The Sma' Glen signal station is a small Roman timber watchtower situated on the spur of Lurg Hill, overlooking the strategic pass through the Sma' Glen where the River Almond cuts through the Highland edge. It belongs to the Flavian Gask system of c. AD 79–86/87, and functioned as an outpost of the auxiliary fort at Fendoch some 3 km to the south, monitoring movement along the glen and the line of the Highland fringe.
Source: Pleiades — A Community-Built Gazetteer and Graph of Ancient Places. View the Pleiades record →
Unlike the towers strung along the Gask Ridge frontier road, this site is one of the "glen-blocking" outposts paired with their parent forts (compare those associated with Dalginross or Bochastle), giving it a tactical rather than purely communications role in observing native movement out of the Highland glens. It thus illustrates how the Flavian army integrated forward surveillance with its forts along the Highland Line, arguably the earliest land frontier system in the Roman Empire.
The site, identified through aerial reconnaissance and ground survey, comprises the typical circular ditch and central post-setting of a Gask-type tower, but it has not been extensively excavated and no significant artefactual assemblage has been published. Most of what is inferred about its character and dating derives by analogy with better-investigated towers such as Parkneuk, Westerton and Shielhill South.
The Sma' Glen signal station is a small Roman timber watchtower situated on the spur of Lurg Hill, overlooking the strategic pass through the Sma' Glen where the River Almond cuts through the Highland edge. It is recorded in the Pleiades gazetteer of ancient places as a watch tower site from the Roman period in Britain.
Sma' Glen Signal Station is classified as a Roman watch tower — a military site in the Pleiades ancient world gazetteer. Roman Britain's archaeology encompasses thousands of sites ranging from legionary fortresses and marching camps to villas, temples and towns.
Several Roman sites lie within a short distance, including Fendoch (4.3 km), Strageath (10.6 km), Muir O' Fauld (12 km). Aubrey Research maps over 2,200 Roman sites across Britain, drawn from the Pleiades ancient world gazetteer.
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