Document record MAB51586 - BOGHEAD

Site of a barrow.

Site of a barrow. During Forestry Commission road laying in 1971, the side of a tree-grown mound was bulldozed revealing several skulls and human long bones. Around a quarter of the site was excavated in 1972 by A. S. Henshall. The mound measured circa 17 m in diameter and 1.7 m high. It was found to consist of a cairn of boulders 1.3 m high capped overall by a thick layer of sand. A post had stood near the centre. The cairn was constructed on a layer of burnt material and near the centre of the mound the underlying natural sand was burned bright red. Flecks of burnt bone suggested the presence of a funeral pyre from which cremated remains were subsequently carefully removed. Throughout the cairn, and the blackened layer beneath, were chips of flint and many pottery sherds. Outside the edge of the mound, a small pit was found with the remains of at least three beakers. Altogether 265 sherds of Neolithic pottery were recovered from this first phase of excavation, as well as 23 flints and a whetstone. Excavation of the site was completed in 1974 by H. A. W. Burl. This second excavation revealed the remains of stakeholes and hearths and hollows with early Neolithic pottery and flint implements, indicating occupation, perhaps alongside a midden which was later levelled over the area creating a black layer containing many sherds of plain and fluted pottery. Over this was heaped a low barrow of sand 6 m across. At least three cairns, about 4 m in diameter and 1.3 m high, which overlapped the perimeter of the barrow, were erected to the east, north and west around a central open space. A fourth cairn to the south may have been destroyed by the widening of the forest road in 1971. A bright yellow sand capping, up to 0.5 m thick, was piled over the whole site to make a mound circa 17 m in diameter. This layer also held many Neolithic sherds, some of which fitted others from the black layer. Five graves had been dug along the crest of the mound in an east-west line, each holding a well preserved skeleton, four being extended. A sixth skeleton was discovered between the north and the east cairns on the old land surface. Although there were no grave goods, a small cremation cist at the top of the mound overlay the skull of one skeleton and provided a prehistoric terminus ante quem for it. Other isolated bones were discovered near the bodies and may be associated with the skeletal remains removed in 1971 to Aberdeen Museum, by Prof. Lockhart, following the site's discovery. A central pit 0.7 m deep, large enough for a primary inhumation, held only layers of dirty sand and two rim sherds of fine Western Neolithic ware. The pottery from this mound is analogous with that found at Easterton of Roseisle. Many carbonized cereal grains, seeds and hazel nut shells recovered from the site.

Period Notes
1972 Excavation radiocarbon sample dates: SRR-686: 4898 +/- 60 BP (charcoal from layer XIII) 3906 – 3530 BC; SRR-687: 3867 +/- 70 BP (charcoal from beaker pit) 2561 – 2139 BC; SRR-688: 4124 +/- 200 BP (charcoal from above ‘cobbling’ under layer XIII) 3336 – 2143 BC; SRR-689: 4959 +/- 110 BP (charcoal from layer XIII) 3971 – 3530 BC; SRR-690: 6006 +/- 60 BP (charcoal under West cairn) 5050 – 4729 BC.
1974 Excavation radiocarbon sample dates: SRR-683: 4946 +/- 175 BP (oak charcoal from infill of central pit) 4228 – 3362 BC; SRR-684: 4823 +/- 60 BP (charred oak from layer XIII under North cairn) 3712 – 3379 BC; SRR-685: 5031 +/- 100 BP (oak charcoal from bottom of Hollow M) 4038 – 3641 BC. (All C14 dates recalibrated using OxCal ver. 4.1, 23/08/2012)

HAW BURL, HAW BURL (Ground Photograph). SAB30670.

HENSHALL, A. S., 1972, BOGHEAD MOUND, SPEYMOUTH FOREST. DES 1972, P. 30, p.30 (Bibliographic reference). SAB4368.

BURL, HAW, 1974, DES 84, 84 (Bibliographic reference). SAB136.

BURL, HAW, 1975, DES 33, 33-4 (Bibliographic reference). SAB137.

BURL, HAW, 1981, RITES OF THE GODS, 57-60 (Bibliographic reference). SAB112.

HENSHALL, AS, 1983, STONE AGE TO THE '45,19-44 (Bibliographic reference). SAB727.

BURL, HAW, 1984, PSAS 114(1983-4) 35-73, PSAS 114, pp.35-73 (Bibliographic reference). SAB101.

SHEPHERD, IAG, 1988, PREHISTORIC GD, 26 (Bibliographic reference). SAB1857.

Record last edited

Sep 25 2024 3:18PM