Monument record MHG5076 - Dun Maraig

NG35NE 5 3769 5915.

(NG 3769 5915) Dun Maraig (NR)
OS 6"map, (1968)

About 70 yards from the W shore of Poll na H-Ealaidh is a tidal islet which is occupied by the ruins of the Dun Maraig. It measures about 40 yards in length by some 30 yards in breadth and has been connected with the W shore by a causeway, now destroyed. On the side next to the causeway it has been defended by a stone wall of considerable strength which has collapsed for the greater part. A portion, however, built just above HWM, maintains a height on the outside of 4-5' for a length of some 8 yards. The opposite side of the islet is rather higher, its rocky margin rising 6-8' above high tide, and here there is no trace of a wall. There are the remains of two oblong houses of late date within. RCAHMS 1928, visited 1915.

Roughly 'B'-shaped on plan Dun Maraig has occupied the whole of the islet and on size should be classified as a fort.
The wall forming the straight side of the 'B' facing SW shows enough of the core and outer face to suggest a thickness of between 2.5m and 3.0m. A break just SE of centre may indicate the original entrance utilized by the occupants of the rectangular buildings. The wall can be traced around the whole of the NW half of the 'B' but there is no trace of it around the SE half where the higher cliff may have provided an effective barrier in itself.
The line of the causeway to the SW can be distinctly seen as a slightly curved intermittent line of boulders disturbed by the tide, but suggesting an original width of c.1.8m.
Visited by OS (I S S) 19 October 1971.