broch

American  

[brokh, bruhkh] / brɒx, brʌx /

Obsolete, brough

noun

1. a circular stone tower built around the beginning of the Christian era, having an inner and an outer wall, found on the Orkney Islands, Shetland Islands, the Hebrides, and the mainland of Scotland.

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broch British  

/ brɒk, brɒx /

noun

1. (in Scotland) a circular dry-stone tower large enough to serve as a fortified home; they date from the Iron Age and are found esp in the north and the islands

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Etymology

Origin of broch

First recorded in 1645–55; Scots, metathetic variant of burgh

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

broch

The three sites in Shetland, which preserve examples of broch architecture, were nominated together under the banner of the Crucible of Iron Age Scotland.

From BBC ● Mar. 22, 2011

Oldest part of the grim little hamlet was a "broch tower": a crude donjon keep.

From Time Magazine Archive

In some few there were wells, but water-supply, save when the broch was in a loch, must have been a difficulty in most cases during a prolonged siege.

From Sutherland and Caithness in Saga-Time or, The Jarls and The Freskyns by James Gray

Now this loch, says Scott, was, at the time when the broch was inhabited, open to the flow of tide water.

From The Clyde Mystery a Study in Forgeries and Folklore by Andrew Lang

"I cannot pay the fine," he said; "for not in all my lands and ships do I possess such wealth nor know I any man who would be my broch, or bail."

From The Thirsty Sword by Robert Leighton