Martin Martin
was a native Gaelic speaker
from Skye who, in the 1690s, became convinced of the need for a first hand
account of the society, the culture and the natural history of the Western
Isles. He visited and mapped St Kilda in 1697, part of a larger project with
John Adair to map the Hebrides more fully. The most important outcome of his
travels was the publication in 1703 of his classic book: A
Description of the Western Islands of Scotland.
First published in 1698, a year after his visit, A Late Voyage to St
Kilda is a fascinating account of a time long gone and a society that
has disappeared as well.
Like other eBooks whose texts are reproduced on Undiscovered
Scotland, A Late Voyage to St Kilda, by Martin
Martin is long out of copyright. What sets the Undiscovered Scotland
version apart is the cross linking between the text of the book and features
elsewhere on the site, allowing the reader to explore beyond the text itself,
finding out more about the places and people mentioned.
