THE ARDROSSAN Castle Heritage Society continued their fine work over the last week with a ground-penetrating radar survey.  Archaeologist Oliver O’Grady travelled from Perthshire to conduct the survey with willing volunteers over a four day period and will present his findings to the members later in the year to ascertain whether there are any unusual or historical grounds for a dig in the area.  Dr O’Grady said: “I specialise in community archaeology projects and also geophysics.

"My main angle is bringing high level research to community groups because there is a big interest in Scotland in finding out more about your local history.” There have been various areas of interest popping up across the vast grounds of the castle and Oliver explained what they could be.

He added: “The castle is a real monument to history but the hill that we’re on, it’s clearly been a focus point for people of centuries, if not millennia and we’ve got the early church site and the boundaries to that.

“Up towards the hill there is a lot of geology but we’ve managed to identify a series of what could be defensive ditch works that could relate to the castle but tantalisingly could relate to something much earlier, like an Iron Age fort, but it’s early days.” When asked what the cream of the crop find would be for the area, Oliver didn’t hesitate: “With the church and the castle it looks to me like an estate centre.

"The real find would be if we could find some medieval settlement.

“Often you would get medieval toons or market towns and we know Ardrossan was a burgh.  “It would be fantastic to find some evidence of the earliest settlements.”  And next year will see the 470th anniversary of the Privy Council meeting in Ardrossan Castle.  Oliver said: “It’s more than likely that they met within the castle but it’s been damaged quite a lot.

"My PhD was on medieval assemblies and one of the things we found is that even up until the 1500s, important meetings were held on hills and there would have been an entourage with a meeting of that scale, it’s a possibilty at this stage but it would be lovely but unlikely to find something in relation to the Privy Council meeting.” There will be a survey carried out at the castle itself which will be followed by interpratation by Dr O’Grady and explaining all the data before a public meeting will be held with a lecture on the results.

To get involved with the society, contact them through their Facebook page by searching Ardrossan Castle Heritage Society. They are keen to get more and more people involved.