The Kilmartin Stones are a collection of 79 ancient graveslabs (one exception being a side-slab of a tomb chest) at
Kilmartin parish church in the village of
Kilmartin
Kilmartin ( gd, Cille Mhàrtainn, meaning "church of Màrtainn") is a small village in Argyll and Bute, western Scotland. It is best known as the centre of Kilmartin Glen, an area with one of the richest concentrations of prehistoric monuments ...
,
Argyll
Argyll (; archaically Argyle, in modern Gaelic, ), sometimes called Argyllshire, is a historic county and registration county of western Scotland.
Argyll is of ancient origin, and corresponds to most of the part of the ancient kingdom of ...
,
Scotland
Scotland (, ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a Anglo-Scottish border, border with England to the southeast ...
, about 30 km due south of
Oban (about 46 km by road). The earliest stones date back to the thirteenth or fourteenth centuries, with the most recent ones dated 1707 and 1712.
Description
Originally, the stones would have been laid flat on the ground to cover a grave. After the
Reformation
The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation) was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and in ...
, however, many of the stones were moved, and in 1956 they were moved inside a shelter to protect them from the weather. The symbolism of the motifs carved onto the slabs is the subject of much discussion and speculation. Many feature swords or
claymores, some alone, others with surrounding designs of twining or
interlaced foliage. Several depict armed men. Other motifs include crosses, animals and
shears; a comb appears with shears on one stone.
It has been suggested that several of the slabs may commemorate
Knights Templar but this theory is unproven.
The nearby landscape
Kilmartin Glen
Kilmartin Glen is an area in Argyll north of Knapdale. It has the most important concentration of Neolithic and Bronze Age remains in mainland Scotland. The glen is located between Oban and Lochgilphead, surrounding the village of Kilmartin. In ...
is the richest prehistoric landscape in Scotland. Within an area not much over long a huge diversity of
standing stones,
stone circles,
carved rocks and ancient tombs can be found. It also has what is believed to be the only 'linear cemetery' in the country, a series of
chambered cairns (burial mounds) laid out in a straight line right down the bottom of the
glen. The oldest of these is believed to be 6,000 years old.
The reason for such a concentration of these ancient monuments in one small area of the
Scottish Highlands
The Highlands ( sco, the Hielands; gd, a’ Ghàidhealtachd , 'the place of the Gaels') is a historical region of Scotland. Culturally, the Highlands and the Lowlands diverged from the Late Middle Ages into the modern period, when Lowland S ...
is unknown.
References
External links
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{{coord, 56, 8, 1, N, 5, 29, 13, W, region:GB_type:landmark, display=title
Archaeological sites in Argyll and Bute
Historic Scotland properties in Argyll and Bute
fr:Kilmartin