Carn Liath

Carn Liath

Carn Liath
A9 (just off)
Golspie
Highland
Sutherland
Scotland
KW10 6SF

Tel: 01667 460 232
E-Mail: hs.members@scotland.gsi.gov.uk

Web: Carn Liath

About Carn Liath

Uniquely Scottish

Carn Liath is a fine example of a broch – a type of fortification found only in Scotland. There are well over 500 of them across the country, the majority in northern and western Scotland and the islands. Brochs emerged in the Iron Age around 2,300 years ago. They stopped being built in the early centuries AD.

Brochs developed from strong circular houses into tall, imposing buildings. They were drystone structures formed of two concentric walls, with a narrow entrance passage at ground level and small cells entered off the central area. A stone stair corkscrewed its way upwards between the two walls to the top. Carn Liath now survives to a height of 3m, but when complete would have reached to at least three times that.

Many brochs stood alone, but in Orkney, Caithness and Sutherland they are more usually associated with a surrounding settlement or village. , on Orkney, is the best preserved, but Carn Liath also has the ruins of stone houses crammed into its surrounding enclosure. Archaeological excavation has demonstrated that the earliest houses were contemporary with the broch.

A safe house

Perhaps because Carn Liath’s beachside location lacks natural defences, the broch itself was a solid and well-defended structure. The broch wall is particularly thick, and its entrance passage has settings for two wooden door-frames. These doors would have been strengthened by sliding drawbars, much like those used in later medieval castles and tower houses. On the right-hand side of the entrance passage is a small chamber that might well have been a guard lodge – also as in a medieval castle. Even in its ruined state, Carn Liath shows the ingenuity of Scotland’s Iron-Age farmers faced with a threat whose nature we can only guess at.

Carn Liath Highlight

•The entrance passage – with all its defensive contraptions, you know you are entering something a bit special.