Monument record 9572 - MY384 Mingulay

MY384: Roundhouse (Iron Age). Coastal valley floor, sand dunes. Initially this site appeared as a midden deposit eroding out of a mound in the area of dune deflation to the west of the dunes system at the north end of Mingulay Bay. Iron Age pottery fragments, animal gone, fire-fractured stones and charcoal have been reported and recovered from this site over a period of many years, and some small trenches were excavated in 1971. The continual erosion of this site encouraged the team, in consultation with Historic Scotland and Scottish Nature, to conduct a limited excavation across the eroding face of the mound. A sequence of stratified deposits and drystone structures were found superimposed one on top of the other, which, apart from possible modern structures and deposits at the top, are wholly Iron Age in date. The structures and deposits rest upon the surface of a shell sand dune that itself is scarred by the marks of cross-ploughing. Since only the face of the mound was excavated, it was not possible to determine exactly the nature of the buildings represented, but the walling was all of single stone width even tought some of them were constructed with massive orthostats (wall 4). The most likely form is that of a roundhouse constructed of stone revetted turf walls.
Branigan & Foster 2000, 121-2

Keith Branigan & Patrick Foster, 2000, From Barra to Berneray: Archaeological Survey and Excavation in the Southern Isles ... (Bibliographic reference). SWE41033.