Three cists and a possible Roman road at Barbush quarry, Dunblane

Abstract

• Over the past 50 years a number of archaeological discoveries have been made at Barbush Quarry, Dunblane including a coin hoard, Neolithic pottery and several prehistoric funerary features. During the supervised removal of spoil heaps at the quarry a concentration of archaeological features was identified and later excavated. The features included three short cists that were fully excavated. One contained a cannel coal and jet disc-bead necklace and another a poorly-preserved skeleton and a Food Vessel. On the basis of the finds an Early Bronze Age date is likely but a radiocarbon determination on poorly preserved skeletal material has provided an unexpectedly late date of 2845±50 bp. Other features included two substantial, broadly parallel ditches that are associated with an area of packed gravel and cobbles in the northern part of the site. These could potentially represent a degraded section of the Roman road that is known to run close to the site