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Midtown field system and clearance cairns is a post-medieval agricultural landscape situated 950 metres east of Midtown in Kincardineshire, Scotland. The site comprises field boundaries and scattered clearance cairns, evidence of systematic land management and stone removal practices that characterise upland farming in the region during the early modern period. The underlying bedrock, composed of psammite, semipelite and pelite of the Argyll Group, was laid down during the Neoproterozoic and yields the coarse and fine-grained metamorphic stones abundant across the landscape.
The clearance cairns represent the accumulated stones cleared from cultivated and pasture land, a laborious but essential process for improving agricultural productivity on marginal ground. Heaped systematically at field margins, these cairns served both practical and boundary-defining purposes. The surviving field boundaries visible at Midtown reflect the reorganisation of land during a period of agricultural intensification in post-medieval Scotland, when proprietors sought to maximise returns from upland terrain.
The monument is protected by Historic Environment Scotland under reference SM4816, recognising its significance as a material record of farming practices and land use in early modern Kincardineshire.
Midtown,field system & clearance cairns 950m E of is a scheduled monument protected by Historic Environment Scotland under reference SM4816. View the official record →
Midtown field system and clearance cairns is a post-medieval agricultural landscape situated 950 metres east of Midtown in Kincardineshire, Scotland. It is designated a Scheduled Ancient Monument by Historic Environment Scotland under reference SM4816.
Midtown,field system & clearance cairns 950m E of dates from the post-medieval period, and is classified as a field system & clearance cairns. It is one of over 32,000 scheduled monuments protected across the UK.
Midtown,field system & clearance cairns 950m E of is a Scheduled Ancient Monument, legally protected by Historic Environment Scotland — the body responsible for designating and safeguarding heritage sites in Scotland. The official designation reference is SM4816.
Several scheduled monuments lie within 10 km, including The Nine Stanes,Mulloch Wood,stone circle 650m NW of The Garroll (0.3 km), Eslie, stone circle 730m S of (0.7 km), Midtown,farmsteads and field systems 800m SE of (0.8 km).
This page is just one thread. A full Aubrey report pulls together 14 strands of Midtown,field system & clearance cairns 950m E of's history, each drawn from the record and mapped to the exact spot:
Every location is different. Not every section appears for every place, only what the historical record actually holds turns up in a report.
Midtown,field system & clearance cairns 950m E of stands on Argyll Group, bedrock that formed in the Neoproterozoic. The rock here is psammite, semipelite and pelite.