A lesser known neighbor

It is a lonesome place.  To say Loch Gruinart, Islay is "windswept" does not do justice to the north Atlantic's winds.  Here, they pile extensive sand dunes on Ardnave Point and then set about rearranging them...an ageless dance of the veil, covering and uncovering.

March 22, 2017  Loch Gruinart (Ardnave Dunes left in background; line of breakers at Loch's mouth is view north into Atlantic)

On the west shore of Loch Gruinart is Kilnave...Cill Naoimh in Gaelic...Church of the Saint.  Kilnave is an enigma in its own right.  Nobody's quite sure.   

March 22, 2017  Kilnave chapel ruins on Loch Gruinart, Islay

When we visited late March 2017, the wind met us head on...a spiritual guardian of the place.  It removed every trace of body heat that might otherwise accumulate under an insulated parka after walking several hundred yards.  There was none of that.  The wind found its openings, and claimed from them all warmth.   It exposed.

But in a strange way it accentuated a sense of pilgrimage...a suffering by the body to witness that which is holy.

Kilnave is well off Islay's busier tracks, like those that lead to the more famous Kildalton Church.  On the of east Islay, Kildalton is near enough to "The Trinity"--Ardbeg, Lagavulin and Laphroaig distilleries--to enjoy "spillover" tourist traffic.  Kildalton is near enough to Port Ellen, to hotels and B & Bs, self catering cottages and near enough to the CalMac ferry terminal with its hubbub.  It is within reach of the curious who come (as we did) to marvel at its astonishing Celtic Ring Cross.

Not so is Kilnave.  One must want to go there, must determine to seek it...to make a pilgrimage. 

March 22, 2017  Kilnave High Cross (overlooks Loch Gruinart; Paps of Jura visible in distance 

There is something about the spiritual fabric of the place.  There is that Kilnave High Cross...that enigma.  Impossibly thin, fragile, weathered yet the Cross still stands--a spiritual testament, a monument about which no one is really sure.

A mere couple inches in thickness, Kilnave Cross is at least as old as c.700 A.D.

And many claim that is is older, much older...dating Kilnave's High Cross to as early as the late 400s.  There is evidence either way.  The uncertainty of its date continues.

Carved from a thin slab of greenish Torridonian flagstone, the Kilnave Cross is said to match rocks found locally on the shore of Loch Gruinart just east of the chapel.  The presumption is that the Cross would have been created nearby, given the weight of quarried stone and the transportation system in its day.

March 22, 2017  Kilnave Cross view from its side

Of course, Torridonian flagstone exists over wide range of Scotland. So, where the Kilnave Cross was created is not exactly known.  If it was carved near Kilnave, perhaps at some distant point in time archeological evidence of its shards and waste rock await discovery.  

In its style, though heavily weathered, its central panel is said  to resemble the cross shaft found at Keills Chapel, in mid- Argyll (near the village of Tayvallich).  Keills' high cross is dated to the late 700s.  So, whichever influenced the other is not known either.   

Ardnave geographically, with its dunes, is much like another more or less contemporary chapel--the "Church of the Dunes" at Forvie, Aberdeenshire, just below Peterhead on the opposite side of Scotland.

These two places do have a common link--Adomnán of Iona (called Eunan), about whom an account will be given later.   Saint Adomnán (c. 624-704 A.D.) referred to a Celtic ecclesiastical community at Loch Gruinart in his seminal work on the Life of St. Columba, written in 697 A.D., likely as a centennial commemoration of Columba's death.     

March 22, 2017  Kilnave chapel ruins--the "new" building dating to late Medieval

March 22, 2017  Masonry inside Kilnave Chapel

More certain in its date are the standing ruins of Kilnave Chapel, at least those that still exist.  Though roofless, it is otherwise mostly intact.

Consensus by historians is that Kilnave Chapel's ruins date to the "late Medieval"...a guesstimate that spans several hundreds of years.  But, we'll take it.

In its plan, Kilnave closely resembles St. Oran's chapel (c. 1150 A.D.), on the Holy Isle of Iona.  Iona is the "Mother Church" of Celtic Christianity.  Iona, historically, has been under the dominion of MacLean lairds.

March 22, 2017  Loch Gruinart from inside Kilnave

Architecturally, historians claim that Kilnave's existing masonry work is similar to that found at Dunollie and Dunstaffnage in Argyll at near Oban, Scotland--former strongholds of  the MacDougall clan.


One of the issues--given the number of centuries that passed while these strongholds were occupied and used as military defensive installations, fought over and besieged, held and taken--is that many additions, structural rebuilds and renovations took place to these strongholds over those centuries.  


Dunollie stands above the entrance to Oban Bay.  Evidently, Dunollie is older than Dunstaffnage.  Or, better said, it appears in the historical records at a very early date. 

A fortress existed at Dunollie in 698 A.D. when it was captured by Irish raiders fighting against the Kingdom of Dalriada--the Lords of the Isles. So in other words, Dunollie was contemporary with the later assumed date of the Kilnave Cross...c. 700 A.D.

However, recent radiocarbon dating (in 2016) of a metalworker's hearth at  Dunollie place the date of the Dunollie fortification even earlier...with artifacts dated to the late 400s A.D.  So, Dunollie, at lest its first manifestation, was also contemporary with the earlier assumed date of the Kilnave Cross...c. late 400s A.D. 

March 29, 2018  Dunollie at Oban

The radiocarbon dated layer at Dunollie was overbuilt around 1000 A.D.  And then that was also subsequently built over.  The majority of Dunollie ruins seen today date to the late 1400s...when the MacDougalls began extensive modifications.

March 30, 2018 Masonry at Dunstaffnage (compare to Kilnave Chapel

The building sequence at Dunstaffnage is perhaps simpler.  Built upon a native rock outcrop, its fortification began in earnest around 1250 A.D.

Dunstaffnage was at full power in 1321 A.D. (which is to say "late Medieval") when it was captured by Robert the Bruce and given to the Campbell family.

Presumably, after this date, the Campbell lairds were not benefactors for lands or ecclesiastical communities that were in the orbit of the Lords of the Isles. Thus, if Kilnave Chapel's masonry is in fact similar to that at Dunstaffnage, it would imply that the existing ruins at  Kilnave date to about mid-13th century...c. 1250 A.D.

Having visited Dunstaffnage this Easter, we noted that its masonry was indeed very similar to that at Kilnave Chapel, which we visited the previous year.

Commenting as we took photos, we assumed that the masonry at Dunstaffnage must be a regional style used in West Scotland and its Hebrides.

But what of Kilnave? Nobody's sure. It too has had its renovations over the centuries.

The rock wall surrounding its burial ground, for example, dates to the Victorian period...late 1800s.  Its present burial ground, which has been expanded several times, has received graves of modern date--many of those veterans of the World Wars.

March 22, 2017  Medieval grave slabs at Kilnave Burial Ground

It also contains Medieval grave slabs.  And it has stone marked graves so weathered in age that they defy dating...having been there apparently since the earliest times of the Celtic ecclesiastical community at Loch Gruinart...which Adomnán of Iona noted in his seminal work on the Life of St. Columba.

On the east side of Loch Gruinart lies a burial ground possibly associated with this early Celtic ecclesiastical community at Loch Gruinart.  It is Cill an Ailein.  Early map records (c. 1500s) indicate a church was also at this place; but no trace of it currently is known.  Its burial ground date is "unassigned"...which means a lot older than some presume.     

Kilnave...Cill Naoimh in Gaelic...Church of the Saint.

Which saint, is not known.  What date, is uncertain.  But Kilnave's enigmatic Celtic High Cross is ancient beyond doubt. 

March 22, 2017  Kilnave Cross, view from inside the chapel ruin