TIMBER-LACED AND VITRIFIED WALLS IN IRON AGE FORTS: CAUSES OF VITRIFICATION
| Autor: | E. W. Mackie |
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| Rok vydání: | 1969 |
| Předmět: | |
| Zdroj: | Glasgow Archaeological Journal. 1:69-71 |
| ISSN: | 2053-7824 0305-8980 |
| DOI: | 10.3366/gas.1969.1.1.69 |
| Popis: | been set out more than once . The practical demonstration in 1937 by Professor V. G. Childe that a drystone wall with many timber beams inside its rubble core would, if burnt under the right conditions, produce vitrified masses, provided the first really satisfactory explanation of the phenomenon*3 >. Forts with such timber-laced walls are known from the continent and there are a few in Scotland of which the best known is probably Aber nethy in Perthshire*4 >. The theory that vitri fication was a deliberate process undertaken to create a fused rampart of enormous strength, always improbable and lacking any experi mental support, finally became untenable after this experiment. However, a conclusive demonstration of the correctness or otherwise of this theory of the origin of the vitrified forts is hard to find because, while beam-holes remain in unburnt timber-laced walls as at Aberncthy, the pro cess of vitrification usually completely destroys the masonry and causes built wall-faces to collapse, together with any beam-holes in them. Finavon is a good example of this. Even the surviving inner wall-faces are so badly warped that, though there are sometimes suggestions of beam-holes, nothing conclusive is visible(5>. Excavations on the vitrified fort of Dun Lagaidh in Wester Ross in August 1967 uncovered a short stretch of wall standing 6 feet high with both vitrified core and beam holes visible (Pl. i). The wall was in fact an outwork, protecting the eastern end of the oblong hillfort |
| Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
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