SUTHERLAND, SCOTLAND—The Scotsman reports that the site of an eighteenth-century inn in the Scottish Highlands has been investigated by a team of archaeologists and volunteers. The Wilkhouse Inn dates to the 1740s and is thought to have been used by travelers and drovers moving cattle to market. The excavators uncovered remains of the inn’s thick, lime mortared walls and a piece of window glazing. Fragments of wine and beer bottles were also recovered, along with pieces of porcelain, buttons, and a sheep bone. Historic accounts record that visitors were served cold meat, eggs, new cheese, and milk, by the innkeeper, Robert Gordon, and his wife. Coins found at the site include a French Louis XIII Double Tournois dating to between 1610 and 1643, suggesting that travelers may have stopped at the site before the inn was built. The inn was abandoned in 1819, when the land was cleared for sheep farming. Nick Lindsay of Clyne Heritage Society said timber rafters, slates, glass, and building stones would have been removed from the inn at that time. “It was then likely left as a ruin, which gradually collapsed over the decades and centuries to a broad pile of rubble,” he said. To read more about the archaeology of Scotland, go to "Letter From Scotland."
