I owe a great debt of thanks to many people in Lewis, Harris and Scalpay. They include: Bullet Cunningham; Neil Cunningham, who offered to shepherd me and Freyja out into the Minch in his launch on a threatening day out at sea; Rachel Cunningham; Cathy MacAulay; John MacAulay; Katie Mary Macdonald; Kenneth Angus ‘Toby’ McIver; Kennie Mackenzie, who has died since this book was written; Dan Macleod; Malcolm MacLeod, who brought many of the experts in this book out to the islands for me, in all sorts of weather, with unfailing courtesy and seamanship; Mary MacLeod; Sophie Macrae; Thomas Macrae; Angus MacSween; Aileen MacSween; Joan MacSween; Liza MacSween; D. R. Morrison; Donald Morrison; John Angus Morrison; Kenny Morrison; Margaret Morrison; Donald ‘Nona’ Smith; and all the children of Scalpay school who lay down on the hermit’s stone for me one afternoon as if they did that every Tuesday.
Above all, I am deeply indebted to three families who have looked after me and the islands over many years: Hugh and Joyce MacSween; Donald and Rachel MacSween; and now John Murdo and his mother Mary Ann Matheson. In many ways, those three families are the Shiants for me.
In writing this book I have called on the expertise of many disciplines and I gratefully acknowledge all the people who have willingly and enthusiastically given me information, guidance and ideas. They include: John Barber, AOC Scotland; David Barker, The Potteries Museum, Stoke-on-Trent; Guy de la Bedoyere; Keith Branigan, University of Sheffield; Mike Brooke, University of Cambridge; Jonathan Bulmer; Hugh Cheape, National Museums of Scotland; Linda Čihaková; Thomas Owen Clancy, University of Glasgow; Trevor Cowie, National Museums of Scotland; Ken Crocket, Scottish Mountaineering Council; David Daněček, Plzen University; Robert Dodgshon, University of Wales at Aberystwyth; Andy Douse, Scottish Natural Heritage; Gail Dundas, National Maritime Museum, Greenwich; Johanne Ferguson, Scottish Natural Heritage; Ian Fisher, Royal Commission for Ancient and Historic Monuments in Scotland; Judith Fisher; Patrick Foster, Czech Institute of Archaeology; David Fowler, Stornoway Library; Ian Fraser, School of Scottish Studies, University of Edinburgh; Simon Fraser; Bob Furness, University of Glasgow; Miranda Grant; Veronica Guiry, Natural Environment Research Council; Mary Harman, Scottish Natural Heritage; Mark Haworth-Booth, Victoria and Albert Museum; Gillian Hughes; Fergus Gibb, University of Sheffield; Mike Harris, Centre for Ecology and Hydrology; Susan Haysom, Scottish Natural Heritage; Michael Henderson, University of Manchester; Felicity Jones, University of Edinburgh; Bill Lawson, Co Leis Thu?; Commander John Lewis; Petr Limburský; Andro Linklater; Tim Lodge; David McCrone, University of Edinburgh; Maggie Macdonald, Clan Donald Library; Bob McGowan, National Museums of Scotland; Ian Mackenzie, School of Scottish Studies, University of Edinburgh; David Maclennan, Scottish Natural Heritage; D J MacLeod; Mary MacLeod, Western Isles Council; Morag MacLeod, School of Scottish Studies, University of Edinburgh; Andrew Martin, National Museums of Scotland; Donald Meek, University of Aberdeen; Ian Mitchell, Joint Nature Conservation Committee; Colin Moody; Stephen Moran, Inverness Musum; Donnie Morrison, Western Isles ICT Advisory Service; Luboš Novák, Plzen University; Nicholas Oppenheim; Steve Percival, Sunderland University; Rosemary Philip; Wanda Pryhouska, Prague Castle; John Randall, Registrar-General for Scotland; Alison Rothwell, RSPB; David Sanders; Angus Smith; Candy Sorrel, Natural Environment Research Council; Paul Stapp, University of York; Ian Stephen; Simon Stephens, National Maritime Museum, Greenwich; Robert Stewart, Scottish National Party; Jim Sutherland; Charles Thomas; Kate Thompson, Joint Nature Conservation Committee, Seabirds and Cetaceans Branch; Derick Thomson; Paul Tyler, Western Isles Council; Robbie Watson; Patricia Weekes, Inverness Museum; Tara Wenger, University of Texas at Austin; Ruaraidh Wishart, National Archives of Scotland; John Wood, Highland Council; Jana Žeglitzová, Prague Castle.
The following people and institutions have kindly lent, given, drawn or made accessible the photographs, maps and illustrations in this book: Clare Arron (dedication page, p373); Robert Atkinson/School of Scottish Studies (pp12, 312); Charlie Boxer (p24); Linda Čhaková (p43); the shade of William Daniell (p79); Patrick Foster (pp127, 172, 189, 232, 248, 264); John Gilkes (pp36–7, 106–7, 237, 290); Aileen MacSween (p149); National Museums of Scotland (p95); Rex Nicholls (pp1, 14, 155, 177, 214–15); Royal Commission for Ancient and Historic Monuments in Scotland (title page); Olivia Sanders (pp7, 52, 182, 292, 295); Mischa Scorer (p337); Douglas Scott (pp46, 277); James Smith (p50); Stornoway Gazette (p19); Chris Tyler, West Highland Free Press (p5); Patrick Ward (pp64, 203, 374). Other photographs are by the author.
The author and publishers are grateful for permission to use quotations from the following works:
p60 ‘Brown-haired Allan …’, from Margaret Fay Shaw, Folksongs and Folklore of South Uist, 3rd ed., Aberdeen UP, 1986, pp259–60
p101 ‘Let’s go much as that dog goes …’ from Denise Levertov, ‘Overland to the Islands’ in Selected Poems of Denise Levertov, Bloodaxe Books
p165–6 ‘He brings northward to meet the Lord…’ from Thomas Owen Clancy and Gilbert Markus, Iona: The Earliest Poetry of a Celtic Monastery, Edinburgh UP, 1995, p147
p166 ‘He left Ireland, entered a pact …’ from Thomas Owen Clancy and Gilbert Markus, Iona: The Earliest Poetry of a Celtic Monastery, Edinburgh UP, 1995, p139
pp230 ‘That night/the scarecrow came …’ from Derick Thomson, ‘Am Bodach-ròcais’, ‘The Scarecrow’ in Black, RIM (ed.), An Tuil: Anthology of 20th Century Scottish Gaelic Verse, Edinburgh UP/Polygon, 1999, pp455–6
pp258–60 ‘The house of the story-teller …’ from Alexander Carmichael, Carmina Gadelica, Scottish Academic Press, 1983, ppxxviii-xxx
p272–3 ‘The girl of my love …’ from Donald Macdonald, Lewis: A History of the Island, Gordon Wright Publishing, 1990, p71
p330 ‘Brown John, catch me …’ from Margaret Fay Shaw, Folksongs and Folklore of South Uist, 3rd ed., Aberdeen, 1986, p121; and ‘Did you see the modest maiden’ from Margaret Fay Shaw, Folksongs and Folklore of South Uist, 3rd ed., Aberdeen, 1986, p225
p363 ‘Who possesses this landscape?…’ from Norman MacCaig, ‘A Man in Assynt’, in Collected Poems, Chatto and Windus, 1990, pp224–31, used by permission of The Random House Group Limited
p373 ‘Look, stranger, at this island now …’ from W H Auden, ‘XXV’, in Edward Mendelson, The English Auden, Faber, 1977, p157
My agent, Caroline Dawnay, continues to be the guide and inspiration to me that she has been for many years. At HarperCollins, Susan Watt has overseen this book with a masterly understanding of what it needed to be, for which I am deeply grateful. Vera Brice, who designed the book, gracefully tolerated an author who failed to make up his mind and both Antonia Loudon and Katie Espiner made life with HarperCollins a great pleasure.
I would like to thank the many friends and relations who have come to the Shiants with me over the years, especially Kate and Charlie Boxer, Pots and Ivan Samarine, Montagu and Sarah Don, Patrick Holden and Becky Hiscock; also Andrew Palmer and Will Anderson, who did their utmost to get there but were prevented by storms.
This book is a long thank-you to my father, without whose appetite in 1937 for ‘remoteness, isolation, grandeur’ it would not have been written. Unmentioned in these pages, but constant, is my deep debt, thanks and love to Sarah Raven.