Kilrenny. General view of back of village from the Kilrenny Burn.

Description Kilrenny. General view of back of village from the Kilrenny Burn.

Date c. 1889

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

Catalogue Number SC 740610

Category On-line Digital Images

Copy of F 2012

Scope and Content Kilrenny, Fife Kilrenny, a tiny village built around its parish church, sits near the eastern tip of the Fife peninsula between the fishing ports of Anstruther and Crail. The Scottish photographer, Erskine Beveridge, photographed the village on a visit to Fife in 1889. The village is dominated by its 15th-century church tower, all that remains of an earlier church. The corbelled parapet and slated spire were added in the 16th century. Single-storeyed cottages, roofed with the distinctive curved pantiles traditionally found in the East Neuk of Fife, step down from the church to a single-arched stone bridge (left) which carries the road from the village over the burn. The church tower was used as a landmark by local fishermen who referred to it as 'St Irnie', perhaps a corruption of St Irenaeus, a bishop of Lyons in the 2nd century. Others connected it with Ringan (St Ninian), the earliest known Christian leader in Scotland, or with St Ethernan, a companion of St Adrian, a 9th-century bishop of St Andrews. However, it may have no connection with a saint's name, and merely be a corruption of the old Gaelic form of 'irnaidhe', meaning 'a prayer'. Source: RCAHMS contribution to SCRAN.

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/collection/740610

File Format (TIF) Tagged Image File Format bitmap