Monument record 1137 - EILEAN AN DUNAIN, BERNERAY

NF87NE 20 8956 7997.

(NF 8956 7997) Dun (NR)
OS 6"map, Inverness-shire, 2nd ed., (1904)

The remains of a dun a situated on a rocky point at Eilean an Dunain, Berneray. It is surrounded at high water and consists of a mass of large stones spread over a roughly circular space c.60ft in diameter. A line of walling is traceable in the interior c.18ft from the SW edge, forming a slight curve for c.18ft from WNW and ESE. On the SW edge of the tumbled stones is a short section of the wall of a circular building, this concavity facing the sea.
RCAHMS 1928, visited 1914.

As described above. The amorphous mass of large stones now survives as a turf-covered circular mound, 11.0m in diameter and 1.3m high.
Visited by OS (N K B) 22 June 1965.

This site, an eroding tidal island, shows evidence of several structures. From the north - an area of irregular, possibly artificial, 'lumps and bumps'; a circular mound, well turfed over, with a curved perimeter wall visible in a couple of rabbit holes, probably a wheelhouse; an entirely denuded, vaguely oval, area of large, worked stones, clearly the remains of a substantial structure, possibly a dun of some sort.
The OS identification (above) probably refers to the likely wheelhouse, whilst the RCAHMS identification, which is earlier, probably refers to the now essentially destroyed remains on the southern end of the island.
MML July 2001

RCAHMS, 1928, The RCAHMCS 9th Report & Inventory: Outer Hebrides, Skye and the Small Isles, 39, No. 120 (Bibliographic reference). SWE5587.