Ploughing very occasionally turns up quite large scatters of fragmentary Roman artefacts, such as pottery or metalwork. They indicate military sites now ploughed flat.
Roman military sites are mainly located across lowland Scotland. Some relate to the Antonine Wall which crossed the Central Belt from the northern shore of the Clyde west of Glasgow to the southern shore of the Firth of Forth just east of Falkirk. Some Roman camps and forts were built north of the Wall, with a few even extending along the east coast and up to the Moray Firth, though many of these were only used for a short time. These military sites reflect an intermittent Roman presence in Scotland between the 1st and 3rd centuries AD.
Thousands of Roman nails were found at Inchtuthil Roman Fort in Perthshire. The large semi-circular rod is probably a metal fitting from a wooden barrel which would have held the nails. Artefact scatters are usually a discrete scatter of mixed artefactual material uncovered on the surface by ploughing which here were revealed by excavation.
HES SC348666
