Related Research Articles
The Highlands is a historical region of Scotland. Culturally, the Highlands and the Lowlands diverged from the Late Middle Ages into the modern period, when Lowland Scots replaced Scottish Gaelic throughout most of the Lowlands. The term is also used for the area north and west of the Highland Boundary Fault, although the exact boundaries are not clearly defined, particularly to the east. The Great Glen divides the Grampian Mountains to the southeast from the Northwest Highlands. The Scottish Gaelic name of A' Ghàidhealtachd literally means "the place of the Gaels" and traditionally, from a Gaelic-speaking point of view, includes both the Western Isles and the Highlands.
The Viking Age was the period during the Middle Ages when Norsemen known as Vikings undertook large-scale raiding, colonizing, conquest, and trading throughout Europe and reached North America. It followed the Migration Period and the Germanic Iron Age. The Viking Age applies not only to their homeland of Scandinavia but also to any place significantly settled by Scandinavians during the period. The Scandinavians of the Viking Age are often referred to as Vikings as well as Norsemen, although few of them were Vikings in the technical sense.
The Outer Hebrides or Western Isles, sometimes known as Na h-Innse Gall or the Long Isle/Long Island, is an island chain off the west coast of mainland Scotland. The islands are geographically coextensive with Comhairle nan Eilean Siar, one of the 32 unitary council areas of Scotland. They form part of the archipelago of the Hebrides, separated from the Scottish mainland and from the Inner Hebrides by the waters of the Minch, the Little Minch, and the Sea of the Hebrides. Scottish Gaelic is the predominant spoken language, although in a few areas English speakers form a majority.
A castle is a type of fortified structure built during the Middle Ages predominantly by the nobility or royalty and by military orders. Scholars debate the scope of the word castle, but usually consider it to be the private fortified residence of a lord or noble. This is distinct from a palace, which is not fortified; from a fortress, which was not always a residence for royalty or nobility; from a pleasance which was a walled-in residence for nobility, but not adequately fortified; and from a fortified settlement, which was a public defence – though there are many similarities among these types of construction. Use of the term has varied over time and has been applied to structures as diverse as hill forts and country houses. Over the approximately 900 years that castles were built, they took on a great many forms with many different features, although some, such as curtain walls, arrowslits, and portcullises, were commonplace.
Barra is an island in the Outer Hebrides, Scotland, and the second southernmost inhabited island there, after the adjacent island of Vatersay to which it is connected by a short causeway. The island is named after Saint Finbarr of Cork.
The Massacre of Glencoe took place in Glen Coe in the Highlands of Scotland on 13 February 1692. An estimated 30 members and associates of Clan MacDonald of Glencoe were killed by Scottish government forces, allegedly for failing to pledge allegiance to the new monarchs, William III and Mary II.
A Scottish clan is a kinship group among the Scottish people. Clans give a sense of shared identity and descent to members, and in modern times have an official structure recognised by the Court of the Lord Lyon, which regulates Scottish heraldry and coats of arms. Most clans have their own tartan patterns, usually dating from the 19th century, which members may incorporate into kilts or other clothing.
The island of Vatersay is the southernmost and westernmost inhabited island in the Outer Hebrides of Scotland, and the settlement of Caolas on the north coast of the island is the westernmost permanently inhabited place in Scotland. The main village, also called Vatersay, is in the south of the island.
The first Highland Land League emerged as a distinct political force in Scotland during the 1880s, with its power base in the country's Highlands and Islands. It was known also as the Highland Land Law Reform Association and the Crofters' Party. It was consciously modelled on the Irish Land League.
Mingulay is the second largest of the Bishop's Isles in the Outer Hebrides of Scotland. Located 12 miles (19 km) south of Barra, it is known for its important seabird populations, including puffins, black-legged kittiwakes, and razorbills, which nest in the sea-cliffs, amongst the highest in the British Isles.
Crofting is a form of land tenure and small-scale food production particular to the Scottish Highlands, the islands of Scotland, and formerly on the Isle of Man. Within the 19th century townships, individual crofts were established on the better land, and a large area of poorer-quality hill ground was shared by all the crofters of the township for grazing of their livestock.
The Crofters Holdings (Scotland) Act 1886 is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that created legal definitions of crofting parish and crofter, granted security of land tenure to crofters and produced the first Crofters Commission, a land court which ruled on disputes between landlords and crofters. The same court ruled on whether parishes were or were not crofting parishes. In many respects the Act was modelled on the Irish Land Acts of 1870 and 1881. By granting the crofters security of tenure, the Act put an end to the Highland Clearances.
The Highland Clearances were the evictions of a significant number of tenants in the Scottish Highlands and Islands, mostly from 1750 to 1860.
The Gaels are an ethnolinguistic group native to Ireland, Scotland and the Isle of Man in the British Isles. They are associated with the Gaelic languages: a branch of the Celtic languages comprising Irish, Manx and Scottish Gaelic.
Coll is a farming settlement near Stornoway, on the Isle of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides, Scotland. Coll is situated on the B895, between Stornoway and New Tolsta, and is also within the parish of Stornoway.
Viking activity in the British Isles occurred during the Early Middle Ages, the 8th to the 11th centuries, when Vikings from Scandinavia travelled to Great Britain and Ireland to settle, trade, or raid. Those who came to the British Isles have been generally referred to as Vikings, but some scholars debate whether the term Viking represented all Viking settlers or just those who raided.
Lady Emily Eliza Steele Gordon Cathcart was born in 1845. Her father was John Robert Pringle. Her first marriage was to Captain John Gordon in 1865. The natural son of Colonel John Gordon "the richest commoner in the northern kingdom" he had inherited his father's extensive assets, valued at £2-3 million in 1858, on the lower estimate equivalent to £214,000,000 in 2021. The estate included Cluny Castle, North and South Uist, Benbecula and Barra.
The Seven Men of Knoydart was the name given, by the press at the time, to a group of land raiders who tried to appropriate land at Knoydart in 1948. The name evoked the memory of the Seven Men of Moidart, the seven Jacobites who accompanied the Young Pretender on his voyage to Scotland in 1745. Comprising seven ex-servicemen, their claim was to be the last land raid in Scotland.
The Highland and Island Emigration Society was a charitable society formed to promote and assist emigration as a solution to the Highland Potato Famine.
Squatting in Scotland is criminalised by the Trespass Act 1865. Following the Highland Clearances, land raids occurred across rural Scotland in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, for example in Vatersay and Knoydart. More recently there have been land occupations as road protests and as part of the Occupy movement. Baile Hoose was occupied during the 2021 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Glasgow.
References
- ↑ Robertson, Iain J.M. (2016). Landscapes of Protest in the Scottish Highlands After 1914: The Later Highland Land Wars. Routledge. ISBN 9781317108047.
- 1 2 Quinnell, Teàrlach. "The story of the Vatersay raiders". BBC. Retrieved 18 September 2017.
- ↑ Scott, A. (2015). Native Stranger: A Journey in Familiar and Foreign Scotland. Hachette UK. ISBN 978-0751561227 . Retrieved 10 August 2019.
