Fig. 254.—Ground plan of Earth-house at Buchaam, in Strathdon.
The similarity of these two structures is no less striking than the excessive peculiarity of their distinctive features. These features are—(1) their position under ground; (2) the contracted entrance; (3) the form of the chamber—a long, low, narrow, and curved gallery gradually widening inwards; and (4) the construction of the chamber—with convergent side-walls supporting a heavily-lintelled roof.
Closely analogous to these in its main features is the underground structure (Fig. [254]) at Buchaam, in Strathdon.[[110]] It is along narrow gallery entering by a small aperture in the narrow end nearly on a level with the original surface of the ground, gradually widening and increasing in height inwards, and terminating abruptly in a slightly-rounded end. It differs in one respect from the two previously described, inasmuch as though it is curved it has not the double curvature which is the special feature of their form. It curves sharply to the left, but the curvature is not repeated in the opposite direction. It is 58 feet in length following the curve along the middle line of the floor. Its width at the entrance is 3 feet 6 inches, and it gradually widens until it attains a maximum breadth of 9 feet 3 inches. The height increases from about 5 feet near the entrance to about 7 feet at the farther end. The roofing stones were mostly in position and were of great size, some being 7 to 8 feet in length, 3 feet in width, 18 inches in thickness, and weighing more than a ton. The walls rise perpendicularly for 2 or 3 feet and then incline inwards with a curve, so that where the width of the chamber at the floor is 9 feet 3 inches, it is contracted to 7 feet 9 inches at 4 feet above the floor and at the roof to 5 feet. The walls are well built, the lower courses of large cubical stones, undressed, and at the distance of about 12 feet inwards from the entrance there are checks for a door formed of two oblong stones set edgeways in the wall and projecting a few inches from its interior surface. The whole floor of the chamber was paved, and a drain, 10 inches square, well built with a good roof, sides, and bottom, and having a peculiar box-like opening or sink in the inside of the chamber, was found leading from its south-east corner. The chamber when opened was nearly filled with earth and rubbish, and at the bottom there was a layer of fine blue clay 20 inches in depth, which had been carried through the walls by percolation of water from the clay bank outside. In or below this clay which covered the paved floor were found the following relics of human occupation—an iron ring, and an object in iron which looked like the shoe of a wooden spade, some staves of a small wooden cog, a wooden comb, some fragments of pottery of coarse workmanship, a portion of a quern or handmill for grinding grain, fragments of deer’s horns, and bones of the sheep and common domestic fowls. At one corner of the inner end of the chamber the ashes of a fire remained, and immediately above them there was a well-built smoke-hole.
Fig. 255.—Ground plan of Earth-house at Culsh, parish of Tarland.
(From a plan by Mr. Jervise.)
A similar structure (Fig. [255]) at Culsh, in the parish of Tarland in the same county, differs from this one only in being curved to the right instead of to the left. It is 47 feet in length and 2 feet wide at the entrance, the width increasing gradually to about 6 feet at the farther end. The walls are partially formed of large boulders set on end or on edge to form the lower course, with rudely-built masonry over them. They converge but slightly, and the roof is formed in the usual manner by large heavy slabs laid across from wall to wall. The floor is formed of the natural underlying rock, and the height from floor to roof increases from 5 feet near the entrance to an average of about 6 feet farther in. When cleared out in 1853, the earth which filled the chamber was found largely mixed with ashes on the floor, and the only relics obtained from its excavation were fragments of coarse unglazed pottery, a large bead, the bones of cattle, and two querns.
Fig. 256.—Ground plan and sections of Earth-house at Kildrummy, Aberdeenshire.
(From a Plan by Mr. Lumsden of Clova.)]
Another (Fig. [256]) excavated a few years ago at Clova, near Kildrummy, also in Aberdeenshire,[[111]] differs from these in being so slightly curved to the left as to be almost straight. It measures 57 feet in length, 2½ feet wide at the entrance, suddenly widening to about 8 feet at about 20 feet within the entrance. At a short distance from the entrance there were checks for two doors about 8 feet apart. The covering stones had been removed from the first 15 feet of the narrow part, but the roof remained entire over the whole of the wider part of the structure, at an average height of about 6 feet from the floor. The earth with which the chamber was filled was largely mixed with charcoal and bones of animals, among which those of the horse and dog were recognised. No manufactured relics were found, but two of the stones in the walls, one being a large boulder, were covered with the small hemispherical pits known as cup-markings.