Dunadd Sacred Hill View all content for Dunadd

"There is a case to be made that Dunadd had a prehistory to match its eminence in the historic period, but that case, I accept, is a weak one. There are Neolithic and Bronze Age artefacts from the site, one of them (a Neolithic stone ball) of a specialised type well outside its usual distribution (RCAHMS 1988, 7). There are standing stones athe foot of Dunadd and there are rock carvings, apparently of prehistoric date, on the outcrop itself. Even the famous inauguration stone - a deep footprint carved into the living rock - is matched by a much fainter petroglyph of the same kind. Most probably both date from the Roman period, but similar carvings are known from prehistory, and the difference of preservation could be due to a difference of age. But far more important is the sheer concentration of major monuments in the surrounding area. The distribution of fortified sites visible from Dunadd is not so very different from the distributions of ceremonial enclosures, mortuary cairns and rock art, most of which could still have been identified in the first millennium AD". Altering the Earth The Origins of Monuments in Britain and Continental Europe. Society Of Antiquaries Of Scotland Edinburgh 1993 Monograph Series Number 8 Author: Richard Bradley

Posted by fitzcoraldo 31st August 2005ce

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