Undiscovered Scotland

 

Balnakeil, a little over a mile north-west of Durness, is a magical place, though at times it can also be a busy one. It comprises a golf club, Balnakeil House, and the start of a walk out across the sublime dune-backed beach at Balnakeil Bay to Faraid Head. It is also home to the ruin of Balnakeil Church, whose graveyard is well worth visiting as, being slightly raised, it offers an interesting perspective on the wider area.

Let's turn our attention to Balnakeil Church itself, which is also known as Old Durness Parish Church or Old St Peter's Church. What you find is a T-shaped structure with a main body running east to west, and an aisle on the north side. The walls are in fairly good shape, if extensively covered by ivy, and the three crowstepped gables help the ruin stand out from a distance.

Balnakeil Church is believed to have been built by Donald Mackay of Farr, a man who would later become Lord Reay, in 1619. It would originally have been a single rectangular block, aligned east-west. The north aisle was added in 1692. The gables were extensively rebuilt in the 1720s. The church was in use until 1814, when a new parish church was built on the south side of Durness. (Continues below image...)

 

The story of Balnakeil Church may actually extend back rather further than the early 1600s. There is a written reference from the early 1200s to a church being located here, which appears to have been built over by the 1619 construction. Going back even further, there is a story that a chapel was founded here by Saint Maelrubha in the years around 700. This story finds some support in signs of a circular bank within the current churchyard that can be seen on aerial photographs of the site.

Other than the views it offers, the graveyard has some interesting memorials. One obelisk (which, it appears, we've never photographed on any of our visits over the years) commemorates Rob Donn (Robert Mackay of Durness), who was known as the "Reay Gaelic Bard" or the "Burns of the North" and lived from 1714 to 1778. It was erected in 1827 and carries an inscription in Gaelic, English, Latin and Greek. There is also a tombstone marking the adjoining graves of the two wives of James Anderson, who died in 1783 and 1790.

The interior of the church is fairly plain and featureless, with one important exception. The door in the east gable leads to a set of five stone steps down to floor level. Just to the left is a stone structure which has clearly been built to shelter a tomb recess set into the south wall of the building. This is by far the church's most fascinating feature. The upper surface of the tomb is highly decorated. One panel carries a carving of an archer shooting a deer and presumably depicts the tomb's occupant. A second carries a large skull and crossbones and the inscription "memento mori", which translates as "remember that you have to die". This was a fairly common inscription on Scottish gravestones in the 1600s, as were other symbols of mortality like angels and hourglasses.

The right-hand end of the stone covering the tomb carries an inscription, which reads "Duncan MacMorrach here lyis lo {lies low}. Was ill to his friend, waur {worse} to his foe. True to his master in weird and wo {wealth and woe} 1623." It is said that Duncan MacMorrach's role for his master included disposing of enemies, and after his death it was decreed that he should not be buried in the graveyard. In what was apparently seen as a compromise he was instead buried in the wall of the church. The stone shelter for his tomb was clearly erected some time after the church fell out of use. The inscribed plaque dated 1619 above the tomb recess is thought to have been moved to its current locations from elsewhere in the church.