Marrister

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Marrister
Marrister, Whalsay - geograph.org.uk - 121731.jpg
Marrister, Whalsay. The two storey white building is the auld manse.
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Marrister
Location within Shetland
OS grid reference HU542640
Civil parish
Council area
Lieutenancy area
Country Scotland
Sovereign state United Kingdom
Post town SHETLAND
Postcode district ZE2
Dialling code 01806
Police Scotland
Fire Scottish
Ambulance Scottish
EU Parliament Scotland
UK Parliament
Scottish Parliament
List of places
UK
Scotland
60°21′25″N1°00′58″W / 60.357°N 1.016°W / 60.357; -1.016 Coordinates: 60°21′25″N1°00′58″W / 60.357°N 1.016°W / 60.357; -1.016

Marrister is a settlement on the west coast of Whalsay in the parish of Nesting in the Shetland islands of Scotland. It looks across Linga Sound to the island of West Linga.

Whalsay island

Whalsay is the sixth largest of the Shetland Islands in the north of Scotland.

Nesting, Shetland parish in the Shetland Islands, Scotland

Nesting is a parish in the Shetland Islands, Scotland. It includes a part of the east Shetland Mainland, measuring about twelve by four miles, along the seaboard from Gletness to Lunna Ness, and also the island of Whalsay and the Out Skerries. The coast is deeply indented by voes and headlands. The arable land comprises only about 1,000 acres (4 km2), the remainder being mostly open moorland. The total area is given as 105.6 km2. This includes the ancient parish of Lunnasting in the North and the island parish of Whalsay to the east, which were added to Nesting in 1891. Before that, the ancient parishes of North Nesting and South Nesting were merged.

Shetland Subarctic archipelago of Scotland that lies north-east of mainland Britain

Shetland, also called the Shetland Islands and formerly Zetland, is a subarctic archipelago in the Northern Isles of Scotland, situated in the Northern Atlantic, between Great Britain, the Faroe Islands and Norway.

Contents

History

Marrister was occupied in Viking times and a gold Viking ring was unearthed there. [1] In the 19th century and early 20th century it was associated with the Smith family. [2] [3] A large flat rock off Marrister is known as the Skate of Marrister. In the 1870s, Robert Cowie mentioned the "neat manse and still neater church" of Marrister, which had been recently built. [4]

Skate of Marrister island in Shetland

The Skate of Marrister is a flat ledge that extends about 300 yards (270 m) from the western shore of Whalsay, in the Shetland islands of Scotland. It is slightly more than 1 mile (1.6 km) north-north-west from Symbister Ness off the village of Marrister, in Linga Sound. At low tide the ledge rises 5 feet (1.5 m) above the water. There is a risk that the strong tide in Whalsay Sound will carry a boat onto the Skate. There is a minor light on the Skate with a nominal range of four miles, flashing green every six seconds.

Robert Cowie (1842–1874) was a British physician and author.

Related Research Articles

West Linga island located between Mainland and Whalsay in Shetland, Scotland

West Linga is an uninhabited island located between Mainland and Whalsay in Shetland, Scotland.

Symbister largest village and port on the island of Whalsay, Shetland

Symbister is the largest village and port on Whalsay, an island in the Shetland archipelago of Scotland. The population in 1991 was 797. The focus of the village is the harbour, which is home to small fishing boats as well as large deep sea trawlers. The village is overlooked by the granite mansion Symbister House, built by the Sixth Robert Bruce of Symbister in 1823. The harbour is also known by the names Bay Of Symbister, Symbister Harbour and Symbister Old Harbour.

East Linga one of the Shetland Islands

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Brough, Shetland village in the Shetland Islands, Scotland, UK

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Tripwell village in the Shetland Islands, Scotland, UK

Tripwell is a hamlet in western Whalsay in the parish of Nesting in the Shetland islands of Scotland. It is located to the south of the village of Brough, northeast of Marrister. Scarfmoor Burn passes on the eastern side of the settlement, passing an old mill in Tripwell. Council houses were built in Tripwell in the late 1970, consisting of sheltered housing for senior citizens and 2 and 3 bedroom family houses.

Symbister House

Symbister House is a former country house in Symbister, Whalsay island, in the Shetland islands of Scotland. It was built in 1823 by the Bruce family who were lairds (landlords) of the island for about 300 years from the 16th century. Since 1964 it has been the Whalsay Secondary School, after it fell into disuse following the death of the last of the landlord occupants of the house in 1944. Built in an elegant Georgian architectural style, it is categorized officially as a category B Listed Building and heritage structure.

Skaw, Whalsay village in the Shetland Islands, Scotland, UK

Skaw is a village in the extreme northeast of Whalsay in the parish of Nesting in the Shetland Islands of Scotland. It is mainly a crofting area. Whalsay airstrip and Whalsay Golf Club, the most northerly golf club in the British Isles, lies in the vicinity. The East Loch of Skaw lies to the east of the village, and the West Loch of Skaw to the southwest. A house here, named Westhoose, has been rebuilt three times. Skaw Voe is a standing stone, 1.5 metres high, which stands 50 metres from the shore. Off Skaw Taing there are the islets of the Outer Holm of Skaw and the Inner Holm of Skaw, the latter of which contains a ruined chapel.

Inner Holm of Skaw a small, uninhabited islet off the northern tip of the island of Whalsay, in the Shetland Islands

The Inner Holm of Skaw is a small, uninhabited islet off the northern tip of the island of Whalsay, in the Shetland Islands of Scotland, north of the village of Skaw.

Huxter Fort

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Whalsay Parish Church Church in Whalsay, Scotland

Whalsay Parish Church or Whalsay Kirk is a Church of Scotland parish church on the island of Whalsay, Shetland Islands, Scotland. It lies to the north of the village of Brough, on the southern part of a promontory known as Kirk Ness, connected to the mainland by a neck of land. It is the main burial ground for villagers of Whalsay. It is one of three churches in the Parish of Nesting, the others being at Nesting and Lunnesting. The church is a category B Listed Building.

Rumble, Shetland island in Scotland, United Kingdom

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Holm of Sandwick island in Shetland Islands, Scotland, UK

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The Pier House Museum is a museum in Symbister, Whalsay, in the Shetland Islands of Scotland. The museum is located in the old Pier House, which was once the centre for trade with the Germans and the export of dried and salted fish to the Hanseatic League, an alliance of trading guilds that established and maintained a trade monopoly over much of Northern Europe between the 13th and 17th centuries. The Germans brought their goods, iron tools, seeds, salt and cloth to barter for dried and salted fish from the island. The old Hanseatic house which had been used by the Germans for several centuries until 1707, was refurbished for the museum, housing artifacts which date from the earlier trading period and providing an important insight into the economy of the Shetlands at the time. Architecturally it is described as "two-storeyed with crowstepped gables, and an external stone staircase." The house and port nearby are categorized officially as a category B Listed Building.

Linga Sound, Shetland strait between the islands of Whalsay and West Linga in the Shetland islands of Scotland

Linga Sound is the strait between the islands of Whalsay and West Linga in the Shetland islands of Scotland.

References

  1. Scientific Research Fund of 1919; Videnskapelige forskningsfond av 1919 (1940). Viking antiquities in Great Britain and Ireland. H. Aschehoug. p. 141. Retrieved 1 February 2013.
  2. Bulloch, John; Henderson, John Alexander (1933). Scottish Notes and Queries. D. Wyllie and son. p. 7. Retrieved 1 February 2013.
  3. Old-lore Miscellany of Orkney, Shetland, Caitness and Sutherland. Viking Club. 1907. Retrieved 1 February 2013.
  4. Cowie, Robert (1879). Shetland: descriptive and historical; and topographical description of that country. Smith. p. 105. Retrieved 1 February 2013.