ABSTRACT
In the generation following the Second World War, research into later prehistoric archaeology concentrated notably on south-eastern Scotland and the Atlantic north and west. The Hownam model, which envisaged a progressive elaboration of defences from palisaded enclosure to wall-ramparts, and from simple, univallate works to more complex, multivallate constructions, was never presumed to apply to central or eastern Scotland. Vitrified forts are likewise not a homogeneous regional or cultural group. Vitrification is in essence what happens under extreme heat to certain types of stone when a timber-framed rampart is fired. The technique of constructing wall-ramparts with rubble core and internal timber-lacing faced with dry-stone courses front and rear is characteristic of many regions of Western Europe from the Bronze Age through to the early medieval period. The oblong forts at Finavon and Forgandenny are representative of a class of enclosure that affords perhaps the best case for recognizing a distinctive regional group in central and eastern Scotland.
