![Mercatcross](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e7/Mercatcross.jpg)
Kinneddar is a small settlement on the outskirts of
Lossiemouth
Lossiemouth ( gd, Inbhir Losaidh) is a town in Moray, Scotland. Originally the port belonging to Elgin, it became an important fishing town. Although there has been over 1,000 years of settlement in the area, the present day town was formed over ...
in
Moray
Moray () gd, Moireibh or ') is one of the 32 local government council areas of Scotland. It lies in the north-east of the country, with a coastline on the Moray Firth, and borders the council areas of Aberdeenshire and Highland.
Between 1975 ...
,
Scotland
Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...
, near the main entrance to
RAF Lossiemouth
Royal Air Force Lossiemouth or more commonly RAF Lossiemouth is a military airfield located on the western edge of the town of Lossiemouth in Moray, north-east Scotland.
Lossiemouth is one of the largest and busiest fast-jet stations in the ...
. Long predating the modern town of Lossiemouth, Kinneddar was a major monastic centre for the
Pictish
Pictish is the extinct language, extinct Brittonic language spoken by the Picts, the people of eastern and northern Scotland from Late Antiquity to the Early Middle Ages. Virtually no direct attestations of Pictish remain, short of a limited num ...
kingdom of
Fortriu
Fortriu ( la, Verturiones; sga, *Foirtrinn; ang, Wærteras; xpi, *Uerteru) was a Pictish kingdom that existed between the 4th and 10th centuries. It was traditionally believed to be located in and around Strathearn in central Scotland, but is ...
from the 6th or 7th centuries, and the source of the important collection of
Pictish stone
A Pictish stone is a type of monumental stele, generally carved or incised with symbols or designs. A few have ogham inscriptions. Located in Scotland, mostly north of the Clyde-Forth line and on the Eastern side of the country, these stones are ...
s called the
Drainie Carved Stones
The Drainie carved stones are a collection of 32 Pictish stones originating from the important early medieval monastic settlement of Kinneddar on the outskirts of the modern town of Lossiemouth in Moray, Scotland. Despite their name the majority we ...
. The Kirk of Kinneddar was the cathedral of the
Diocese of Moray
The Diocese of Moray was one of the most important of the medieval dioceses of the Roman Catholic Church in Scotland. Its territory was in central northern Scotland.
History
It was founded in the early years of the 12th century by David I ...
between 1187 and 1208, and remained an important centre of diocesan administration and residence of the
Bishop of Moray
The Bishop of Moray or Bishop of Elgin was the ecclesiastical head of the Diocese of Moray in northern Scotland, one of Scotland's 13 medieval bishoprics. If the foundation charter of the monastery at Scone is reliable, then the Bishopric of Moray ...
through the 13th and 14th centuries.
Today little remains of the site except the old kirkyard, including the former parish cross. The Bishop's Palace at Kinneddar went out of use in the 15th century when the
barony Barony may refer to:
* Barony, the peerage, office of, or territory held by a baron
* Barony, the title and land held in fealty by a feudal baron
* Barony (county division), a type of administrative or geographical division in parts of the British ...
of Kinneddar was combined into the larger barony of Spynie, with stone from the palace being used to build
Spynie Palace
Spynie Palace, also known as Spynie Castle, was the fortified seat of the Bishops of Moray for about 500 years in Spynie, Moray, Scotland. The founding of the palace dates back to the late 12th century. It is situated about 500 m from the locati ...
. The Kirk of Kinneddar became redundant when its parish was combined with that of
Ogstoun to form the new parish of
Drainie in 1669.
Name
![Laich of Moray and Loch Spynie 1730](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/28/Laich_of_Moray_and_Loch_Spynie_1730.png)
The
place name
Place may refer to:
Geography
* Place (United States Census Bureau), defined as any concentration of population
** Census-designated place, a populated area lacking its own municipal government
* "Place", a type of street or road name
** Often ...
Kinneddar comes from two
Gaelic
Gaelic is an adjective that means "pertaining to the Gaels". As a noun it refers to the group of languages spoken by the Gaels, or to any one of the languages individually. Gaelic languages are spoken in Ireland, Scotland, the Isle of Man, and Ca ...
elements: ''cenn'', meaning "head" or "end", and ''foithir'', probably derived from a
Pictish
Pictish is the extinct language, extinct Brittonic language spoken by the Picts, the people of eastern and northern Scotland from Late Antiquity to the Early Middle Ages. Virtually no direct attestations of Pictish remain, short of a limited num ...
word meaning "district" or "region". Although Gaelic in form, ''foithir'' is only found in placenames in former Pictish areas of eastern Scotland, where it often refers to high-status areas. The name therefore probably reflects Kinneddar's status as a subsidiary centre of a high-status administrative area, probably centred on
Burghead
Burghead ( sco, Burgheid or ''The Broch'', gd, Am Broch) is a small town in Moray, Scotland, about north-west of Elgin. The town is mainly built on a peninsula that projects north-westward into the Moray Firth, surrounding it by water on thre ...
.
Location
Kinneddar is located on a raised ridge of land originally on the edge of
Loch Spynie
Loch Spynie is a small loch located between the towns of Elgin and Lossiemouth in Moray, Scotland. Close to Spynie Palace, the ancient home of the bishops of Moray, it is an important wildlife habitat which is protected as a Ramsar Site.
His ...
, with the loch's marshes surrounding the site on three sides. Loch Spynie was a sea loch during the medieval period, stretching 11 km from Kinneddar west to
Burghead
Burghead ( sco, Burgheid or ''The Broch'', gd, Am Broch) is a small town in Moray, Scotland, about north-west of Elgin. The town is mainly built on a peninsula that projects north-westward into the Moray Firth, surrounding it by water on thre ...
and providing sheltered anchorage for seagoing vessels. Kinneddar was still described as being "in a corner of the sea" in 1207, but blown sand had cut the loch off from the sea creating a freshwater loch by the 17th century and in the 19th century the loch was drained to its current size.
The sandstone ridge between the modern towns of Burghead and Lossiemouth would have been an island during the early medieval period and contained a group of unique and interrelated Pictish sites: as well as the religious site at Kinneddar there was
Burghead Fort – the largest fortified site in early historic Scotland – and the
Sculptor's Cave
The Sculptor's Cave is a sandstone cave on the south shore of the Moray Firth in Scotland, near the small settlement of Covesea, between Burghead and Lossiemouth in Moray. It is named after the Pictish carvings incised on the walls of the cave n ...
at
Covesea, which was important to the Picts as a ritual centre. This area was probably the most important centre of royal power for the Pictish kingdom of
Fortriu
Fortriu ( la, Verturiones; sga, *Foirtrinn; ang, Wærteras; xpi, *Uerteru) was a Pictish kingdom that existed between the 4th and 10th centuries. It was traditionally believed to be located in and around Strathearn in central Scotland, but is ...
, which flourished from the 4th to the 9th centuries.
History
Pictish monastic site
![Drainie carved stones 1](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/da/Drainie_carved_stones_1.jpg)
Kinneddar was one of the major ecclesiastical centres of the
Picts
The Picts were a group of peoples who lived in what is now northern and eastern Scotland (north of the Firth of Forth) during Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages. Where they lived and what their culture was like can be inferred from ea ...
, with
radiocarbon dating
Radiocarbon dating (also referred to as carbon dating or carbon-14 dating) is a method for determining the age of an object containing organic material by using the properties of radiocarbon, a radioactive isotope of carbon.
The method was dev ...
showing activity on the site from the 7th century through to its first appearance in documentary records in the 12th century, and possible activity as early as the late 6th century. The site was surrounded by
vallum
Vallum is either the whole or a portion of the fortifications of a Roman camp. The vallum usually comprised an earthen or turf rampart (Agger) with a wooden palisade on top, with a deep outer ditch (fossa). The name is derived from '' vallus'' (a ...
ditches first cut during the 7th century enclosing an area of 8.6 hectares – the largest such enclosure discovered within the territory of Northern Pictland. Within the enclosure there is evidence of a significant settlement and industry, including a
smithing hearth and evidence of
ironworking
Ferrous metallurgy is the metallurgy of iron and its alloys. The earliest surviving prehistoric iron artifacts, from the 4th millennium BC in Egypt, were made from meteoritic iron-nickel. It is not known when or where the smelting of iron from ...
, and the postholes of large wooden
roundhouses. Annexe enclosures to the south of the main enclosure and dating to the 11th and 12th centuries suggest that the site grew in size and importance over time.
The scale and layout of the site is very similar to that of
Iona Abbey
Iona Abbey is an abbey located on the island of Iona, just off the Isle of Mull on the West Coast of Scotland.
It is one of the oldest Christian religious centres in Western Europe. The abbey was a focal point for the spread of Christianit ...
, suggesting that the establishment of Kinneddar may have been connected with the church of
Columba
Columba or Colmcille; gd, Calum Cille; gv, Colum Keeilley; non, Kolban or at least partly reinterpreted as (7 December 521 – 9 June 597 AD) was an Irish abbot and missionary evangelist credited with spreading Christianity in what is toda ...
.
Kinneddar was the source of an important collection of carved
Pictish stone
A Pictish stone is a type of monumental stele, generally carved or incised with symbols or designs. A few have ogham inscriptions. Located in Scotland, mostly north of the Clyde-Forth line and on the Eastern side of the country, these stones are ...
s, the 32 fragments representing parts of ten cross-slabs, three free-standing crosses and at least eight panels from stone
shrine
A shrine ( la, scrinium "case or chest for books or papers"; Old French: ''escrin'' "box or case") is a sacred or holy sacred space, space dedicated to a specific deity, ancestor worship, ancestor, hero, martyr, saint, Daemon (mythology), daem ...
chests. Some of the sculpture is unfinished showing that it was produced on-site. The stones are decorated with patterns including
knotwork
A knot is an intentional complication in cordage which may be practical or decorative, or both. Practical knots are classified by function, including hitches, bends, loop knots, and splices: a ''hitch'' fastens a rope to another object; a ' ...
and
ring-headed crosses, but also include several illustrating human figures such as horse riders and warriors with spears, and one Class I stone decorated with a
crescent and V-rod pattern. Particularly significant is the carving on a fragment of a panel representing the biblical
King David
David (; , "beloved one") (traditional spelling), , ''Dāwūd''; grc-koi, Δαυΐδ, Dauíd; la, Davidus, David; gez , ዳዊት, ''Dawit''; xcl, Դաւիթ, ''Dawitʿ''; cu, Давíдъ, ''Davidŭ''; possibly meaning "beloved one". w ...
wrenching open the jaws of a lion. This is similar to the decoration on the more complete
St Andrews Sarcophagus
The Saint Andrews Sarcophagus is a Pictish monument dating from the second half of the 8th century. The sarcophagus was recovered beginning in 1833 during excavations by St Andrew's Cathedral in Scotland, and in 1922 the surviving components we ...
from
St Andrews Cathedral
The Cathedral of St Andrew (often referred to as St Andrews Cathedral) is a ruined cathedral in St Andrews, Fife, Scotland. It was built in 1158 and became the centre of the Medieval Catholic Church in Scotland as the seat of the Archdiocese of ...
and is likely to have contained the body or relics of a king or important saint. David was an imperial symbol closely associated with royal power and this iconography indicates that Kinneddar was a focus for extensive royal patronage, perhaps linked to nearby
Burghead Fort. The sculpture from Kinneddar is closely linked to that found at the monastic site at
Portmahomack
Portmahomack ( gd, Port Mo Chalmaig; 'Haven of My .e. 'Saint'Colmóc') is a small fishing village in Easter Ross, Scotland. It is situated in the Tarbat Peninsula in the parish of Tarbat. Tarbat Ness Lighthouse is about from the village at t ...
, indicating that these two monastic houses may have enjoyed the bulk of royal patronage within the kingdom of
Fortriu
Fortriu ( la, Verturiones; sga, *Foirtrinn; ang, Wærteras; xpi, *Uerteru) was a Pictish kingdom that existed between the 4th and 10th centuries. It was traditionally believed to be located in and around Strathearn in central Scotland, but is ...
.
The
Pictish sculptures found in the vicinity of the castle and kirkyard point to the area being an important 8th-century Christian centre (see
Culdees
The Culdees ( ga, Céilí Dé, "Spouses of God") were members of ascetic Christian monastic and eremitical communities of Ireland, Scotland, Wales and England in the Middle Ages. Appearing first in Ireland and subsequently in Scotland, atta ...
) and may have been a principal location for the
conversion of the Picts.
Kinneddar Kirk
![Kineddar Church Location](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/55/Kineddar_Church_Location.jpg)
Within the area of the earlier monastic enclosure stood the ancient Kirk of Kinneddar. At least two shrines existed within the kirk between the 8th and 10th centuries, probably containing one or more saint's
relic
In religion, a relic is an object or article of religious significance from the past. It usually consists of the physical remains of a saint or the personal effects of the saint or venerated person preserved for purposes of veneration as a tangi ...
s. One of these may have been the oratory or cell with a "stone bed" established at Kinneddar by the early medieval saint
Gervadius, according to the 16th century ''
Aberdeen Breviary
The ''Aberdeen Breviary'' ( la, Breviarium Aberdonense) is a 16th-century Scotland, Scottish Roman Catholic Church in Scotland, Catholic breviary. It was the first full-length book to be printed in Edinburgh, and in Scotland.
Origin
The creation o ...
''.
Kinneddar was adopted as the cathedral of the
Diocese of Moray
The Diocese of Moray was one of the most important of the medieval dioceses of the Roman Catholic Church in Scotland. Its territory was in central northern Scotland.
History
It was founded in the early years of the 12th century by David I ...
by
Richard de Lincoln
Richard de Lincoln was a medieval Anglo-Norman prelate. Although of English origin, he was a royal clerk in the administration of King William of Scotland. With royal support, he was elected Bishop of Moray on 1 March 1187 and was consecrated at ...
while he was
Bishop of Moray
The Bishop of Moray or Bishop of Elgin was the ecclesiastical head of the Diocese of Moray in northern Scotland, one of Scotland's 13 medieval bishoprics. If the foundation charter of the monastery at Scone is reliable, then the Bishopric of Moray ...
between 1187 and 1203, following the move of the bishop's seat from
Birnie. In 1207/8 the seat of the diocese moved again with
Spynie
Spynie was a seaport, burgh and ancient parish in Moray, Scotland, that survives as a small hamlet and civil parish. It is the location of the ruins of Spynie Palace, which was the principal residence of the Bishops of Moray between the 12th and 17 ...
being confirmed as the cathedral of Moray by
Pope Innocent III
Pope Innocent III ( la, Innocentius III; 1160 or 1161 – 16 July 1216), born Lotario dei Conti di Segni (anglicized as Lothar of Segni), was the head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 8 January 1198 to his death in 16 J ...
.
Although Kinneddar ceased to be a cathedral it remained important within the diocese, and charter evidence shows that it was the site of the bishopric's charter ceremonies on at least six occasions between 1226 and 1328, and was the site of the signing of a diocesan memorandum during the bishopric of
Alexander Bur
Alexander Bur (died 1397) was a 14th-century Scottish cleric. It is highly possible that Bur came from somewhere in or around Aberdeenshire, although that is not certain and is only based on the knowledge that Aberdeenshire is where other peopl ...
(1362–1397).
Gothic tracery
Tracery is an architecture, architectural device by which windows (or screens, panels, and vaults) are divided into sections of various proportions by stone ''bars'' or ''ribs'' of Molding (decorative), moulding. Most commonly, it refers to the s ...
was added to the kirk during the bishopric of
Archibald
Archibald is a masculine given name, composed of the Germanic elements '' erchan'' (with an original meaning of "genuine" or "precious") and ''bald'' meaning "bold".
Medieval forms include Old High German and Anglo-Saxon .
Erkanbald, bishop of ...
between 1252 and 1298, and when the Bishop's Palace was abandoned its tower was used by the kirk as a
belfry.
The parish of Kinneddar was merged with that of
Ogstoun to form the new parish of
Drainie on 17 February 1669. The kirk at Kinneddar went out of use in 1676, with stone from Kinneddar being used to construct the new kirk at Drainie. Although the foundations of the kirk at Kinneddar were recorded as still being visible in 1760, by 1792 only "vestiges" remained.
Bishop's Palace
Bishop Archibald enlarged or rebuilt the castle in c. 1280 and it continued to be used by the bishops until the late 14th century.
[Royal Commission on the ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland, Archaeological Notes: Canmore ID 16459][Cramond, ''Records of Elgin'', pp. 16–7. Cramond cites the primary source, ''the Registry of Moray'' where Bishop Bur arrests a ship on 7 June 1383 in the tidal Loch Spynie delivering cargo to the burgesses of Elgin. Bur was sailing from his residence at Kinneddar Castle to the church of Urquhart.] The palace was attacked and burned by
Robert the Bruce
Robert I (11 July 1274 – 7 June 1329), popularly known as Robert the Bruce (Scottish Gaelic: ''Raibeart an Bruis''), was King of Scots from 1306 to his death in 1329. One of the most renowned warriors of his generation, Robert eventual ...
and
David de Moravia
David de Moravia (died 1326) was Bishop of Moray during most of the First War of Scottish Independence. He was elected Bishop of Moray, probably in early 1299. Extended details exist regarding the election because of an extant letter of Pope Bo ...
in 1308, but was repaired and recorded as the residence of Bishop
Alexander Bur
Alexander Bur (died 1397) was a 14th-century Scottish cleric. It is highly possible that Bur came from somewhere in or around Aberdeenshire, although that is not certain and is only based on the knowledge that Aberdeenshire is where other peopl ...
in 1383. The palace remained the head of the
barony Barony may refer to:
* Barony, the peerage, office of, or territory held by a baron
* Barony, the title and land held in fealty by a feudal baron
* Barony (county division), a type of administrative or geographical division in parts of the British ...
of Kinneddar until 1451, when all nine baronies held by the Bishops of Moray were combined into a single barony headed by
Spynie
Spynie was a seaport, burgh and ancient parish in Moray, Scotland, that survives as a small hamlet and civil parish. It is the location of the ruins of Spynie Palace, which was the principal residence of the Bishops of Moray between the 12th and 17 ...
, and from 1462 Bishop
David Stewart may have used stone from the now-redundant palace at Kinneddar in his building of the David Tower at Spynie Palace. By 1623 it was being described as ''palatium dirutum'' - the "ruined" or "destroyed" palace.
Nothing now exists of the castle except one fragment of a rubble wall that is integrated into the Kinneddar
kirkyard
In Christian countries a churchyard is a patch of land adjoining or surrounding a church, which is usually owned by the relevant church or local parish itself. In the Scots language and in both Scottish English and Ulster-Scots, this can also ...
boundary wall.
[Oram, ''Moray & Badenoch'', p. 122]
The ruinous structure still existed in 1734 and was described as being a central tower enclosed by two concentric hexagonal walls which made it unique in Scottish terms.
Notes
References
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{{Former cathedrals in Scotland
Episcopal palaces in Scotland
Castles in Moray
Pictish sites in Scotland
Former cathedrals in Scotland
Medieval cathedrals in Scotland
Scheduled Ancient Monuments in Moray
Ruins in Moray
1187 establishments in Scotland