Tag: Outer Hebrides

River Barvas, Barvas, Lewis

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Sacred River:  OS Grid Reference – NB 351 494

Folklore

As with traditions found all over the world, rivers and lakes had spirits, gods and rituals attached to them.  Despite us believing that no such things ever occurred in Britain and the rest of the so-called ‘civilized’ world, such things were once common.  One of the annual rites performed at the Hebridean river at Barbhas (Barvas)—and described by Alexander Fraser (1878)—is just one such example:

“The natives of Barvas had a peculiar custom on the first day of May, of sending a man across the river at (the) dawn of day to prevent any females from crossing it first, as that would hinder the salmon from ascending the river all the year through.” (Fraser 1878)

The importance of the salmon, both as an important food source and equally as a ‘sacred animal’, is known in myths and legends throughout the British Isles.  To the legendary hero-figure Finn, it played a part of him gaining supernatural wisdom, and this quality is integral to the fish itself who ate the hazelnuts of knowledge and gained such power.  In this same short piece of folklore, the time of year when the ritual should be enacted on the River Barvas is Beltane, which is renowned as the prime period in the annual cycle/calendar relating to fertility.  This element relates to maintaining the fecundity of the river and the salmon where, in this case, men crossing the waters symbolically fertilizes them to ensure the annual return of the fish.  It would be interesting to know when this custom finally died out.

References:

  1. Fraser, Alexander, Northern Folk-lore on Wells and Water, Advertiser Office: Inverness 1878.
  2. Ross, Anne, Pagan Celtic Britain, RKP: London 1967.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian

Clach an Eolas, St Kilda, Outer Hebrides

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Legendary Stone:  OS Grid Reference – NF 101 996?

Also Known as:

  1. Stone of Knowledge

Archaeology & History

This stone has very similar qualities to the one found upon Mullach-geal, ⅔ of a mile to the west, as a place where ritual magick was performed.  And, just like the Mullach-geal stone, we only have an approximate position of its whereabouts: “behind the village”, as Mr Sands (1878) said.  The same words were used by other St Kildan writers when it came to describing the whereabouts of Tobar Childe, so we must assume it to be reasonably close to the old well.

Folklore

Mr Sands seems to be the first person to write about it, telling us,

“At the back of the village is a stone, which does not differ in external appearance from the numerous stones scattered around, but which was supposed to possess magical properties.  It is called Clach an Eolas, or Stone of Knowledge.  If any one stood on it on the first day of the quarter, he became endowed with the second sight — could “look into the seeds of Time,” and foretell all that was to happen during the rest of the quarter.  Such an institution must have been of great value in Hirta, where news are so scanty.  To test its powers I stood on it on the first day of Spring (old style) in the present year, but must acknowledge that I saw nothing, except two or three women laden with peats, who were smiling at my credulity.”

Charles MacLean (1977) mentioned the stone a hundred years later, but seems to have just copied this earlier description.  Does anyone up there know its whereabouts?

References:

  1. MacLean, Charles, Island on the Edge of the World, Canongate: Edinburgh 1977.
  2. Sands, J., Out of the World; or Life in St. Kilda, Maclachlan & Stewart: Edinburgh 1878.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian

Mullach-Geal Stone, St Kilda, Outer Hebrides

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Legendary Rock:  OS Grid Reference – NF 092 996

Archaeology & History

This is a most intriguing site, whose exact location seems to have been forgotten.  It was first mentioned in Macaulay’s History of St Kilda (1764) as being one of four stone altars that the islanders used for worship.  Three of them were related to the early christian figure of St. Brendan, whose well and chapel remains are on the south-side of the island.  However, this fourth stone altar possessed a purely magickal and heathen function.  Macaulay initially gives the location as being “on top of a hill to the southwest” of St. Brendan’s chapel; but subsequently tells us it was upon “Mulach-geall” which is a mile NNW.  It was an important place to the people of Hirta and its exact position needs to be found and, hopefully, the altar still exists.

Folklore

Despite Macaulay’s conflicting directions of how to get here (a common feature of early writers), he wrote:

“I have already made mention of one St. Kilda altar, that in Brendans Chapel.  There are no less than four more in the island, of which three lie at considerable distances from the holy places.  There is one particularly on the top of a hill to the south-weft (sic), dedicated according to tradition to the God who presides over Seasons; The God of thunder, lightning, tempests and fair weather.  To avert the terrible judgments inflicted by this mighty Divinity, the ancient St. Kildians offered propitiatory sacrifices on this altar, sacrifices of different forts, much like the old Pagans, who offered a black sheep to Winter, or the Tempest, and a white one to the Spring…  The place where the people of this island, offered their victims to Taranis, is called Mulach-geall, that is to say, the White eminence or hill…”

More than a hundred years later, Seton (1878) made mention of it, but added no further details.

The invocation to Nature’s elements is something we find echoed at some sites further east, such as the Well of the North Wind on Iona and its compatriot Well of the South Wind.  At both these places, so-called ‘pagan’ rituals were used to both placate and invoke the gods and spirits of the wind.  This one on St Kilda possessed additional magickal prowess.  But where is it?  Have we lost it, or is it sleeping somewhere on the edge of Mullach-Geal…?

References:

  1. Macaulay, Kenneth, The History of St. Kilda; Containing a Description of This Remarkable Island; the Manners and Customs of the Inhabitants; the Religious and Pagan Antiquities There Found, T. Becket: London 1764.
  2. Seton, Gordon, St. Kilda – Past and Present, William Blackwood: Edinburgh 1878.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian

Firbhreige, North Uist, Outer Hebrides

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Standing Stones:  OS Grid Reference – NF 7700 7031

Also known as:

  1. Canmore ID 10079
  2. Toroghas

Getting Here

This is nice n’ far north indeed – north-west Uist in fact!  Hit the A865 road northwest to the village of Ceann a’ Bhaigh.  By the little church at the little crossroad, take the track on your right which leads you into the hills.  Go all the way to the end of this track and walk straight north for a couple of hundred yards, as if you’re heading up the hill, Toroghas, in front of you.

Thom’s drawing of the Stones & possible alignments

 

Archaeology & History

Here are two small standing stones, each not much more than three-feet tall, about 40 yards apart.  Alexander Thom (1984) looked for astronomical alignments here, but found very little, merely commenting:  “From here a number of sites are visible, but the (easternmost) stone might be said to indicate Craig Hasten or Deaskeir Islet.”  In his own analysis of the site, Clive Ruggles (UI23 – 1984) also found such astronomy lacking here.

Folklore

In Thom, Thom & Burl’s (1990) description of these two small stones, Aubrey Burl mentioned how “their name is similar to the stones on Skye called ‘Na Fir Bhreige’, or ‘the false men’. This has been variously interpreted as meaning men who were turned to stone for being unfaithful to their wives or, alternatively, to stones that from a distance resembled men.”  Which is apparently the tale here. (see Grinsell 1976)

Comparative religious studies clearly indicate that legends of petrified beings are representative of the spirits of the ancestors residing in the said stones or other artifact.  If there’s any validity to this ingredient, it would imply that some prehistoric burials can be found nearby — though my archaeo-records show nothing (but that doesn’t mean they’re not there).  If there anyone goes wandering hereabouts in the near future, see if you can find any tombs in the locale.

References:

  1. Beveridge, Erskine, North Uist: Archaeology and Topography, William Brown: Edinburgh 1911.
  2. Ruggle, C.L.N., Megalithic Astronomy, BAR: Oxford 1984.
  3. Thom, A., Thom, A.S. & Burl, A., Stone Rows and Standing Stones, vol.1, BAR: Oxford 1990.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Carra Bhroin, Lochboisdale, South Uist

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Standing Stone:  OS Grid Reference – NF 8117 2248

Also Known as:

  1. Canmore ID 10138
  2. Carragh broin

Archaeology & History

The nature of this site seems a little disputed.  Shown on modern OS-maps and cited as being visited and seen in April 1967, the Canmore website also describes it in the present tense — but when I.A. Crawford (1965) wrote of this site he told that, “this standing stone…has been destroyed in fencing operations” — i.e., building a fence or wall, not some doods having a fencing fight!

Equally curious would be the stature of the site; as in the Royal Commission report (1928), the stone was told to be only 2-feet tall — which would mean that if this site is included as an authentic archaeological site, then we’re gonna have to double or treble the number of standing stone sites nationally!  There are masses of ‘monoliths’ two-feet tall and above which are in the ‘natural’ category.  But this stone, for whatever reason (the folklore probably), has been granted the providence as an authentic standing stone.

Folklore

Tradition told that this old stone was “alleged to mark a battle site” in ancient days.  The variation on this theme tells that the stone marked the grave of a man who was slewn in battle here.  Seems likely that there will be prehistoric tombs nearby…

References:

  1. Crawford, I.A., ‘Carra Bhroin, S.Uist,’ in Discovery & Excavation in Scotland, 1965, SRG & CBA 1965.
  2. Royal Commission on the Ancient & Historical Monuments & Constructions of Scotland, Inventory of Monuments and Constructions in the Outer Hebrides, Skye and the Small Isles, HMSO: Edinburgh 1928.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Tobair na h-oige, St. Kilda, Outer Hebrides

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Sacred Well (lost):  OS Grid Reference – NA 100 000

Also Known as:

  1. Well of Eternal Youth

Folklore

An old story told in previous centuries by the indigenous folk of Hirta (St. Kilda) described a long-lost well that was thought to be an abode of the little people, known as the Well of Eternal Youth.  Not to be confused with the Well of Virtues near the Amazon’s House less than a mile west, the rough whereabouts of this site is cited by J. Sands (1878) in the folklore section of his otherwise historical account on these faraway Atlantic islands.  He wrote:

“Once on a time an old fellow, in going up Connagher with a sheep on his back, observed a Well which he had never seen or heard of before.  The water looked like cream, and was so tempting, that he knelt down and took a hearty drink.  To his surprise all the infirmities of age immediately left him, and all the vigour and activity of youth returned. He laid down the sheep to mark the spot, and ran down the hill to tell his neighbours. But when he came up again neither sheep nor well were to be found, nor has any one been able to find the Tobair na h-oige to this day.  Some say that if he had left a small bit of iron at the well—a brog with a tacket in it would have done quite well—the fairies would have been unable to take back their gift.”

Explorations of old maps and texts has failed to show with certainty where this legendary well may have been (the grid-ref is an approximation), but it was reported in Mrs Banks’ Scottish Calendar Customs (1937) to have been “issuing out of the face of a rock on the north-side of the east bay…only accesible by the inhabitants, no stranger daring to climb the steep rock.” Some of us would try!

References:

  1. Banks, M. MacLeod, British Calendar Customs: Scotland – volume 2, Folklore Society: London 1937.
  2. Sands, J., Out of the World; or Life in St. Kilda, Maclachlan & Stewart: Edinburgh 1878.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Roghadal, Harris, Outer Hebrides

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‘Stone Circle’:  OS Grid Reference – NG 0496 82914

Archaeology & History

Not included in Burl’s (2000) magnum opus, it looks as if this place has long since gone – but perhaps a local or a wanderer might find remnants of it still there somewhere. The only thing I’ve so far found about it is in Martin Martin’s journey here in 1695, where he described this “stone circle in the sea” thus:

“On the east-side of the village Rowdil, there is a circle of stone, within 8 yards of the shore: it is about 3 fathoms under water, and about 2 stories high: it is in form broader above than below, like to the lower story of a kiln: I saw it perfectly on one side, but the season being then windy, hindered me from a full view of it. The natives say that there is such another circle of less compass in the Pool Borodil, on the other side of the bay.”

Local people say that the structure is a natural one, with others of a similar nature found close by.  Does anyone know more about this – and perhaps about the other apparent circle at Borasdal, less than a mile to the west?

References:

  1. Martin, Martin, A Description of the Western Islands of Scotland in 1695, Eneas Mackay: Stirling 1934.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Tigh Stallar, Boreray, St. Kilda

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Stone circle:  OS Grid Reference – NA 153 050

Archaeology & History

The isle of Boreray is four miles northeast of Hirta and here once lived, according to legend, a christian hermit.  However in the reverend Kenneth Macaulay History of St. Kilda (1764), he told us that the character was actually a druid.   Take your pick!  The druid lived at Stallir House, adjacent to which, said Macaulay, was

“a large circle of huge stones fixed perpendicularly in the ground, at equal distances from one and other, with one more remarkable regular in the centre which is flat in the top and one would think sacred in a more eminent degree.”

In a later article by F.L.W. Thomas (1867) he also mentioned this ‘stone circle’, though indicated its decline.  Additional information on this little known stone is sparse due to its somewhat remote position on one of the uninhabited isles of St. Kilda.  I wouldn’t mind spending a month or two there, roughing it, to see what’s what!

References:

  1. Macaulay, Kenneth, The History of St. Kilda. Containing a Description of This Remarkable Island; the Manners and Customs of the Inhabitants; the Religious and Pagan Antiquities There Found, T. Becket: London 1764.
  2. Thomas, F.L.W., “On the Primitive Dwellings and Hypogea of the Outer Hebrides,” in Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, volume 7, 1867.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian


Carra Bhroin, Lochboisdale, South Uist

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Standing Stone:  OS Grid Reference – NF 8117 2248

Also Known as:

  • Carragh broin

Archaeology & History

The nature of this site seems a little disputed.  Shown on modern OS-maps and cited as being visited and seen in April 1967,the Canmore website also describes it in the present tense — but when I.A. Crawford (1965) wrote of this site he told that, “this standing stone…has been destroyed in fencing operations” — i.e., building a fence or wall, not some doods having a fencing fight!

Equally curious would be the stature of the site; as in the Royal Commission report (1928), the stone was told to be only 2-feet tall — which would mean that if this site is included as an authentic archaeological site, then we’re gonna have to double or treble the number of standing stone sites nationally!  There are masses of ‘monoliths’ two-feet tall and above which are in the ‘natural’ category.  But this stone, for whatever reason (the folklore probably), has been granted the providence as an authentic standing stone.

Folklore

Tradition told that this old stone was “alleged to mark a battle site” in ancient days.  The variation on this theme tells that the stone marked the grave of a man who was slewn in battle here.  Seems likely that there will be prehistoric tombs nearby…

References:

Crawford, I.A., ‘Carra Bhroin, S.Uist,’ in Discovery & Excavation in Scotland, 1965, SRG & CBA 1965.
Royal Commission on the Ancient & Historical Monuments & Constructions of Scotland, Inventory of Monuments and Constructions in the Outer Hebrides, Skye and the Small Isles, HMSO: Edinburgh 1928.

Tobar nam Buadh, St. Kilda, Outer Hebrides

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Holy Well: OS Grid Reference – NA 0863 0024

Tobar nam Buaidh on 1928 map

Also known as:

  1. Canmore ID 3962
  2. Tobar-ianadaiche-buadhan
  3. Well of Virtues

Archaeology & History

This legendary healing spring (the Well of Virtues) is on the north side of the island, a few hundred yards northwest of the legendary Amazon’s House. Martin Martin (1703) told that this well,

“near the female warrior’s house is reputed to be the best, the name Toubir-nim-buey, importing no less than the well of qualities or virtues; it runneth from east to west, being sixty paces ascent above sea; I drank of it twice, and English quart at each time; it is very clear, exceeding cold, light and diuretick; I was not able to hold my hands in it above a few minutes, in regard of its coldness; the inhabitants of Harries find it effectual against windy-chollicks, gravel, head-aches; this well hath a cover of stone.”

The reverend Kenneth Macaulay (1764) also wrote of this place, giving additional details:

“Near the fountain stood an altar on which the distressed votaries laid down their oblations. Before they could touch the sacred water with any prospect of success, it was their constant practice to address the genius of the place with supplication and prayer. No one approached him with empty hands. But the devotees were abundantly frugal. The offerings presented by them were the poorest acknowledgements that could be made to a superior being, from whom they had either hopes or fears. Shells and pebbles, rags of linen, or stuffs worn out, pins, needles or rusty nails, were generally all the tribute that was paid; and sometimes, though rarely enough, copper coins of the smallest value.”

T.S. Muir’s sketch

There was a very small stone-built well-house with a low roof covering the top of the spring, inside which a small pool formed.  The small well-house was described by Thomas Muir (1883) and ruins of it are reported to still cover the sacred waters, which run into an old stone trough.  Muir called it the ‘spring of many virtues’, describing it as one of five holy wells on this small isle.

In James MacKinlay’s (1893) magnum opus he reported that its waters could cure deafness.

References:

  1. Macaulay, Kenneth, The History of St. Kilda, James Thin: Edinburgh 1974 (original edition 1764).
  2. MacKinlay, James, Folklore of Scottish Lochs and Springs, William Hodge: Glasgow 1893.
  3. Martin, M., Description of the Western Isles of Scotland, Andrew Bell: London 1703.
  4. Mathieson, J., “The Antiquities of the St. Kilda Group of Islands,” in Proceedings Society of the Antiquaries Scotland, volume 62, 1928.
  5. Muir, Thomas S., Ecclesiological Notes on some of the Islands of Scotland, David Douglas: Edinburgh 1883.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian