During the early first millennium
Cal BC the Billown landscape was restructured, and a fieldsystem laid out
over the top of the earlier features. This field system is extensive, and
may be of co-axial or trackway form. Its prolonged and intensive use is
almost certainly the reason why some of the Neolithic features do not survive
as earthworks.
In Site K the fieldsystem cuts across the
area of middle Bronze Age industrial activity. The part of it examined in
1997 lies at the north end of Site K and in Site J and connects with linear
features examined in Site C in 1995. The main feature is a droveway or track
some 3m wide. On the north side is a ditch (F392)
which may have had a low stone wall beside it to judge from the quantity of
stones in the upper ditch fill. On the south side there was a stone wall (F384)
which superseded an earlier ditch. Two further, broadly parallel, ditches
lie to the north of the droveway at the north end of Site K, one of which
(F382) runs through into Site J in
a diminished form (F358) where is drains
into the large pit F350. A number of
small postholes, pits and gulleys lie to the north of the droveway in Sites
K and J.
In Site C excavations in 1995 revealed
a round house hanging pendant from the southern boundary wall of the trackway
examined in 1997. In plan, the house is sub-circular or D-shaped with a
central hearth. The structure is bounded by a narrow bedding trench supporting
a stone wall preserved one course high for perhaps half its circumference.
Projecting radially outwards from this
wall is a series of rectangular buttress foundations. Beyond these, roughly
concentric with the inner wall, is a series of shallow scoops or pits.
These, it is suggested, mark the positions where roof timbers were made
earthfast. The interior space within the structure measures approximately
4.4m by 5m, the outer dimensions 6.5m by 7m. There is a possible entrance
to the southwest where there is a posthole between the rather well-defined
external buttress foundations and a larger gap than usual between a pair
of scoops around the outside. In the centre of the structure is a substantial
hearth about 1.4m by 1.6m. Built of clay, this hearth may have supported
a small oven to judge from the quantities of burnt lay around about. A
charcoal rich area east of the hearth suggests that it was fuelled and
cleaned from that side. Also on the eastern side of the structure is a
shallow gully leading from just inside the wall-line outwards; perhaps
a drain. Within the structure were at least two pits, and perhaps also
a trough or tank edged with stone slabs. Numerous stakeholes may represent
internal partitioning or an earlier phase to the structure.
