Shielhill North occupied a small knoll below the hilltop carrying Kaims Castle fortlet. The Roman road passed to its south-east. The tower's outlook across Strathallan helps explain this choice of ground: soldiers could observe a broad landscape as well as movement on the road immediately below.
Visit Shielhill North
📍 Location: Shielhill North, Perth and Kinross. National Grid reference NN 8559 1219.
👁 What survives: Buried remains on a slight knoll; the enclosure is known through aerial survey and excavation.
⭐ Best for: A lookout on the climb to Kaims Castle.
🥾 Visit: The pin marks the archaeological site, not a parking place, entrance or confirmed walking route. Use existing appropriate paths, respect crops and neighbouring homes, and follow local signs and any forestry restrictions.
🏛 Explore nearby: Gask Ridge watchtower guide · Ardoch Roman Fort
Google Map location · Trove site record · HES scheduled monument record · Roman Gask Project
Approximate site pin, converted from the published National Grid reference (OSGB36 / British National Grid) to WGS84. Use it to locate the site, not its scheduled boundary. The reference is shown at approximately 10 metres precision; it is not a new survey.
Shielhill North at a glance
| Feature | Evidence and interpretation |
|---|---|
| Period | Usually assigned to the late first-century, Flavian Gask system; precise site chronology remains uncertain. |
| Remains | Buried remains on a slight knoll; the enclosure is known through aerial survey and excavation. |
| Roadside position | North-west of the road; entrance towards the road. |
| Possible communication | Shielhill North → Ardoch |
| Garrison | The unit and number of soldiers are not securely known. |
The remains and their investigation
Thomas Pennant described earthworks here in the eighteenth century, but they subsequently disappeared from view. Aerial photographs taken by J. K. St Joseph in 1972 revealed the enclosing ditches and even the four main post settings. Later investigation and resistivity survey helped distinguish the roughly rectangular inner enclosure from the more rounded outer ditch.
The two ditches had entrance breaks towards the road. This places Shielhill North with Greenloaning, Blackhill Wood and Shielhill South, the double-ditched southern group. The excavation report describes relatively shallow ditches; two circuits should not automatically be read as an exceptionally powerful fortification. The timber structure provided the elevated observation position.
The nearby road evidence complicates the sequence. Quarry-like pits and possible alternative alignments raise questions about changes to the route and its relationship with the tower. Woolliscroft treated these as possibilities requiring further evidence. The tower's Roman identification is strong, but a precise foundation date and a complete sequence for road and tower remain unresolved.
Watching the road
The nearby road linked the larger garrisons and the smaller posts. A watchtower gave soldiers an elevated position from which to observe traffic and the surrounding ground. The close spacing of these installations makes sense for surveillance as well as communication: recognising movement on a road is a different task from seeing a distant warning signal.
Modern trees, field boundaries and road surfaces are later parts of this landscape. They can hide both the earthworks and former sightlines. A modern ground-level view should therefore be compared cautiously with the possible outlook from a timber platform.
Shielhill North on the Gask Ridge
Possible communication with the forts
Woolliscroft’s visibility study places the known towers between Glenbank and Kaims Castle within view of Ardoch. A direct signal to the fort is therefore a plausible arrangement for Shielhill North. The diagram shows that proposed link, rather than a relay through every neighbouring tower.
These links depend on assumptions about tower height and visibility. Vegetation, weather and whether the installations were occupied at the same time also matter. Neither the diagram nor the surviving earthworks establishes a signalling code, a fixed watch rota or the size of a tower crew.
References and further reading
Trove: Shielhill North — NRHE 25378 — national site record, location and archaeological references.
HES scheduled monument record — SM3897. HES designation records are available through Trove.
Woolliscroft: Shielhill North, including St Joseph’s excavations — report or source text hosted by the Roman Gask Project.
Woolliscroft (1993), Signalling and the design of the Gask Ridge system, PSAS 123, 291–313 — possible links and their limitations.
Woolliscroft and Hoffmann, The Roman Gask system fortlet of Glenbank, PSAS 139, 167–193, Table 2 — comparative roadside positions. Westerton follows its excavation report where the descriptions differ.
Read alongside the Gask Ridge watchtower guide and the guide to Roman forts in Scotland.
