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Remains of castle, used as a palace and/or hunting seat by Robert II between 1371-1388. A license was granted by King Robert III in 1390 to Malcolm Drummond to build a new tower. The later tower intruded into the west side of the earlier work, on a different axis. The plan of the older castle shows a great oblong hall, nearly 30.48 m long by 9.14 m wide, with walls 3 m thick. This hall was on the first floor, over unvaulted cellars divided by two cross-walls, one of which was removed to built the later keep. At each corner of the north end of the hall and the southeast corner are remains of quadrangular towers. Immediately north of the keep were found the remains of two piers which supported a wooden bridge over the river. During excavations in 1925 a highly enriched silver-gilt Highland brooch was uncovered in the area which contained the prison. The brooch was found by a party of Boy Scouts under the supervision of Simpson, and was unearthed at a depth of 18 inches. A programme of conservation work was carried out on the ruins in 2013. Evaluation of the site of consolidation works was carried out by Alder Archaeology in 2014. Two test pits dug to investigate a suspected sub-surface wall line recorded this in one pit, however, a feature in the second pit may have been a floor. Three possible buttresses or tower bases were recorded in April 2014 as part of an ongoing watching brief on Phase II of the consolidation works. During June-July 2014 excavation was carried out by Alder Archaeology on an area between two test pits which had suggested the presence of a buried wall feature. The basal courses of a substantial defensive wall linking the extant (ruinous) gatehouse with the remains of a corner tower in the southeast part of the site The base of a splayed window or arrow slit was also revealed. Further work uncovered the stubs of two partition walls, apparently destroyed during later building works involving the construction of a tower house. A watching brief by Alder Archaeology in September 2014 during de-turfing of a courtyard area, and hand excavation of small areas for interpretation board stands recorded no archaeological features or artefacts. A further watching brief was carried out by Alder Archaeology in March 2015 during groundworks for a new flagpole in the northeast corner of site, but no archaeological features or artefacts were observed.
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Historic Environment Records (HER)