An Dun, Loch Ardbhair, broch in Loch Ardbhair, Highland, Scotland, UK
An Dun, also called Loch Ardbhair, is a small round structure from the Iron Age built on a rocky island in Loch Ardbhair. The walls are over one meter thick and made of irregularly stacked stones without mortar, with only parts still standing over two meters high. A narrow entrance on the south side leads into the roughly seven-meter-wide interior space, which contains no chambers or galleries.
The structure was built between 700 and 200 BC during the Iron Age, when many Scottish communities constructed such round stone buildings as homes and defensive structures. Its remote position on the rocky island suggests it played a strategic role in protecting and controlling access to the loch.
The name An Dun comes from Gaelic and means simply 'the fortress'. The structure shows how early communities built their homes in hard-to-reach places to protect themselves and maintain control over the water and land. This choice of location was an important part of daily life and safety at the time.
The site is accessible only at low tide via a rough stone causeway that connects to the rocky island. At high tide, the island becomes surrounded by water, so it is important to check tide times and allow enough time to return safely.
The structure is one of the smaller examples of its kind, explained by its isolated position on the rocky island. Yet this isolation made it an ideal lookout point for controlling water routes and the land around the loch.
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