Dùn Meadhonach

Dùn Meadhonach occupies the summit of an isolated rocky ridge about 30 metres above the surrounding ground, roughly 530 metres north of Balnahard farmhouse. Its position above Port Mòr and Lower Kilchattan gives it wide views across the coast, but no excavated sequence fixes when its walls were built or how long they were used. The name means “Middle Fort”, and the RCAHMS survey treats it as one of several fort sites in the Balnahard landscape rather than proof of a securely dated Iron Age occupation.

The main enclosure is oval, measuring about 58 metres north-east to south-west by 23 metres across the remains of a stone wall around two metres thick. Much of that wall has fallen down the steep sides of the ridge, but the outer face is best preserved on the east, where it survives to four courses. The 1974 Ordnance Survey record similarly describes the wall as a stony mound with short stretches of outer face still visible on the north-west and south.

The survey records an additional defensive line on the more accessible east side. This outwork encloses a lower rocky terrace to the north-east and retains walling up to three courses high externally. A steep path on the west is the likeliest route of the principal entrance; a break in the eastern wall may instead have given access to the outwork. The contrast between the steep sides and this extra eastern defence explains the fort’s deliberately selective approaches.

Inside the enclosure, three sub-rectangular buildings survive as footings on the north-west, each about 5.5 by 3.5 metres internally. They appear to have been built over the fort wall and their relationship to the fortification cannot be securely dated. Much of the interior is rocky and unsuitable for habitation, so the visible huts should not be treated as straightforward evidence for the original occupants; they may represent a later use of the ridge after the defensive wall had declined.

In about 1862, rabbits exposed two small cups, two saucer-sized plates described as bronze or copper, and an iron knife and fork at the foot of Dùn Meadhonach. The objects were taken off the island and are now lost, so they cannot supply a secure chronology. Their reported discovery matters because it shows that the record is not one of complete absence of finds: it is a site without controlled excavation and without surviving artefacts that can now be reassessed.