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Publication Account
Date 1985
Event ID 1016590
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Publication Account
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1016590
There are two islands in the Lake of Menteith; the smaller is occupied by the Castle of Inchtalla, while the larger houses the Priory ofInchmahome, which must be one of Scotland's most attractively sited monuments. The Augustinian Priory was founded in 1238 by WalterComyn, 4th Earl of Menteith, but there may have been an Early Christian monastery on the island. All that remains to be seen of the latter establishment, however, is a rather poorly carved slab preserved in the Chapter House. The Priory remained in ecclesiastical hands until the early 16th century when the land was leased to a lay family, after which it became, to all intents and purposes, the heritable property of the Erskines. Following the battle of Pinkie (1547), the young Queen Mary and her mother were lodged for safe-keeping with the monks at Inchmahome for three weeks, but by the end of that century the island had lost its religious community.
Although the Priory is now in ruinous condition, enough survives to give a vivid picture of this compact religious house with its spacious church and conventual buildings ranged around the cloister. Building and remodelling continued over a long period, and this is particularly noticeable at the west end of the church where a square bell-tower was added in the late medieval period, and on the south of the cloisters where the foundations of an earlier range of buildings have been exposed. Some of the piers and the west doorway of the church show marked similarities to work at Dunblane Cathedral (no. 51), which was under construction at about the same time, and it is possible that some of the masons were involved in both projects. Originally there was a group of medieval grave-markers and effigies in the church but most have now been moved to the Chapter House for greater protection.
During the medieval period the monks cultivated parts of the island, and traces of field banks and other enclosures can still be seen; on the west of the island there is a small knot garden Ccfthe much more elaborate example at the King's Knot, Stirling, no. 15) which is traditionally, but probably erroneously, associated with Mary, Queen of Scots.
Information from ‘Exploring Scotland’s Heritage: The Clyde Estuary and Central Region’, (1985).
