Dulsie, Cawdor, Cantray Bridge? White bridge?

Built c 1720 to 1730 between the 1715 and 1745 Uprisings as a reault of a survey carried out by Wade who was reporting on the Military situation in the Highlands.  He proposed building a series of roads and forts to facilitate the pacification of the Highlands. See Fort Augustus, Fort George and Fort William.  He also built barracks at Ruthven, Glenelg.

Nairn High Street - Court House, (built on site of old Tolbooth, meeting of Council, storehouse of weights and measures, jail, collection of taxes and tolls and place for merchants stalls), Mercat Cross (market place), Sheriff Falconers House, Castle Square (oldest house), 36 High St (Cumberland's pre battle night)

Nairn old parish church - 17^th / 18^th C ruin, original parish church.  Origins may go back to middle ages.  The upper floor collapsed during the 18^th C.  Current church built on corner of Academy Street and Seabank Road.  One in between?  See also graveyard maps held by TEC Services.