1. On the north-west-facing slopes of Cefn Drum lie the remains of a linear building, a smaller building and several curvilinear banks. It is not clear that all are associated chronologically, but the remains possibly represent a small farmstead.
SN 61470462 This building lies on ground which has been slightly terraced into the hillside and measures 16.5m (E-W) by 4m within turfed-over walls spread to 1.5m-2m wide and up to 0.5m high. There is a 2m wide gap in the north wall and another in the south-west corner.
The smaller building, a few metres to the south, is a rectangular structure, open on the east, with spread walls up to 0.5m high and overall measuring 5m square.
In front of, and in between, the two buildings lies a boulder measuring 1.5m (E-W) by 0.5m wide and 0.6m high.

To the north of the larger building is a curvilinear bank of large stones. It follows first a northerly then a nort-easterly path for about 100m. Of variable width, maximum 1.5m, its height averages 0.4m. A shorter length of bank - 17m long, 2m wide and 0.4m high - lies about 50m to the west-south-west of the buildings. Faint cultivation marks are visible on APs (1) to the south-east of this bank and are aligned NE-SW.
A slight, discontinuous bank can be followed from a point between the two buildings, across a nearby track and fading after an overall distance of 50m. It is generally spread and indistinct being clearly visible only where the track crosses it.
On the other side of the track, a faint bank can be traced from about SN 61550459 downhill for about 80m (NE-SW) and for a further 60m or so as a slight lynchet on a more southerly alignment. This feature seems to be the east boundary of an area of cultivation marks aligned E-W (1).

David Leighton, RCAHMW, 11 November 2000

2. Recent detailed survey and excavation (2) suggest this complex is related to medieval sheep farming, part of a more extensive sheepcote.

Buildings first noted by P.R.Davis, AW 33 (1993), p.77 (No.4)
(1) OS APs 88/025 187-8
(2) Studia Celtica, 41 (2007), 1-23

David Leighton, RCAHMW, 19 August 2009




Visited DKL April 1990