Field Visit

Date September 2017

Event ID 1031910

Category Recording

Type Field Visit

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1031910

Eilean Fhianain Special Survey

The roofless shell of the old parish church at Eilean Fhianain stands in a commanding position a little to the SW of the centre of the island. The building is mainly a reconstruction of 19th century date but evidently incorporates within its ENE end an earlier church dating to the medieval period, formerly the parish church of Sunart.

The church now measures 21m from ENE to WSW by 4.8m transversely within walls that average 0.6m in thickness and only 1.2m in height. The late masonry is of a poor quality, roughly coursed and mortared and capped with cement, but it has evidently re-used stone from the earlier church. The doorway is located towards the WSW end of the SSE wall, and there are three window openings in both side-walls, all of which appears to be modern work that was never intended to hold a window. A further opening is provided in the WSW gable, while the ENE gable contains a niche and is abutted by a large altar, both relatively recent features. The altar, a thin slab supported on rough masonry, is mentioned in Muir’s account from 1857 (1885, 76).

The surviving medieval fabric is limited to sections of the side-walls which indicate that the earlier church has measured at least 9.7m in length and 4.8m in breadth within a wall 0.8m in thickness which survives up to 2.7m in height. The masonry is of good quality incorporating split boulders bonded with an abundance of small pinnings, and a small socket hole in the SSE wall probably reflects the position of an earlier timber screen separating the chancel and nave, similar to features seen in the church at Kilvickeon, Mull (NM41NW 1).

A talus of rubble that surrounds the church, particularly on the NNW and SSE sides, appears to be a product of the collapse of the original church and its subsequent clearance, but supplemented by the gathering of stone from the shore for burial markers. This talus has been disturbed along the SSE wall in an attempt to reveal the line of the medieval building.

The evidence that the building has been heavily restored is not limited to the character of the stonework and openings but is also suggested by the fact that this church appears to have been lengthened. In its current form it is longer than any other in the area (c.f. RCAHMS 1980, Fig. 6). In 1838, the church at Arisaig (NM68NE 1) was described as being of ‘larger size’ but now measures only 14.2m in length (New. Stat. Acc. v7, 148). That said, the church on Eilean Fhianain seems to have reached its current length before 1857 (Muir 1885, 77; White 1874).

The altar is the location for the early medieval bell, as well as a collection of architectural fragments (including a fragment of a late medieval slab) which support an interpretation of the building as a medieval parish church (NM76NE 1.10). An early medieval cross stone (NM76NE 1.04) is situated at the W end of the church, and an earthfast late medieval graveslab at its E end (NM76NE 1.06).

The church at ‘Swynort’ (Sunart) first comes on record in 1392 and a succession of rectors to the island are recorded in the 16th century (OPS 1854, 198). The graveslab of one such, Roderick McAlestir, survives at Ardchattan Priory (RCAHMS 1975, No. 217 (12)). The parish of Sunart was combined with Arisaig and Kilchoan to form Ardnamurchan sometime after the Reformation and possibly after 1630 (Stat. Acct. v20, 287), but the church may have been used for services as late as the 1730s (J Kirkby pers. comm.).

Visited by HES Survey and Recording (GFG, ATW) September 2017.