Corn Hillock Chambered Cairn View all content for Corn Hillock

From the hill above the Mill of Ireland this and Cummi Howe broch and The Cairns 'Danish fort'/castle look equidistant - though it is 8m from the cliff edge the other sites could have suffered more erosion, one tideswept and the other ? subject to undercutting - and there were three brochs on the other side of the water too. From the road the hollow appears less central. Short of Outbrecks I followed the track down to the north end of Cumminess Bay. There is a gate into the NW corner of the field containing Corn Hillock but my main purpose was to see the known broch, so as yet I have only viewed it from the coastal fence. At this end of the bay there is a rather lage area covered by loose large stone blocks of fairly regular shape that have all the appearance of being artificial, which made me think of the the stones dumped into the sea from the Work Broch in St.Ola (and from whatever lay by/under St.Nicholas Church in Holm). Though I then walked along the low clifftop it is a little intermittent and I would suggest going along the shore mostly. It simply has not the feel of a broch in my mind. Only a few stones can be seen in the coastal side until you approach the north end, where I noticed what seems to be an overgrown trench (either excavated or for sheltering stock I think) with various sorts of stone around the likely sides. These are mostly horizontal slabs, perhaps evidence of drystane walling - but I wish I had gone in to inspect as my images show up on the southern end a large ? orthostat and low down on the northern end a rectangular sandstone block that may have an incised line around the face of it. The orthostat's position is an unlikely one in a broch (my hazard would be pre or post "Broch Age") and the block resembles ones I connect with early kirks (there is one in a wall by Long Howe that has to come from St.Ninian's Chapel and another in the Sands of Wideford bridge I take to have come from Essonquoy). Best guess from me is that Corn Hillock is the result of two periods of construction.

Posted by wideford 26th May 2009ce

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