In February Lizzie Robertson and I spent a week in Glencoe scoping out features and sites to excavate as part of our 2024 Glencoe field school (#Glencoe2024) as well areas of the landscape where survey would add to our understandings of land use in the glens post-medieval past.
With the construction of the first stretch of the new footpath from the NTS visitor centre to Achnacon (and on to the old centre car park) due to completed by this summer, and with it the opportunity to engage with larger numbers of visitors, we have decided to explore the settlement of Achnacon through excavations this summer, building on previous trial trenching by the NTS Archaeology team.
One of our key focuses for this seasons excavations is to explore subsistence practices and connections through a programme of targeted excavations around the township. Some of our key questions centre on themes of subsistence, industry and land management within the settlement, as well as connectivity both within the wider glen and its environs, and further afield to Lowland Scotland, Ireland, England and Continental Europe in comparison to last years excavations at the chiefly hunting residence in Gleann Leac-na-Muidhe, how connected those who lived here were both within and beyond their immediate landscape. In collaboration with the NTS Archaeology team we will investigate a series of features in the settlement area.
Our survey team this summer will be focusing on other areas of Glencoe to explore changing settlement patterns, land use and subsistence practices on a landscape scale. This will involve aspects of walkover survey and building survey around Achtriochtan, Achnambeithach and Stroan.
Our creative media and engagement team will be collaborating with both the National Trust for Scotland and the Glencoe Folk Museum to produce interpretative media and resources for communicating stories about the Glencoe landscape, and our practice as archaeologists, to public audiences. This will involve aspects of audio-recording, film making and site-based performance and will culminate in the installation of an audio-visual experience at the NTS vistor centre’s reconstructed turf house during our Open Day event (June 22nd).
We will also have opportunities available for volunteers this summer for those interested in getting their hands dirty (or not!). Keep your eyes peeled for further posts!
– Edward Stewart
Landscapes Of Glencoe And Rannoch Moor 
Leave a comment