Ancient tree · Medieval
Capon Tree
Scottish Borders
Concrete, brick and timber now hold together a sessile oak reckoned at about a thousand years old: one of the last trees of the Jedforest, and the…
- Near Jedburgh
Scotland · Region
Ancient places in Scottish Borders
39 places in Scottish Borders, from the deepest prehistory to the medieval world.
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Fortified place · Iron Age
Cademuir Hill Fort
Scottish Borders
Two Iron Age forts crown the Cademuir ridge. The larger, Cademuir I, on the summit, enclosed about 2.25 ha within a single 3 m thick stone wall and…
- Near Peebles
- 4.4 km from car park
- Some walking
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Building or ruin · Medieval
Dryburgh Abbey
Scottish Borders
A monastery under an abbot on the banks of the Tweed, nominally founded in 1150 by agreement with Hugh de Morville.
- Near St Boswells
- 363 metres from car park
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Fortified place · Iron Age
Edin's Hall Broch
Scottish Borders
The hilltop on the northeast slope of Cockburn Law was first fortified in the pre-Roman Iron Age, when double ramparts and ditches enclosed an oval…
- Near Duns
- 1.8 km from car park
- Some walking
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Fortified place · Iron Age
Eildon Hill North Hillfort
Scottish Borders
Excavation has shown the hillfort: a defended settlement on high ground: was occupied by 1000 BC, in the Bronze Age, roughly 2500–800 BC, when meta…
- Near Melrose
- 1.7 km from car park
- Some walking
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Carved stone · Prehistoric
Hownam Rings
Scottish Borders
C. M. Piggott's 1948 excavation at Hownam Rings became a landmark in the archaeology of northern Britain. It produced the 'Hownam model' (or 'Howna…
- Near Hownam
- 1.2 km from car park
- Some walking
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Carved stone · Medieval
Jedburgh Abbey
Scottish Borders
In 1118, before his accession to the Scottish throne, Prince David established a foundation of Augustinian canons at Jedburgh. It rose from priory:…
- Near Jedburgh
- 1 min walk from car park
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Building or ruin · Medieval
Kelso Abbey
Scottish Borders
Kelso Abbey was founded at Roxburgh in 1128 by Tironensian monks from Tiron, near Chartres in France. The community had first entered Scotland c. 1…
- Near Kelso
- 2 min walk from car park
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Building or ruin · Medieval
Melrose Abbey
Scottish Borders
St Mary's Abbey, Melrose was founded in 1136 by Cistercian monks at the request of King David I of Scotland: the first Cistercian abbey in Scotland…
- Near Melrose
- 2 min walk from car park
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Fortified place · Medieval
Smailholm Tower
Scottish Borders
Smailholm Tower is a peel tower (a small border stronghold, built as a refuge against raiders) atop the crag of Lady Hill, around five miles west o…
- Near Smailholm
- 1 min walk from car park
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Minor monument · Medieval
Dovecot, Kirkgate, Chirnside
Scottish Borders
Three hundred and eighty-two nesting boxes in sixteen circular rows, inside a dovecot: a purpose-built pigeon house: that once served the home of D…
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Minor monument · Medieval
Market Cross, Market Square, Melrose
Scottish Borders
Melrose’s 1645 market cross combines a restored seventeenth-century shaft with a nineteenth-century base and a weathered unicorn finial carrying th…
- Easy path
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Minor monument · Medieval
The Old Market Cross, Greenlaw
Scottish Borders
Said to have been put up on the Market Green in 1609. It is now set against the west side of the church, off the green entirely.
- Near Greenlaw
- Easy path
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Fortified place · Iron Age
Black Meldon
Scottish Borders
A hillfort whose seven round houses survive as ring-grooves: and five of them stand in a deliberate straight line.
- Rough ground
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Fortified place · Iron Age
Bow Castle Broch
Scottish Borders
One of only three brochs surviving in the Scottish Borders, and the only one to have yielded a Roman cockerel-shaped brooch alongside 2nd-century a…
- Rough ground
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Fortified place · Medieval
Cessford Castle
Scottish Borders
A Border Reiver stronghold whose name outlived it: the ruined tower still lends its title to the Duke of Roxburghe, who is Baron Ker of Cessford to…
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Fortified place · Medieval
Drochil Castle
Scottish Borders
A palace-like fortress with a corridor running the full length of every floor: its builder's execution left the ambitious design frozen half-finish…
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Fortified place · Iron Age
Eildon Hill
Scottish Borders
Nearly 300 house platforms cut into a volcanic hilltop make this one of the largest hillforts known in Scotland: later crowned by a Roman signal to…
- Rough ground
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Fortified place · Medieval
Elibank Castle
Scottish Borders
A 1511 royal charter tied one family's right to farmland to a promise to build in stone, and the Italianate terraced gardens later raised here rank…
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Fortified place · Medieval
Fast Castle
Scottish Borders
Once known as Fause (False) Castle for the lights its defenders hung to lure ships onto the rocks below, this stronghold made deception part of its…
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Fortified place · Medieval
Fatlips Castle
Scottish Borders
A reivers' watchtower above the Teviot whose unlikely name is said to record an indecorous greeting for visitors, later reborn as a Lorimer-designe…
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Fortified place · Medieval
Floors Castle
Scottish Borders
A family record stretching from medieval Reiver land to French tapestries brought from a New York estate: one house rebuilt twice over three centur…
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Fortified place · Medieval
Greenknowe Tower
Scottish Borders
Built for comfort rather than combat, its four-storey L-plan shell still carries an original iron yett, corbelled turrets and a kitchen with meat h…
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Fortified place · Medieval
Hermitage Castle
Scottish Borders
A single Border stronghold ties together a witchcraft forfeiture, Mary Queen of Scots' most reckless ride, and generations of Douglas and Hepburn p…
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Fortified place · Iron Age
Milkieston Rings
Scottish Borders
A small hillfort of the Iron Age, roughly 800 BC until the Roman conquest: a settlement defended by banks and ditches on high ground: with up to si…
- Rough ground
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Tomb or burial place · Prehistoric
Mutiny Stones
Scottish Borders
A Neolithic long cairn named after a devil's mittenful of stones: and reduced to less than half its remembered height by shepherds building walls.
- Rough ground
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Fortified place · Medieval
Neidpath Castle
Scottish Borders
A single L-plan tower rebuilt almost nowhere else in its 750-year life, whose carved archway still names both families that shaped it: the Hays' go…
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Sacred place · Prehistoric
Ninestane Rig
Scottish Borders
Legend says the lord of Hermitage Castle was boiled alive here in 1320, in a cauldron slung between the two big stones.
- Rough ground
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Fortified place · Iron Age
Northshield Rings
Scottish Borders
A hillfort whose outer defences are stronger than its inner ones: and an eight-metre gap that shows which were built first.
- Rough ground
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Fortified place · Roman
Oakwood Roman Fort and Camp
Scottish Borders
A cohort fort and the builders' camp that put it up, both found from the air in 1949: and abandoned because of a war on the Danube.
- Rough ground
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Fortified place · Roman
Pennymuir Roman camps
Scottish Borders
Camps A and B here are among the best-preserved Roman marching camps in Scotland, and Camp B was deliberately rebuilt inside Camp A rather than lai…
- Rough ground
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Fortified place · Medieval
Roxburgh Castle
Scottish Borders
A grassy mound is nearly all that remains of what was once one of the most fought-over fortresses on the Anglo-Scottish border, changing hands at l…
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Fortified place · Iron Age
Rubers Law
Scottish Borders
Three separate strongholds - an Iron Age (the centuries before Rome arrived, from about 800 BC) hillfort, a Roman signal station and an Early Medie…
- Rough ground
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Fortified place · Iron Age
Torwoodlee Broch
Scottish Borders
Roman pottery, glass and a coin found packed inside its walls turn this collapsed tower into rare physical evidence of contact: hostile or looted:…
- Rough ground
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Fortified place · Medieval
Traquair House
Scottish Borders
Its Bear Gates have stood locked since the eighteenth century under a vow never to reopen them: a promise the family has kept for more than two hun…
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Fortified place · Roman
Trimontium (Newstead)
Scottish Borders
One of the largest caches of Roman military finds in Britain: arms and armour from 117 pits: came from a fort that was, briefly, the empire's most…
- Easy path
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Fortified place · Iron Age
White Meldon
Scottish Borders
Four concentric rampart (the raised bank thrown up around a fortified enclosure) lines and at least 29 round-house platforms make this one of the l…
- Rough ground
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More places in Scottish Borders
Briefer entries: recorded and worth knowing, with fuller pages to come.
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Minor monument · Medieval
Dovecot, Ayton Castle
Scottish Borders
A dated panel above the door reads 1745, or possibly 1743: inserted, it seems, to mark the completion of repairs to the 653 nesting boxes inside.
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Fortified place · Iron Age
Peniel Heugh
Scottish Borders
A 237-metre hill near Ancrum carrying both an ancient defended settlement and the Waterloo Monument.
- Some walking
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