Eigg, Cleadale General view of farms, and looking towards Laig Bay

Description Eigg, Cleadale General view of farms, and looking towards Laig Bay

Date c. 1890

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

Catalogue Number SC 743161

Category On-line Digital Images

Copy of IN 897

Scope and Content Cleadale, Eigg, Highland Cleadale, the main centre of population of Eigg, is a small crofting community of traditionally-built houses which lies in the north-west of the island. The Victorian photographer, Erskine Beveridge, visited Eigg c.1890, providing one of the oldest known photographic records of the island. This well-spread out township of small, early 19th-century squat stone houses overlooks the wide sweep of Laig Bay. The houses are the traditional round-cornered 'blackhouses', a type unique to the Hebrides, with thick walls and thatched roofs. They were the home of crofters who farmed the land allotted to their croft, and supplemented their livelihoods by fishing (every crofter had a boat). Crofts were laid out at Cleadale in 1810, and each was allocated an area of land for cultivation. The crofts varied considerably in size, but most could support three to five cows, and each crofter was allowed to keep one working horse - a small Hebridean 'garron' (a Clydesdale cross) - on common grazing land. The rich black soil formed from the underlying basaltic rocks of the island produced good crops, particularly cereals, which were usually worked in a rotation of potatoes followed by oats. The land would then revert to pasture for several years before being ploughed again. Oats were an important winter feed for cattle and horses, and potatoes were the staple food of the crofters, supplemented by rabbit and fish. Source: RCAHMS contribution to SCRAN.

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