31678: DUNAN, LEWIS – BUILDING (Undated), SITE (Undated)

Summary:

BUILDING (Undated)
SITE (Undated)
Islet with rectangular building and causeway.

Location:

NB 3313 2120

Full description:

NB32SW 4 3313 2120.

Dunan: An islet, isolated at high tide, surmounted by a ruinous rectangular building and approached by the remains of a causeway. Not a dun.
Visited by OS (AA) 9 July 1969.

Acknowledgement:

Information provided by Western Isles Council Sites & Monuments Record, January 2006.

Further information below is recorded by Chris Burgess, Archaeologist from a site visit on 2 September 2006

This small (tidal) islet, shows at least two distinct phases of activity on it. The first and most obvious of these is a later rectangular structure that covers most of the islet’s grassed surface. This stone and earth-core building is attributed in oral tradition as being part of the local fishing industry (a smoke house?), a fact clearly supported by its size, location and form.

Beneath this building there appears to be the remains of an older, larger, circular structure. It seems likely that these are the remains of a ‘Dun’ similar in construction to those elsewhere on the Island but at the smaller end of the range of size for such structures. If this is the ca\se, then little more than the basal courses of the stone walls of this building now survive.

The islet is accessed by means of a causeway of stone. This feature is of uncertain date and may be associated either with the prehistoric use of the islet or the post-medieval fishing industry, or both. A groin, or rough wall of large, regular boulders has been constructed across the islet-end of this causeway, a feature not unusual with prehistoric causeways. Today, the causeway is fully flooded (and therefore unusable?) at high tide.

No sign of midden material or other material culture was identified during our site visit, though given that the island suffers from the effects of erosion (particularly during the highest tides), this is no surprise as any loose material would likely be washed away.