This report presents the results of the excavation of a stone ford laid across the base of a small stream valley near Rough Castle, Falkirk. It was discovered during an opencast coal mining project. Radiocarbon dates and pollen analysis of deposits overlying the ford combine to indicate a date for its construction no later than the early first millennium cal BC. Interpreting this evidence was not straightforward and the report raises significant issues about site formation processes and the interpretation of radiocarbon and pollen evidence. The importance of these issues extends beyond the rarely investigated features such as fords and deserve a larger place in the archaeological literature.

A cist burial containing the fragmentary remains of a (probably) female skeleton, a decorated Northern British/Northern Rhine Beaker, a group of flints, a fragmentary copper awl and some fragments of burnt bone and charcoal, was unearthed by ploughing in 1995. A sample of skeletal bone yielded a radiocarbon date of 2135-1935 cal BC at one sigma. Analysis of the pollen and spore content in an area of stained cist-floor sediment surrounding the skeleton suggested that flowers of Brassicaceae and Filipendula were deliberately deposited in the cist at the time of the inhumation. A series of trial trenches was excavated around the burial to investigate whether any additional archaeological evidence was detectable, but none was found.

Describes the excavation of a ruinous cairn, possibly heel-shaped.

Three long cist burials were discovered during road widening along the A1 near Dunbar. As a result of plough damage only one, poorly-preserved skeleton survived, identified as either a female adult or a young, slightly-built male. An unusually early radiocarbon date (1850 ± 45 BP) derived from the remains of this individual, must be viewed with caution due to poor collagen survival. The work was commissioned by Historic Scotland on behalf of the National Roads Directorate of the then Scottish Office Development Department.

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