General view of farmstead.

Description General view of farmstead.

Date 15/9/1883

Collection Papers of Erskine Beveridge, antiquarian, Dunfermline, Fife, Scotland

Catalogue Number AG 1683

Category Photographs and Off-line Digital Images

Copies SC 746101

Scope and Content Glen Scaddle, Highland Glen Scaddle, an isolated mountain valley in the Ardgour peninsula, runs from Loch Linnhe in the east towards Loch Shiel in the west. A farmstead in the glen was photographed c.1895 by the Victorian photographer, Erskine Beveridge. The farmhouse, a low thatched building, has walls constructed of large stones, held together without mortar, and a roof supported by cruck framing, a type of wooden-framed construction. The roof is hip-ended, with overhanging eaves of thatch which form of fringe around the wall-tops. The thatch is secured by a network of ropes which stretch across the roof. There are openings for doors, and a tiny opening, set well back from the face of the wall, which serves as a window. The field (left) has been harvested, and the sheaves of straw have been arranged into groups (stooks), and stood on end to dry. Erskine Beveridge (1851-1920) was a writer, antiquarian and linen manufacturer, whose private income allowed him to indulge one of his main passions, photography. In the late 19th century he travelled widely with his camera, and in 1923 his son, John Henry Beveridge, published 'Wanderings with a Camera 1882-98', a collection of his father's landscapes and archaeological views of Scotland and abroad that are of excellent quality and composition. Many of Beveridge's photographs provide a unique photographic record of the traditional thatched houses of the Highlands and Islands before they fell into disuse or were demolished. Source: RCAHMS contribution to SCRAN.

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/collection/260329