58 / Archaeology In Northumberland
Otterburn: Shittleheugh Bastle
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In 2009, a team lead by Countryside Consultants was commissioned to undertake a complex multi-disciplinary Management Plan for the monument, funded by Natural England, designed to halt the progressive deterioration of the monument. North Pennines Archaeology undertook detailed archaeological surveys of Shittleheugh Bastle and its wider landscape. The landscape features were surveyed using a survey-quality GPS system and standing structures were subject to detailed building recording using a Reflectorless Total Station. All 2
Shittleheugh
Surveying a bastle
ny traveller on the A68 and A686 driving down through Otterburn has probably seen Shittleheugh Bastle many times, through its prominent position on the western slope of Blakeman’s Law, and its tall gables standing as landmarks, sometimes picked out in pink in the setting sun against the darkening skies. However, they may not have realised the importance of the site, nor its wider landscape. The roofless structure is a Scheduled Ancient Monument and a Grade II listed building; the position of the site, being so marginal, has probably in part ensured its survival despite its close proximity to the Ministry of Defence firing ranges (evidence of previous firing range activity was seen within the site boundary). Nevertheless, continued battering by the elements and structural weakness saw the bastle placed on the English Heritage Building at Risk Register and prompted the owner to seek professional help.
elevations were photographed and ‘rectified’ – ie made flat – in order to produce a permanent pictorial record of the walls prior to consolidation works. The remains of Shittleheugh Bastle are characteristic of a defensive 1
structure, possibly erected in the 16th or 17th century in response to Border warfare. Bastle houses were erected by prominent farming families, or ‘kinships’, headed by a laird. Each kinship was identified by a particular surname strengthened in the system of inheritance known as ‘gavelkind’ by which a dead man’s land was divided equally among all sons. Shittleheugh Bastle has been attributed to the Reed family in the 16th century, and searches of parish registers also show links to the Halls and Andersons. In a 1551 report on the state of the Borders, Sir Robert Bower observed the ‘Countrey of Riddersdale standeth much by surnames, of which surname the Haulls be the greatest and moste of the reputation in that country and 3
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next to them the Reades, Potts, Hedlies, Dawgs and Fletchers’. Armstrong’s Map of Northumberland (1769) shows a representation of a house labelled ‘Shittleheugh’ with the name ‘Mr Reed’.
A typical bastle consisted of a firstfloor hall sometimes with a smaller room at one end and garret room above. The ground floor was used for accommodating cattle and horses, whilst the first floor domestic accommodation raised the household above direct attack by assault or battering ram. The thick defensive walls meant that the family and stock were secure against sudden raids. With one or two exceptions surviving examples of bastles are within around 20 miles of the Border; this may be significant as 20 miles from the Border was the distance within which an Act of Parliament in 1555 required castles and forts to be repaired and open ground enclosed with ditches and quick-set hedges in order to impede the movements of raiders. Within areas where bastles are found, they tend to be sited in clusters or within close proximity to another. Shittleheugh Bastle is constructed of massive masonry blocks, with walls measuring about 1.10m thick. It is rectangular in plan with ventilation slits at ground floor level. The presence of ventilation slits and lack of evidence for fireplaces or windows suggest that the ground floor of the bastle was never intended for humans, and that animals were brought into the building for security during times of border raiding. There was no evidence at the 5