Tappoch (Tapock) Broch

As I have found no information on the meaning of the word Tapock (now spelled Tappoch), I will take my best guess. The Broch stands on Tapock which is the highest point in Torwood. ‘Tap’ is a commonly used pronunciation in Scotland for ‘top’. ‘Ock’ can mean small, as in Hillock. Tapock = small-top ? — I look forward to hearing the real explanation.

I believe there have been several publications about the Broch but I have only read the report by Colonel Dundas and on the strength of that, I will jump in with both feet — OK, you know what I mean! In 1864, the Broch was excavated by Colonel Joseph Dundas F.S.A. Scot. of Carronhall. You can read Colonel J. Dundas’s report here.

Extract from Colonel Dundas’s report:
Tapock is the highest point in the ancient forest of Torwood, and commands an extensive view of the whole district lying between the [river] Forth and the [river] Carron, as well as of the distant country and mountains beyond those rivers. The general appearance of Tapock is that of a conical hill or mound, flat on the top.

Interestingly, Colonel Dundas’s report does not mention the word Broch and the plans / drawings are titled a Tumuli (a mound of earth and stones over a grave) and Tumulus is the name recorded for this feature on the 1861 Ordnance Survey map. He does not mention any surprise at finding no bodies or skeletal remains. He does refer to ‘the chamber’ and ‘the floor of the house’.

Extract from Colonel Dundas’s report (page 261):
The walls of the chamber have an inclination outwards. On the north-west there is a portion of 20 feet in length, at the height of six feet from the floor, where the upper part of the wall is put back 18 inches, thus forming a sort of shelf**.
This change of plan appears to have arisen from the builders finding that their wall did not slope back sufficiently to resist the pressure from without, and adopting the above plan as a remedy.
**Subsequent examination shows that this ledge is carried round the whole of the chamber.

I have to disagree with Colonel Dundas on two of the above points.
Firstly, the ‘shelf’ does not run round the full circumference — only about two thirds of it.
You can see it in the above photo by the RCAHMS around 1953.

Unfortunately the shelf to the left of the entrance is now too eroded to be seen properly.
Secondly, it takes great effort to cut and move large stones. You don’t just drop them down and hope everything is roughly in the right place. You get it right first time.

The Broch was not just a hollow tower. It had several levels within. These floors had to be supported. At six feet high, this shelf is an ideal height for supporting the floor joists for the first floor. Six feet would be a slightly tight fit for the height of a man but the ground floor may have been used to house the livestock.

Dundas never seems to realise that this is a Broch. Brochs were very common in the North and West but here in lowland Scotland they were almost unheard of.

A conventional Broch, the ‘mother-of-all cavity wall projects’ with inner and outer walls each being about 2.5 metres thick, stood on average around 9 metres tall.

Extract from Colonel Dundas’s report (page 264):
. . . on the supposition that there was a roof with a rubble backing similar to the walls. I cannot imagine how the room could have been filled with so solid a mass, except by the falling in of the roof.

Is Colonel Dundas seriously suggesting that this building, with an internal diameter of about 10 metres, had a domed or arched roof made from irregular roughly cut stone and no cement?

Extract from Colonel Dundas’s report (page 260):
After the removal of an immense mass of large stones and rubble with which the chamber was filled, and which was thrown over on the east side of the mound to the amount of upwards of 200 tons, we found ourselves in a large chamber, of an irregular circular form, 106 feet in circumference.

200 tons — does that sound impressive? It would have raised the height of the Broch by about one metre.
That's fine, if all you want to do is hide from a short person, but hardly a magnificent structure. We are short of about 2,000 tons of stone.

So where did all the stone go?
Let us speculate. I am a Master Castle Builder (I know the secret hand-shake) and I have been asked to build a castle in Torwood [not the current one, the one before that]. Seemingly old Morag with the second-site has predicted an invasion by an army of chaps with posh accents and a king with very long legs. I don’t believe a word of it, but work has been slack recently and I am glad to have the contract.

Cut stone is a very expensive product. I sit on the Tapock looking over the Forth Valley.
Only one decent road (don’t mention the Romans). Everything has to be moved along country tracks little better than animal paths.
Where is a good source of local stone?
What is the cost of transporting just two big stones on a horse-drawn two-wheeled cart?
I can feel my margins being squeezed but it’s just the sharp edge of the stone I am sitting on.
I stand up and take note of the ancient and abandoned old Broch behind me. Enough stone to build two castles! — and a little conservatory on the side.
One wheelbarrow, one stone and one man running frantically downhill trying to keep up with said barrow — ten minutes — job done — the decision is an easy one.

When my castle eventually becomes a ruin, as all castles do, the stone will be used to build something else.
Old Morag was sipping some vile smelling brew the other day when she mumbled something about an Alexander Forrester, from Garden, and a fancy Mansion House. That woman really needs a man in her life.

Think of Hadrian’s Wall (sometimes you have to mention the Romans). A magnificent stone structure that is now only a quarter of its original height.
Where did all the stone go?
It is born again and part of farm houses, outbuildings and sheep-pens all along the length of the old Roman boundary that caused the Scottish pound note to look different from the English pound note.
I can imagine Calum the Caledonian at the security checkpoint, insisting to the Roman officer who has just refused a bribe, “I think you’ll find, that Pound-note is ‘Legal Tender’ by the way!”

Extract from Colonel Dundas’s report (page 263): All the stones used in the building are of the same sandstone as the rock on which the mound stands. The mound, i.e., the hacking of stones and earth on the outside of the walls of the central chamber, varies from 18 to 28 feet in thickness. Below the mound, on the west and precipitous side, there is a series of caves in the face of the rock. Some of these have apparently been deepened by the hand of man.

“All the stones used in the building are of the same sandstone as the rock on which the mound stands”
— so where is the hole they quarried the stone from?
You don’t haul stone any further than you have to.

Let us speculate. The precipitous sheer drop on the north-west face may once have been a gentle slope like the rest of the Tapock.

You start quarrying your stone here and leave a formidable vertical cliff to make it difficult for burglars.

Only when the foreman returns from holiday and starts screaming obscenities do you realise that you cannot excavate any more stone as you will soon be undercutting the very Broch you are building.

Quarrying stops immediately but there is an embarrassing slight rocky overhang that hopefully the customer will not notice — plant a few heathers and a bit of bracken — that should hide it.

The Potty Chamber

On the NE wall there is a chamber and there are interesting theories about that chamber.
‘Kitchen’ was one — I discounted that immediately as there was no sign of kitchen units or a gas supply.
It was not mentioned by Colonel Dundas or his draughtsman in 1864. This abomination is a modern addition — but when?

First off, this was not built by skilled hands. It was done by a ‘builder from hell’. If its wall was not backed by solid stone and infill, this structure would simply collapse.

I came across the Broch for the first time in 2004. This chamber immediately struck me as being similar to a Sangar. A Sangar is a small fortification constructed of stones and build by soldiers on rocky ground when it is impossible to dig-in with a conventional trench. I know they were used a lot around Monte Cassino in World War Two.

During World War Two, Britain was poised for a German invasion. Good Observation Posts are the key to military success.
Aircraft and artillery can be guided by the observers. Tappoch is one of the highest points in the Forth Valley and commands a view as far as the Forth Bridge and Rosyth Naval Dockyard.
As far as I know, there were few trees on the Tappoch in the 1940’s.
I would be very surprised if the military did not have an Observation Post on the Tappoch.

Now the question — did soldiers, at that Observation Post, build the Sangar?
Unfortunately, the report by RCAHMS around 1953 does not mention the chamber. The first mention of the chamber that I can find is by E W MacKie 1964

Traces of what appeared to be an intra-mural chamber were observed on the wallhead on the NE side, and a small scale investigation was carried out in the spring of 1964. The built end of a long chamber about 3' deep was found on the wallhead, appearing to run towards the main entrance at a height which would bring it out above the level of the lintels there. It was surmised that this was a secondary structure, possibly recent, inserted after the broch was in ruins.

If the chamber did not appear until after the 1950’s, my best guess is it was built by schoolboys on their summer holidays that lasted 8 weeks.
I was an eleven year old in 1962 and had gained the rank of Private in the Boy Scouts.
Along with a friend or two, I would spend many days in the local woods, armed with axes, knife and twine, building ‘survival shelters’.
Mind you, I was quite gifted at woodwork. Others may have been more in their element shoving stones about to build their shelters. Others still may have built theirs from straw but two huffs and a puff would have knocked that down.

The Entrance

The entrance is a long low narrow passage of twenty feet in length. It is now full of large fallen stones and is not a sensible place to wander.
An intruder would have been forced to adopt a crouched and vulnerable posture to gain access.
A single defender could have kept back an army as she prodded with a long sword while sitting on a three legged stool — milking a cow with the other hand.

Extract from Colonel Dundas’s report (page 262):
The floor of these passages is much worn, whereas the steps above mentioned bear no marks of wear and tear.
From this we may infer that the lower passage was the usual one of entry into the house, while the upper or staircase one was only occasionally used, and would probably be the means of retreat in the event of the mound being attacked, and the lower doorway being forced.

The Stairwell

The stairwell was a means of internal access to the upper floors but today it simply looks like the Broch’s back door and is probably the least dangerous means of accessing the floor of the Broch.

As you climb the stairs that were originally in the cavity between the inner and outer walls, you now appear to exit on the outside of the Broch. This is because the outside wall of the broch was spirited away by crazed looking men with wheelbarrows a long long time ago.

I have heard rumours that stone is still being spirited away, now and then, by crazed looking dudes on quad bikes.

The Cupboards

Small openings appear to have been deliberately created in the wall as storage space but it is now getting difficult to identify them especially when the bracken gets to around two metres high.

Extract from Colonel Dundas’s report (page 261):
At irregular heights and intervals in the walls there are about nineteen spaces of from 10 to 14 inches in width, and similar depth. These appear to be arranged without any order, and to have been left when a large stone afforded a good lintel or sole at a convenient distance from the ground. These spaces are well adapted for cupboards or store places. Nothing was found in them, however, except some white clay peculiar to Torwood.

Humans or livestock on the ground floor? The answer to that question would help determine what the cupboards might have been used for.

They could have been for the outdoors stuff like wellington boots and sprung-loaded haggis traps. There may well have been similar cupboards at all floor levels in the Broch.

Calum would need a place to keep his sporran-brush and blue makeup and Mari would need a place to keep her aspirin.
It’s anyone’s guess what old Morag keeps in hers — no one is daft enough to put a hand in there.

Best Time to Visit Tappoch Broch

Basically before the bracken gets established so before the end of May and preferably after a few days without rain.

Around mid May, you should see the Rhododendrons in flower and, with a bit of luck, the yellow flower will still be on the Gorse and the pretty lambs will be chopping about.

Other perspectives on Tappoch Broch

The Broch is popular with a lot of people. Some record their experiences. If I find any accounts that tickle my fancy, I will put the links below.

Where the Fatdog Walks — A “RUFF” Guide to Wild Scotland

Ken Brown and his dog Maisie (stage name — The Fatdog), armed with a rucksack of Bonios, tramp the wilds of Scotland and Maisie writes a blog to record the events.

This is their walk to Tappoch Broch in winter.

Torwood Castle or Torwood-head Mansion

Still under construction.