The site was associated with the general location of plague pits that were established on the Queen's Links (a Scots term for coastal sand dunes) during the 1647–48 outbreak of the plague.

Millions of rats were killed and in 2 months no new cases of plague were reported. Bubonic plague, or "the black death," had raged throughout Europe and Asia over the past centuries. In the ...

The pit is believed to have been a garbage dumping ... Large plates had been popular before the smallpox plague, but afterward they were increasingly replaced by smaller ones, Jinno said.