Monument record 1935 - ALLT CHRISAL, BARRA

NL69NW 7.05 6418 9776.

T17: This large collapsed circular stone structure measures some 11m in diameter, with internal divisions and a courtyard enclosure. The site forms a substantial, easily visible mound with hundreds of medium-sized blocks of stone scattered across it. On the N is an annexe 6.7m by 2m and to the E an enclosure 8m by 15m abuts the main structure. It is tentatively dated to the late Iron Age from a few fragments of pottery recovered from rabbit burrow outcast and from the appearance of the structure. Armit considers this to be an Atlantic roundhouse, but Branigan and Foster are of the opinion that it is more likely to be a wheelhouse. Work on the site was limited to a detailed measured survey of the stonework and no excavations were carried out. The survey, however, showed that several phases of building are represented, including a rectangular structure which could be much later than the wheelhouse, which it apparently superecedes. It appears to be much older than farmstead NL69NW 7.06 and may be of medieval date.
I Armit 1992c; K Branigan and P Foster 1995; NMRS MS/595/3.

NL 642 977 Excavation was begun of the suspected wheelhouse at the preferred site of Allt Chrisal. The excavation is planned as a study of the effects of rabbit infestation on substantial stone structures. Excavations this year focused on the rectangular structure built at the back of the circular house and on the enclosure, apparently of a garden plot, to the E of the house. The rectangular structure, similar to one attached to the wheelhouse at Allasdale 3km to the N, was built partly over the circuit wall of the wheelhouse and was certainly a later addition. No unequivocal dating evidence was found for this structure. The enclosure to the E contained a largely stone-free soil and was probably a cultivation plot rather than animal pen. About 500 sherds of plain black pottery were recovered from this soil but no decorated or featured sherds were identified; dating is therefore problematic. It is hoped that continued excavation in 1997 will yield more diagnostic material.
Sponsor: Historic Scotland
P Foster 1996

NL 642 977 Excavation of the Iron Age wheelhouse (T17) concluded and completed the survey and excavation of the monuments (T15-29) begun in 1988 in the Allt Chrisal area (DES 1996, 103). The site showed considerable structural damage was caused by burrowing rabbits and to a lesser degree rats, and was excavated over a period of three years to 1998, in part to assess this burrowing damage. In order to track the displacement of material around the site all finds of pottery and flintwork, bone being dissolved in th3e acid peat soil, where given a unique number and individually plotted by EDM.
In 1997 excavation began within the wheelhouse revealed a complex, and at times ephemeral, sequence of late occupation phases, whose structural remains occupy a position either on top of or just within the upper internal structural elements. Several crude circular or semi-circular stone foundation settings overlay the wheelhouse superstructure while a small rectangular building was built incorporating the upper portions of the wheelhouse western internal radial partition walls. The entrance to this building was from the W, but this was an opening that had been constructed at a much earlier period and may even have been an integral part of the wheelhouse construction, although there is also a southern doorway that could be the primary entrance. The dating of these phases is highly problematical and must relay upon future analysis of the associated ceramics; very little is currently known about local 1st millennium pottery, the period most likely to apply to these structures….
The internal area of the building was refilled with soil to protect the unstable stone wall divisions and the unexcavated floor deposits. Much of the collapsed outer, southern wall skin was reuilt to conserve and stabilise the rest of the structure.
Foster 1998, 97-98


The monument known as Alt Chrisal, multi-period settlement 750m ESE of Gortein, Barra, comprises the remains of a multi-period settlement site that also includes some evidence for prehistoric ritual activity. Survey & excavations between 1989 and 1994, by Sheffield University, found evidence for settlement dating from the Neolithic (about 3600 years BC) to the 18th and 19th centuries. The stone-built elements of the excavated structures are still largely visible on site today, where not destroyed by the road and sheep pen. The area to be scheduled is irregular, with maximum dimensions of 300m NNW-SSE by 270m NNE-SSW, to include the main focus of surviving above-ground structures at Alt Chrisal and an area in which evidence related to their construction and use may survive. The fenceline along the roadside and around the sheep pen (which forms the S boundary of the site) is excluded from the scheduling, to allow for maintenance.
HS scheduling document, 8.11.2005

I. Armit, 1992c, The Later Prehistory of the Western Isles of Scotland, 163, A.B 14 (Bibliographic reference). SWE26177.

K. Brannigan & P. Foster, 1995, Barra: archaeological research on Ben Tangaval from the end of the Ice Age to the Crofting Commissio, 49, 51, 53, 55, 64, 203, 204 survey plan p. 54, fig. 4.3 (Bibliographic reference). SWE33223.

P Foster, 1996a, Discovery and Exavation, Scotland, 103 (Bibliographic reference). SWE38138.

Council for Scottish Archaeology, 1998, Discovery and Excavation in Scotland (Bibliographic reference). SWE41173.