Coldbackie
| |
|---|---|
 Coldbackie by Tongue | |
  Coldbackie Location within the Sutherland area | |
| OS grid reference | NC613599 |
| • Edinburgh | 183 mi (295 km) |
| Civil parish | |
| Council area | |
| Lieutenancy area | |
| Country | Scotland |
| Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
| Post town | LAIRG |
| Postcode district | IV27 |
| Dialling code | 01847 |
Coldbackie (Scottish Gaelic : Callbacaidh) is a crofting township in Sutherland and is in the Scottish council area of Highland Scotland. [1]
Coldbackie lies at the mouth of the Kyle of Tongue, 2 miles (3.2 km) north east of Tongue. It sits under Cnoc an Fhreiceadain (the Watch Hill), looking north across Tongue Bay to the Rabbit Islands. It is one of a series of townships, running from Tongue along the A836 to Blandy. The township of Scullomie is 1 mile (1.6 km) to the north.
The name Coldbackie could have old Norse or Gaelic roots. The place name Coldbackie is not unique to the Kyle of Tongue, with there being two Coldbacks in Shetland (in Unst and Delting) and one in north west Iceland, both areas where Norse roots would be more likely. Omand, in The Sutherland book, translates Coldbackie as kula-bakki, bank with the bump, whilst Stewart, in Place names of Shetland says that Coldbacks is Cold Hill.
Firth is a word in the English and Scots languages used to denote various coastal waters in the United Kingdom, predominantly within Scotland. In the Northern Isles, it more usually refers to a smaller inlet. It is linguistically cognate to fjord, which has a more constrained sense in English. Bodies of water named "firths" tend to be more common on the Scottish east coast, or in the southwest of the country, although the Firth of Clyde is an exception to this. The Highland coast contains numerous estuaries, straits, and inlets of a similar kind, but not called "firth" ; instead, these are often called sea lochs. Before about 1850, the spelling "Frith" was more common.
Highland is a council area in the Scottish Highlands and is the largest local government area in the United Kingdom. It was the 7th most populous council area in Scotland at the 2011 census. It shares borders with the council areas of Aberdeenshire, Argyll and Bute, Moray and Perth and Kinross. Their councils, and those of Angus and Stirling, also have areas of the Scottish Highlands within their administrative boundaries.
Lerwick is the main town and port of the Shetland archipelago, Scotland. Shetland's only burgh, Lerwick had a population of about 7,000 residents in 2010.
Sutherland is a historic county, registration county and lieutenancy area in the Highlands of Scotland. Its county town is Dornoch. Sutherland borders Caithness and Moray Firth to the east, Ross-shire and Cromartyshire to the south and the Atlantic to the north and west. Like its southern neighbour Ross-shire, Sutherland has some of the most dramatic scenery in Europe, especially on its western fringe where the mountains meet the sea. These include high sea cliffs, and very old mountains composed of Precambrian and Cambrian rocks.
Caithness is a historic county, registration county and lieutenancy area of Scotland.
Durness is a village and civil parish in the north-west Highlands of Scotland. It lies on the north coast of the country in the traditional county of Sutherland, around 120 miles north of Inverness. The area is remote, and the parish is huge and sparsely populated, covering an area from east of Loch Eriboll to Cape Wrath, the most north-westerly point of the Scottish mainland.
Tongue is a coastal village in northwest Highland, Scotland, in the western part of the former county of Sutherland. It lies on the east shore above the base of the Kyle of Tongue and north of the mountains Ben Hope and Ben Loyal on the A836. To the north lies the area of Braetongue.
Lairg is a village and parish in Sutherland, Scotland. It has a population of 891 and is at the south-eastern end of Loch Shin.
The Papar were, according to early Icelandic sagas, Irish monks who took eremitic residence in parts of what is now Iceland before that island's habitation by the Norsemen of Scandinavia, as evidenced by the sagas and recent archaeological findings.
Bonar Bridge is a village on the north bank of the Kyle of Sutherland to the west and the Dornoch Firth to the east in the Parish of Creich in the Highland council area of Scotland.
Ben Loyal is an isolated mountain of 764 m in Sutherland, the northwestern tip of the Scottish Highlands. It is a Corbett located south of the Kyle of Tongue and offers good views of the Kyle, Loch Loyal to the east, and Ben Hope to the west.
Ardgayard-GY ["high wind" - see below Further reading: MacGregor] is a small Scottish village on the south west shore of the Dornoch Firth, Sutherland and is 1 mile south from Bonar Bridge and lies at the entrance to Strathcarron, the valley of the River Carron and is at the mouth of the Kyle of Sutherland.
The languages of Scotland are the languages spoken or once spoken in Scotland. Each of the numerous languages spoken in Scotland during its recorded linguistic history falls into either the Germanic or Celtic language families. The classification of the Pictish language was once controversial, but it is now generally considered a Celtic language. Today, the main language spoken in Scotland is English, while Scots and Scottish Gaelic are minority languages. The dialect of English spoken in Scotland is referred to as Scottish English.
Sandsting is a parish in the West Mainland of Shetland, Scotland, forming a southern arm of the Walls Peninsula. After the parish of Aithsting was annexed into Sandsting in the sixteenth century, it became known as Sandsting and Aithsting parish.
Scullomie is a small fishing and crofting township at the head of Tongue Bay in Sutherland in the Scottish Highlands. It is located around 3 miles (4.8 km) north of the village of Tongue on the northern coast of Scotland and is in the Scottish council area of Highland. The place name is spelled Skullomie on some Ordnance Survey maps.
Melness is a locality, comprising a group of small remote crofting townships, lying to the west of Tongue Bay opposite Coldbackie, in the north coast of Sutherland, Scottish Highlands and is in the Scottish council area of Highland. The individual hamlets are:
The modern names of Scottish islands stem from two main influences. There are many names that derive from the Scottish Gaelic language in the Hebrides and Firth of Clyde. In the Northern Isles most place names have a Norse origin. There are also some island place names that originate from three other influences, including a limited number that are essentially English language names, a few that are of Brittonic origin and some of an unknown origin that may represent a pre-Celtic language. These islands have all been occupied by the speakers of at least three and in many cases four or more languages since the Iron Age, and many of the names of these islands have more than one possible meaning as a result.
Scandinavian Scotland refers to the period from the 8th to the 15th centuries during which Vikings and Norse settlers, mainly Norwegians and to a lesser extent other Scandinavians, and their descendants colonised parts of what is now the periphery of modern Scotland. Viking influence in the area commenced in the late 8th century, and hostility between the Scandinavian earls of Orkney and the emerging thalassocracy of the Kingdom of the Isles, the rulers of Ireland, Dál Riata and Alba, and intervention by the crown of Norway were recurring themes.
The Kyle of Tongue is a shallow sea loch in northwest Highland, Scotland, in the western part of Sutherland. Featuring a rocky coastline, its mouth is formed at Tongue Bay. The community of Tongue is situated on the Kyle's eastern shore and the loch is crossed by the Kyle of Tongue Bridge and Causeway.
The Sutherland spaceport, also known as Space Hub Sutherland or UKVL Sutherland, is planned to be the first spaceport of the United Kingdom. It would be operated by a commercial entity and would employ 40 people. The spaceport will host a launch vehicle called Orbex Prime. The spaceport will be located on the A' Mhòine peninsula northwest of Tongue village, Sutherland, Scotland. Construction is set to begin in late 2021, with a first launch as early as 2022.