Publication Account
Date 1995
Event ID 1016737
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Publication Account
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1016737
The cross-slab standing by the gate is almost three metres high. Incised on one face is the outline of a large, plain ringed cross. The stem of the cross expands into a wide base, imitating the sort of base that supported free-standing crosses. The top of the cross seems to be partly carved into shape, but may have broken along the carved lines.
Inside the church, at the west end, are three more carved fragments kept in display cases. The largest is part of a broken cross-slab decorated in relief. The design and execution of the complex patterns are of a very high standard. To the right of the ringed cross is a panel of whirling triple-spirals with varied terminals including birds' heads, closely related to designs in gospel books of the period. Other patterns include interlace and key pattern. The other two smaller pieces belong to one or more cross-slabs decorated with interlace. They were found at the east end of the graveyard.
The cross-slabs are the only surviving physical evidence of an Early Christian community founded here in 673 by St Maelrubha, who came from the abbey of Bangor in Ireland. He chose a well sheltered and fertile spot for his new monastery, of which he was abbot until his death in 722. From historical sources we know little more about it than the names and dates of the first two abbots. No trace remains of the monastic buildings, which may have been a few thatched huts and a little stone chapel within an enclosure bank, and only the cross-slabs give us some idea of the artistic capabilities of these early monks.
The church is next recorded in 1515 as the parish church of Applecross in the diocese of Ross. The existing church, now disused, was built in 1817.Most of the furnishings have been removed, but a west gallery survives, and a fine pulpit with reader's desk. The ruins of a small 15th-century chapel stand in the graveyard.
Information from ‘Exploring Scotland’s Heritage: The Highlands’, (1995).
