Between approximately 2500 and 4500 thousand years ago, during a period archaeologists call the Bronze Age, people built two cairns on a sloping hill 870m south-east of where Butteryhaugh Bridge stands today. One of the cairns was used for the burial of the dead. It is known today as Deadman Cairn. The other cairn was smaller, and may have been used for burial, or it may have been a field clearance cairn. Today, Deadman Cairn is surrounded by trees, and there is no sign of the other cairn, although it may survive within the trees. The cairns are Scheduled Monuments protected by law.