A sanctuary
For over a thousand years, Applecross has been known in Gaelic as A’Chomraich – ‘The Sanctuary’.
The ‘small beautiful jewel’ of the Mackenzie according to a seventeenth century poet known as the ‘bard of Assynt’.
‘Is Cistearnach bheag rìomhach, Ge h-ìseal ri cois mara I.’
‘Small beautiful jewel, low to the foot of the sea’.
At one time Applecross was in fact legally recognised as a sanctuary, under the same medieval laws that made churches places of sanctuary. In the case of Applecross, the whole area was regarded as holy ground and anyone fleeing from pursuit was safe if they came within six miles of the church at Clachan.
St Maelrubha
The church stands on the spot where St Maelrubha of Bangor in Ireland established a monastery in 673 AD. Maelrubha is said to be second in importance only to St Columba of Iona in the story of the spread of Christianity in the north west of Scotland.
The monastery Maelrubha established may have lasted for as many as 300 years and it is from this period that we can date the beautiful fragments of an intricately caved stone cross displayed in the heritage centre, and the large cross slab standing at the entrance to the graveyard.
The monastery seems to have been destroyed by a Viking raid sometime in the late 1st millennium AD. According to a story written down 500 years later, this sacrilegious pillaging of the sanctuary was appropriately punished, as the Norse ship sank with all hands, despite it being a ‘tranquil sea’, as they fled with the monastery’s treasures.
Before Maelrubha
We don’t know who lived in Applecross before Maelrubha arrived, but it was obviously an important place, as shown by the remains of a broch, an Iron Age stone tower, built hundreds of years before the arrival of Maelrubha. From around the same time, or earlier, date the many ‘hut circles’ still visible around Applecross. A replica of one of these round houses has been built by the local community, not far from the broch.
The broch was the subject of an archaeological dig undertaken by the Channel 4 TV programme ‘Time Team’ in 2005, and there were several more detailed follow up excavations over the next five years.
Going back even further, the ‘First settlers’ project examined the archaeological evidence for Mesolithic (middle stone age) people visiting Applecross on seasonal hunting and fishing trips 8000 years ago.
Clan Mackenzie
The Mackenzie clan gained control of Applecross from the mid-1500s onwards. It had remained church land even after the monastery was destroyed, but when the Reformation of the sixteenth century removed the power and land of the catholic church, Applecross like much other church property, passed into the hands of powerful nobles. Applecross was obtained by the Mackenzies, and it was they who built the mansion house, which still looks out over Applecross Bay.
One of the early Mackenzie lairds, known in Gaelic as Iain Molach (‘Hairy John’), was the author of two genealogies of the Mackenzie clan. In an era when extravagant hospitality and generosity was a hallmark of a chieftain, Iain Molach was known as one of the most generous. According to a well-known story, when an Irish harper returned home from a tour of Scotland he was asked which was the most generous hand he had encountered in his travels, and he replied, ‘The right hand of the Laird of Applecross’; and when asked which was the next most generous hand he had met with, replied: ‘The left hand of the Laird of Applecross.’
In around 1600, the only known violation of the sanctuary of Applecross by a Scottish clan occurred. The story is told in one of the clan histories written by Iain Molach. It conveniently portrays the rival clan MacDonald, with whom the Mackenzies spent many years feuding, as the perpetrators of the violation, so the story should perhaps be viewed with some circumspection!
‘Clan warfare – the violation of the sanctuary’
The only recorded violation of the sanctuary of Applecross by a Scottish clan is related in a manuscript written by the Mackenzie laird of Applecross known as Iain Molach, or Hairy John, in 1667. According to the manuscript Alasdair MacGorrie, a “speciall comander” of Clan MacDonald of Glengarry, came to Toscaig seeking the murderers of his father, who had fled to A’Chomraich. His mission of revenge was carried out “contrarie to ye opinion of all his friends” and was a bit of a fiasco. While he failed to find those responsible for his father’s death, he did end up killing two old men of the Mackenzie clan, thus spilling blood in the sanctuary. Fittingly, and perhaps inevitably, Alasdair was to meet his own end only ten days later at the very same spot. On this occasion, his clan was preparing a major raid on Mackenzie territory and had anchored near the modern Skye bridge, “to ye number of 37 boats and great galleyes”. Alasdair was sent ahead with his men to scout the area and again landed at Toscaig. Meanwhile the Mackenzies, who had heard rumours of the raid, sent a galley, surprised the MacDonalds and chased them off and then killed MacGorrie, who had refused to flee. Thus the violator of the sanctuary met his end in the very place he had committed the crime.
Jacobite period
The people of Applecross fought with their laird in the 1715 Jacobite rebellion, culminating in the battle of Sheriffmuir.
The MacKenzies lost Applecross, temporarily, after the rising failed. Alexander Mackenzie, third laird of Applecross had his lands seized by the crown and had to flee to France, never to return to Applecross, or Scotland. After a period of nine years, during which the government had great difficulty in obtaining any rents from Applecross, Alexander’s son Roderick bought Applecross back from the government for a sum of £3,777.
Once bitten, twice shy, the Mackenzies of Applecross did not join the final 1745 rebellion, even though the ship which brought Bonnie Prince Charlie to Scotland called at Applecross on its way back to France and urged Mackenzie to “hurry up” and go to the Prince with all his men.
In the century after the failure of the 1745 Jacobite rising Applecross, like most parts of the Highlands, suffered greatly from the ‘double-whammy’ of a massively increasing population in an area of marginal agricultural productivity on the one hand, and, on the other, a series of lairds who had rapidly became more interested in maximising the financial income from their lands rather than fulfilling their tradition role of being father to their clan (‘clann’ being the Gaelic word for children).
‘The power of the lairds – brutal eviction’
In August 1859, under the headline, ‘Eviction at Applecross’, the Northern Ensign newspaper reported one small example of injustice arising from the arbitrary exercise of landlord power. The location was Milton.
“The poor tailor they made short work of. They found him quietly sitting down to his breakfast, when they seized him and pitched him outside the door, sending his humble breakfast after him. They next turned on his wife, who was lying sick in bed. They dragged her from bed screaming, and sent her outside, bruising and discolouring her arm. Her infant child, who was sucking at her breast, was then taken out and laid upon the ground. The whole effects were thrown out after him and the door locked. The people stood by horror-struck by such cruel treatment and could only express their sympathy for this afflicted family by raising a small subscription on their behalf.”
The reason for his family’s eviction was “simply this … that he ought first to have come and obtained permission to commence his trade as tailor on the property”. The rest of the people of Applecross were warned “that if they gave shelter to the tailor or their family they would be at once deprived of their lands.”
The degree of brutality was disputed in the newspapers, as the factor and the local minister gave contradictory accounts.
However, according to the factor’s own account, the issue arose because the tailor came to Applecross from Skye, at the invitation of a Milton family who rented him a house; but the factor felt he, as representative of the laird, had a right to decide who could live in Applecross and told him he had to leave the area. When the tailor refused (egged on by the minister, according to the factor), he had to be forcibly removed. Sadly, we do not know what happened to the tailor and his family.
19th – 20th Centuries
In the 1820s the first road into Applecross over the famous ‘Bealach’ was built, although it was the 1950s before it was tarred.
The road did not go any further than Applecross Bay, so until the new coast road was opened in 1975, the peninsula was split north and south. The only land connection from the southern part of Applecross to what were thriving crofting hamlets dotted from Lonbain to Kenmore, was a footpath suitable only for walkers, horseback, cycle or motorcycle. These hamlets were mainly supplied by boat.
Indeed until car ownership became common in the late 20th century, MacBrayne’s Kyle to Stornoway mailboat was the main way in and out of Applecross for most people and goods. If the weather allowed, and often it didn’t, the mailboat briefly ‘hauled to’ off Applecross so that a small rowing boat could come out from Milton to transfer the Applecross passengers and goods to and from the ship.
Throughout most of the past 200 years, people in Applecross subsisted mainly on crofting and fishing, along with paid employment on the Applecross estate for some. There were also many small enterprises, including small shops in almost every hamlet, and in the earlier period self-employed weavers, tailors and cobblers.
Some made a living as coastal traders, ferrying goods as far afield as England and Ireland in relatively small ships, or as drovers taking cattle to market.
Many left Applecross to seek employment. In the early nineteenth century most young people went to the east coast or down south to do seasonal agricultural employment or to work on the fishing fleets. Later it was the ‘merchant navy’ for the men and ‘going into service’ (working as domestic servants) for the women. Not all came back.
After a period of population explosion between 1755 and 1830 (when there was an estimated increase of nearly 350%) numbers declined, gradually at first as a few people emigrated or moved south, and then very rapidly after the turn of the twentieth century. By 1950 the population was smaller than it had been in 1750.
In the 1980s, an oil rig construction yard at Kishorn briefly provided industrial employment in the area and brought some new residents to the area and allowed some locals to return.
More recently tourism has been the main economic activity in Applecross, with all the benefits and challenges that it brings to remote and rural areas that are often regarded as ‘fragile’ environments – in terms of culture and heritage as well as the natural environment.
The Historical Society and the Heritage Centre hope to increase knowledge and awareness of the history, culture and environment of this precious area, and thus preserve it as a modern day sanctuary for residents and visitors alike, encouraging and welcoming anyone who wishes to come and rest a while in the area that is our home.
A’ Ghàidhlig air a’ Chomraich
Fad a h-eachdraidh fhada bha Gàidhlig aig muinntir na Comraich, co-dhiù bha iad nan croitearan is iasgairean no nam pearsaichean-eaglais no cinn-chinnidh. Tha dualchainnt ionadail ann, aig a bheil gu leòr sa chumantas, a thaobh briathrachas is fuaimneachadh, le dualchainntean eile ann an Ros an Iar is Loch Aillse. Ge-tà, tha i aig glè bheag air a’ Chomraich a-nise, agus tha an t-eagal ann gu bheil i a’ falbh an aon rathad ’s a chaidh iomadh dualchainnt eile air tìr-mòr na Gàidhealtachd thairis air a’ cheud bliadhna a chaidh seachad.
A rèir a’ Chunntais-sluaigh ann an 1891, bha Gàidhlig aig 95% de mhuinntir na Comraich. Bha gu leòr an uair sin dà-chànanach ach bha a’ mhòr-chuid (56%) ann an dà bhaile – Camas Tearach agus Cùil Duibh – fhathast gun Bheurla nan claignean. O mhoch gu dubh agus bho Shàbaid gu Sàbaid bha am beatha gu lèir air a cumail ann an Gàidhlig, a’ gabhail a-steach sheirbheisean eaglais agus leughadh an Leabhair air an t-Sàbaid fhèin. Rinn Achd an Fhoghlaim ann an 1872 – a steidhich siostam foghlaim aona-chànanach – cron mòr air a’ Ghàidhlig agus tron fhicheadamh linn chrìon i gu h-uabhasach ann an iomadh coimhearsnachd. Sheas a’ Chomraich an aghaidh sin gu ìre, ’s dòcha air sàillibh ’s gun robh i car iomallach. Ann an 1961, bha Gàidhlig aig 72% de mhuinntir an àite, àireamh air leth fallain, agus bha cuid de chloinn fhathast air an àrach ann an dachannan far an robhar a’ còmhradh anns a’ chànan. Ge-tà, ann an 2001, bha an uiread aig an robh Gàidhlig air tuiteam gu na bu lugha na fichead às a’ cheud, agus tha i air a dhol an lughad tuilleadh bhon uair sin.
Math dh’fhaodte nach seachainn an dualchainnt ionadail a bàs, ach tha fhathast ùidh aig feadhainn a tha a’ fuireach air a’ Chomraich anns a’ chànan, agus iad ga h-ionnsachadh. A bharrachd air sin, tha fileantaich aig a bheil ceanglaichean teaghlaich don sgìre ach a tha a’ fuireach ann an àiteachan eile ann an Alba no thall thairis. Tha iad dìleas do chànan a steidhich fèin-aithne na Comraich, a bharrachd air Alba fhèin, agus iad ag iarraidh eòlas a bhith aca air dualchas is litreachas an àite agus gu sònraichte air na h-ainmean-àite a tha gan cuartachadh fad an t-siubhail. Mar chànan tìre a nì tuairisgeul de dh’àrainneachd na Gàidhealtachd, chan eil a samhail ann. Tha àite mòr aig a’ Ghàidhlig fhathast ann a bhith a’ cur ri beatha nan daoine a tha a’ fuireach anns an àite bhrèagha seo.
Gaelic in Applecross
For most of its very long history, Applecross was a Gaelic-speaking community, with the language in daily use at all levels of society, from crofters and fishermen to clerics and clan chiefs. There is a rich and distinct local dialect, now spoken by only a small number of natives of the peninsula, which shows some commonality, in both vocabulary and pronunciation, with the Gaelic of other parts of Wester Ross and Lochalsh. The loss of several unique dialects of the Scottish mainland – with the language for long unsupported by the state, unvalued by the establishment and excluded from education – is one of the great tragedies of modern life in the Highlands.
According to the 1891 Census, 95% of the Applecross population spoke Gaelic. While bilingualism was by then widespread, the majority of folk (56%) in the townships of Camusterrach and Culduie were still monolingual Gaels, living out their entire life in the language including the Sabbath, when church services were held in Gaelic and the Gaelic Bible was widely read. The 1872 Education (Scotland) Act, which effectively removed Gaelic from the classroom (following a period in the 19th Century when both languages were in common use in Highland education), combined with other social factors to stimulate a rapid decline in Gaelic usage in many West Highland communities. Perhaps due to its remoteness, Applecross resisted this trend for some time and in 1961 72% of the population remained Gaelic speakers, with some children still being raised in a home where the language was dominant. However, by 2001, the proportion of the local population speaking Gaelic had fallen to less than twenty percent and it has diminished further since then.
While the local dialect may not be able to resist an ultimate demise, there is still interest in the language in Applecross, with some people currently learning Gaelic. There are also fluent speakers with family connections to the area who live elsewhere in Scotland or the wider world. Interest is fed, not only by a loyalty to the tongue that shaped the community and its identity over centuries (not to mention it being a founding language of the Kingdom of Alba/Scotland), but also by a desire to engage meaningfully with a small body of local literature and with a fascinating and inspirational heritage of place-names. As a language that describes hill, bog, wood, shore, sea and the bounty of nature, Gaelic has no equal in this part of the world. It still has a role to play in informing and enriching the lives of those who inhabit this beautiful place.
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