Loch Tay () is a freshwater loch in the central highlands of Scotland, in the Perth and Kinross and Stirling council areas. It is the largest body of fresh water in Perth and Kinross, and the sixth largest loch in Scotland. The watershed of Loch Tay traditionally formed the historic province of Breadalbane. It is a long, narrow loch of around long, and typically around wide, following the line of the strath from the south west to north east. It is the sixth-largest loch in Scotland by area and over deep at its deepest. Pre-history and archaeology Between 1996 and 2005, a large scale project was carried out to investigate the heritage and archaeology of Loch Tay, the Ben Lawers Historic Landscape (BLHL) Project. It took place primarily on the National Trust for Scotland’s property but included some local landowners who held the agricultural lands between the head-dyke and the loch-shore. Mesolithic period Before 1996 the earliest known evidence for occupation along the shores of Loch Tay had been a nearby stone-axe factory at Creag an Caillich and the 1965 excavations of the stone circle at Croft Moraig (dated to the 3rd- to 2nd-millennium BC). However, the BLHL project found a lithic scatter along the Ben Lawers Nature Trail that dated to the 8th and 7th millennia BC, during Scotland's Mesolithic period. This and another Mesolithic site found during the project were very important to archaeologists understanding of that time period in Scotland. Until the 1990s most Mesolithic sites were recorded along the coasts and these sites were the first ones recorded in the uplands of the Highlands, demonstrating that the hunter and gathers of that time did not strictly live by the coasts. Neolithic and Bronze Ages The BLHL project also found evidence of people living and working in the hills above the loch during the Neolithic period. A Beaker burial was also found, the Balnahanaid Beaker, which may be among the earliest Beakers in Scotland, dating to a time when their use was rare. Prehistoric environment and loch levels Investigations of the loch have found that a Neolithic woodland existed on its edge for at least 900 years and that during that period the shoreline would have been least 4–5m lower than it is today. Iron Age Several of the 20 crannogs found along Loch Tay have been radiocarbon dated to the Iron Age: Morenish Crannog 50 BC