Cnoc a' Chaisteil (site of)

Cnoc a’ Chaisteil is a motte which may have been the predecessor to Teaninich Castle.

The site may have started out as a defended promontory, jutting out from a terrace overlooking the mouth of the Alness River, as early as the 6th century BCE, however it was reused during the 10th or 11th centuries CE. Measuring around 32m north to south and around 29m east to west, it was defended by natural slopes to the south and east and by a crescentic ditch and banks to the north and west.

The ditch was V-shaped and around 7.5m wide by around 2.4m deep. The outer bank was around 4.5m wide and around 0.5m tall and the inner bank around 6.0m wide by around 0.3m tall. A causeway entrance to the west was around 3.5m wide. The western half of the defences and the entrance have been damaged by gravel quarrying.

The site may have been reoccupied and refortified during the campaigns of William the Lion in Moray and Ross, a conclusion reached due to its similarities with the 12th century Dunskeath Castle around 16km to the east.

There are few documentary references to a castle here, but the “manerium . . . de Owlenys” is mentioned in 1365. The site of the castle was evidently later used as a place of justice as in 1585 the “castlehill of Alness” is mentioned when “Ane bailzie Court of the Earldome of Ross and Lordshippe of Ardmeanach” was held there by Robert Munro of Fowlis, and in 1667 when Donald McBane McOnell was found guilty of the murder of Neil Munro he was informed by the sheriff at Dingwall that he would be “brought to the place of Knockchastell in Alness and suffer death by separating yor head from yor souldiers.”

Despite the lack of any evidence it is not unreasonable to assume that the castle on the motte was superseded by what is now known as Teaninich Castle around 200m to the south. The land on which that castle was built was previously known as Milntown of Alness and was a possession of the Munro family from at least the late 15th century, held from the Earl of Ross. The first of the family was Robert Munro of Milntown of Alness, sixth son of Hugh Munro of Coul, who was born in the second half of the 15th century and may have built a castle there early in the 16th century.