Field Visit

Date 8 September 1922

Event ID 1104595

Category Recording

Type Field Visit

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1104595

RCAHMS Inventory: Outer Hebrides, Skye and the Small Isles.

Dunvegan Castle.

Dunvegan Castle, the seat of McLeod of Dunvegan, is the most considerable of the historic structures in Skye, and is singular in possessing details of architectural merit. It occupies the summit of a rock in a sheltered and almost landlocked bay on the eastern shore of Loch Dunvegan, that rises to a height of from 20 to 25 feet, is enclosed by sea on three sides, and is separated from high ground on the east or landward side by a gully 16 yards wide and 15 feet deep in places, which is mainly natural. As the rock can be scaled at several points, the terre plein is defended by a wall returning round the perimeter, which in time has come to be incorporated in buildings to north, south and east. From Grose's view of the castle, published in 1790, before the modern alterations and additions were made, it is apparent that the nucleus of the whole is the large tower at the north-east angle which dates in or about the 15th century and formed a dwelling complete in itself. This was slightly altered in the 16th century, and in the same century increased accommodation was provided by building the new house with the "Fairy Tower" between the southern angle and the 15th-century tower; some part of this addition was renewed and embellished in 1686. In or towards the 18th century the old tower was ruinous and disused, and was replaced by a wing on the west of the 16th century house. Within relatively modern times the old tower was restored and modernised, and was linked up to the 16th-century house by an addition containing a vestibule and porch ; the 16th-century house was widened and heightened, and the castle as a whole was finished in the then fashionable battlemented "baronial" style. The access was originally only from the west, but this was subsequently supplemented by a side gate on the east, reached from the bed of the gully by a flight steps; when the porch and vestibule were added the gully was bridged and the west entrance went out of use.

In the 15th century the castle comprised a barmkin about a quarter of an acre in extent, irregularly shaped, with the house tucked away in the north-east angle. The barmkin wall probably was surmounted by a roundway, for there are corbels on the south-east angle of the "Fairy Tower," which cannot be explained if they were not for the purpose of supporting a parapet. The barmkin entrance, set on the western side, was fairly wide, and had an arched head, but in the 16th century it was constricted by inserting moulded jambs and lintel, the latter enriched with a ribbon and baton moulding. The entrance was defended by two swinging gates with an intermediate rising gate, which can hardly be dignified as a portcullis. Past the gates the access leads straight up to the barmkin level and passes on the south the draw well, but just within the innermost gate a narrow branch led up to the tower entrance. (Fig. 217.[SC 1104768])

The tower on plan comprises an oblong main block 48 ¼ by 35 feet, with a jamb or wing 11 by 14 ¾ feet unusually placed, for it projects from a gable. The entrance seems to have been at first floor level in the north-west, re-entering angle on the site of the door now opening between the drawing room and billiard room; some distance above this is a machicolation. Main block and wing were both four storeys in height, but the wing has been heightened in the last alterations. The masonry is rubble harled built of stone excavated on or near the site, but the dressings are of imported freestone. Those inserted in the 16th century are distinguished by being delicately moulded. The basement floor is vaulted with a barrel vault and comprises a cellarage, which became the kitchen in the 16th century. At the eastern end a mural staircase descends and gives access from the Hall, which occupied the first floor. The lower storey of the wing is a pit or prison originally reached from a hatch in its vault, but subsequently entered from a small 16th-century door in the east wall. The pit ventilated into the mural staircase. The Hall, which has been modernised as the drawing room, measures 30 ¾ by 20 ¾ feet. The windows in the lateral walls are modern. The only original feature is a small mural chamber at the southern angle. The staircase, which must have risen from this floor to the roof, is not apparent, but it is conjectured that it lay in the west wall, for in that wall externally is seen a small window which cannot otherwise be accounted for. Within the wing at the level of the Hall is a small chamber with a vaulted roof, lit from north and east by narrow slits ;above this is a second chamber with a garderobe in the gable and narrow slits in the lateral walls. The two floors in the main block above the Hall are quite modernised.

The 16th-century house comprises the graceful little "Fairy Tower," a four-storey structure at the south-east angle, and the four-storeyed wing extending northwards from that tower (Fig. 218 [SC 1104769]). Both these portions are modernised internally, but the tower still retains its crenellated parapet and walk, while the wing has a good Renaissance balustrade, added in 1664. Preserved in the wine cellar are some details removed from the wing during the latest alterations: (a) is a panel with a lengthy inscription in Latin, now very weatherworn and almost illegible, but apparently to the effect that John McLeod (Iain Breac) and Flora McDonald, his wife, restored the wing in 1686 ; (b) a dormer pediment inscribed F MD beneath a thistle slip; (c) a second pediment bearing a lion rampant. On the upper part of the modern porch is a long armorial panel c. 17th century, stated to have been removed from another building. The central shield, supported by lions, griffins rampant regardant, holding swords and surmounted by a crown and label, is parted per pale and charged dexter a castle at fess between the three legs of Man in chief and a bull's head cabossed at base, and sinister a galley beneath a lion rampant and a right hand grasping a cross crosslet. The label is upheld by angels. The panel is otherwise filled with such decorative motifs as foliage, two banners opposed, animals lying and standing, and an object resembling a female figure on a helm. The impaled arms are those of Iain Breac, chief from 1664 to 1693, and his wife, Flora Macdonald of Sleat. (Fig. 220.)

In the courtyard are the symbol stone described in Article No. 528 and a very interesting female figure in 17th-century costume which apparently bore a sundial (Fig. 219). A very similar figure, which came from North Barr, Ayrshire, is now at Lennoxlove, East Lothian [NT57SW 29].

RCAHMS 1928, visited 8 September 1922.

OS map: Skye xxi.