Monument record MHG28459 - Rhaoine

NC60SE 57.00 6506 0495

NC60SE 57.01 6507 0490 Sheepfold

The remains of this farmstead, consisting of at least four buildings and two enclosures, are situated in an improved field on the S side of the A839 public road, between the road and a stone-walled sheepfold (NC60SE 57.01). It has been extensively robbed, and many of the walls are now defined only by grassed-over robber-trenches, although the remains are sufficient to enable the layout to be deciphered. The largest building, which may have been the farmhouse, is at the S edge of the steading (ROG95 767); it measures internally 27m from WNW to ESE by 4m transversely, it has an outshot at each end and it is divided into two compartments. To the N of this there are three other buildings set around a courtyard open to the SSW, the largest of which measures 16.2m by 4.3m over walls reduced to stony banks (ROG95 768-70). To the E of this courtyard, and to the NNE of the possible farmhouse, there is a rectangular enclosure measuring about 48m by 40m, and there is an other enclosure to the N of the courtyard, partly destroyed by the modern road. The disturbed remains of a possible fifth building are situated at the E edge of the latter enclosure.
This farmstead is not depicted on 1st edition of the OS 6-inch map (Sutherland 1879, sheet ciii) which does, however, depict the sheepfold immediately to the S. It is likely that the farmstead succeeded the township on the higher ground to the NE (NC60NE 19.00) and dates from the early 19th century, when 'Rhine' was let as a sheepfarm (National Library of Scotland, 1815 map of Sutherland estates,).
(ROG95 767-71)
Visited by RCAHMS (SDB) 22 June 1995