About Sutherland - Scotland

History of Sutherland Part 2 | History of Sutherland Part 3 | Ancient Monuments

 

History of Sutherland - Part 1

The county of Sutherland has a history extending over 6,000 years, however many recent changes have altered its boundaries. This northern area was the Southland or Sudrland of the early Norse settlers in Orkney. But even that was not the beginning of its story.


The Ordnance Survey maps clearly mark many sites which date back to the days before written history. The earliest hunters and fishers of 4,000 B.C. have left traces of their occupation of this land in ‘middens’ i.e. heaps or strata of broken shell, pieces of charcoal etc. Vestiges may be found east of the Meikle Ferry, Dornoch, at Achuvoldrach Ferry near Tongue, and at the Little Ferry, Golspie.


Their successors, immigrants from the mainland of Europe, built the great chambered tombs, many of which are in ruins – great, grey heaps of stones on a hillside. They may be seen at Fiscary, near Bettyhill, at Skelpick in Strathnaver, in Strath Fleet at Torboll, at Torrish in the Strath of Kildonan, at The Ord, near Lairg and in many other locations.


The next group of incomers also left their visible marks on the county in stone rows in the Strath of Kildonan on the slopes of Learable Hill and at Torrish; in stone circles at Dalharrold in Strathnaver at Aberscross near The Mound, and at Braegrudie above Rogart and Achinduich south of Lairg. There is no doubt that these rows and circles were planned with geometric precision by men of the highest intelligence. Closely linked with these works are stones which have cup and ring marks, hollowed out by the expert craftsmanship of skilled men. Some of these may be found on the shore of Loch Hakel near Tongue, at Torrisdale west of Bettyhill on the north coast and on Learable Hill in Kildonan.

Dalharrold, Aberscross & Braegrudie.


On this hill is also one of the many standing stones to be found in the county. As the name suggests, they are solitary massive upright pillars of the local stone. Other examples are at Ospisdale, at Dalnamain (west of The Mound), at Glen Loth and at Invershin Mains.

Dun Dornaigil.


These early Sutherland folk (Bronze Age and Iron Age farmers) made their homes in hut circles – now simply saucer-like depressions which would have been roofed with divots, enclosed by a circular line of boulders protruding from the heather. Literally hundreds of hut circles have been found – at Dalharrold in Strathnaver, Achinael in Strath Carnaig, Dremergid in Rogart and many other areas.


Close by are often found earth-houses, underground passages, their stone roofs vaulted with flagstones and probably used by the people and the stock when danger threatened. These souterrains, as they are sometimes called, are visible at Kilphedir and Suisgill in Kildonan, above Kirkton Quarry near Golspie, at Cracknie near Loch Loyal and elsewhere. A thousand feet above an earth-house on the shore of Loch Eriboll, near to five lochans, is an unusual roundhouse, set in remote inhospitable country safe from enemies of any description, human or animal.


Of course, there was need to defend one’s self from enemies and different kinds of defensive structures were built during the centuries – promontory forts like Seanachaisteal on the north coast near Durness; hill forts like Ben Griam Mor near Kinbrace, and Duchary Rock, in Strath Brora; vitrified forts like the Dun of Creich near Spinningdale.


The brochs, too, were part of the defences. Many of them have been robbed of their dressed stones but there are enough left to show the original skill of these early builders of dry-stone masonry. It is worth taking the trouble to find Dun Dornoigil in Strathmore, Grummore in Strathnaver, Sandy Dun near Bettyhill, and Clachtoll near Stoer.


There is a clear link between some of these ancient monuments and the beginning of what is termed history. For example, some of the standing stones were later hallowed by the early Christian missionaries who incised the cross of the Christian faith on the outward signs of pagan places. Such incised crosses are to be seen at Tuiteam Torbhach by Rosehall, Farr Churchyard near Bettyhill, Learable Hill and Clach an Eig in Kildonan, St. Demhan’s stone by the side of Creich cemetery. These old pagan places were reconsecrated by the missionaries of the seventh and eighth centuries. And with the coming of these travellers from over the sea, the mists of prehistory begin to dissolve. History, as we see it, shows a clearer outline.


Where they found small groups of folk, Gaelic-speaking Celts or Picts, the monks taught the Christian message. Of the Pictish language unfortunately no written example has been identified. There do exist, however – in Dunrobin Museum for example – some Pictish symbol stones, beautifully and elaborately carved, as yet enigmatic but obviously carrying some sort of message. The saints of the Celtic church are more clearly identified. Any place name beginning with ‘Kil’ shows that here was a small chapel dedicated to Christian worship, as at Kil-donan, Kil-phedir, Kill-in, Kil-braur, Kil-malie, Kil-main etc. Off the coast of Tongue lies the island of St. Columba. Not far away and long before Columba, there was a holy place on the Island Naombh. These two islands were both sacred though no one can tell when their sanctity was first acknowledged.

   

Left: Farr Stone. Right: Pitish Symbol Stone, Dunrobin Museum.


It is known that by the middle of the ninth century, Kenneth MacAlpin, King of Scots, is reported in the Scottish Chronicle to have ‘destroyed’ the Picts. As a result, they lost their identity.


The Scots attacked them from the west and south. the Norsemen attacked them from the north. And the kingdoms of north and south Pictland were no more.
The old litany of the Celtic church is a reminder of the havoc and dread felt and suffered when the Norsemen landed in Sutherland. “A furore Normanorum libera nos Dominus.” – from the fury of the Norsemen, O Lord, deliver us.


A survey of place names gives a picture of those districts where the Vikings made their most lasting impression. They held and named most of the seaward parts of the straths and nearly all the coast lands of the county, in fact, the land most fit for cultivation below five or six hundred feet. e.g. Helmsdale, Golspie, Skelbo, Embo, Stoer, Scourie, Laxford, Wrath, Durness, Eriboll, Hope, Tongue, Skerray.


Because Norse buildings were made largely of wood, very little remains are to be found. The cluster pillars and part of the nave and choir of Dornoch Cathedral are of the thirteenth century period. But Bishop Gilbert, the founder of the cathedral, was no Viking. He was of Flemish descent by way of Moray. His cathedral is the oldest church still in use in the county. At his own expense, he began the building of the cathedral in Dornoch in 1224. A year earlier, this great man, Gilbert de Moravia (Gilbert Murray) had been consecrated Bishop of the Province of Cat, that is of Caithness and Sutherland. The ceremony is traditionally said to have taken place in the old church of St. Barr, one of the seventh century missionaries in the north. The site of St. Barr’s chapel is at the east end of the cathedral churchyard. The Bishop’s Palace, now an hotel, stands opposite the cathedral but is of much later date, sixteenth century.


Bishop Gilbert fought many times against the Viking invaders. His brother, Richard of Skelbo, was killed at his side during the Battle of Embo on Dornoch Links. A wieve (lifelike) image of him lies on top of his sarcophagus in his brother’s church.


Light and incense for the cathedral church of the diocese had to be furnished by other churches in the province, including Balnakeil Church near Durness. In 1275, this tiny north coast church contributed 7 merks to help Pope Gregory’s Crusade to the Holy Land. (7 merks was worth about 9¾ Scots money or 7s. 9½d. in sterling.) It is a far cry from Balnakeil in the north of Scotland to Jerusalem in the Middle East. Tradition says that not only money but men made the long journey.
Hundreds of years later (in 1623 to be exact) a man was buried in Balnakeil Church. He was Donald Macleod, reputed to have been an illegitimate son of the great Donald Mackay and to have been born on the island in Loch Stack. He is supposed to have committed 18 murders, which may have weighed on his conscience, for he believed an old witch when she told him gleefully that she would dance on his grave. Donald Macleod, or McMurcho as he was called, arranged for a niche to be built in the wall of the church where his body might finally be placed and the witch’s prophecy frustrated. On his tombstone are these words:


Donald Mhic Murcho here lies low.
Was ill to his friend, worse to his foe.
True to his master in weird and woe.


Could it be that ’his master’ was The Evil One’?

 

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