Loch Linnhe () is a
sea loch
''Loch'' () is the Scottish Gaelic, Scots and Irish word for a lake or sea inlet. It is cognate with the Manx lough, Cornish logh, and one of the Welsh words for lake, llwch.
In English English and Hiberno-English, the anglicised spellin ...
on the west coast of Scotland. The part upstream of
Corran is known in
Gaelic as (the black pool, originally known as Loch Abar), and downstream as (the salty pool). The name ''Linnhe'' is derived from the Gaelic word , meaning "pool".
Loch Linnhe follows the line of the
Great Glen Fault
The Great Glen Fault is a strike-slip fault that runs through the Great Glen in Scotland. The fault is mostly inactive today, but occasional moderate tremors have been recorded over the past 150 years.
Location
Aligned northeast to southwest, ...
, and is the only sea loch along the fault. About long, it opens onto the
Firth of Lorne
The Firth of Lorn or Lorne ( gd, An Linne Latharnach) is the inlet of the sea between the south-east coast of the Isle of Mull and the mainland of Scotland. It includes a number of islands, and is noted for the variety of wildlife habitats that ...
at its southwestern end. The part of the loch upstream of Corran is long and an average of about wide. The southern part of the loch is wider, and its branch southeast of the island of
Lismore is known as the Lynn of Lorne.
Loch Eil feeds into Loch Linnhe at the latter's northernmost point, while from the east
Loch Leven feeds in the loch just downstream of Corran and
Loch Creran feeds into the Lynn of Lorne. The town of
Fort William lies at the northeast end of the loch, at the mouth of the
River Lochy.
According to the
Bard
In Celtic cultures, a bard is a professional story teller, verse-maker, music composer, oral historian and genealogist, employed by a patron (such as a monarch or chieftain) to commemorate one or more of the patron's ancestors and to praise ...
Fr.
Allan MacDonald, an important figure in
Scottish Gaelic literature
Scottish Gaelic literature refers to literature composed in the Scottish Gaelic language and in the Gàidhealtachd communities where it is and has been spoken. Scottish Gaelic is a member of the Goidelic branch of Celtic languages, along with Iris ...
, Loch Linnhe was said in local
Scottish folklore
Scottish folklore (Scottish Gaelic: ''Beul-aithris na h-Alba'') encompasses the folklore of the Scottish people from their earliest records until today. Folklorists, both academic and amateur, have published a variety of works focused specifically ...
to be the home of an
each-uisge
The each-uisge (, literally " water horse") is a water spirit in Scottish folklore, known as the each-uisce (anglicized as ''aughisky'' or ''ech-ushkya'') in Ireland and cabyll-ushtey on the Isle of Man. It usually takes the form of a horse, an ...
, or "water horse", whose back could accommodate all the children who wished to ride him. But when they did, the water-horse would gallop off into the nearest lake to drown and eat the children on his back. Fr. Allan MacDonald later recalled that during his childhood in nearby Fort William, "Many's the horse I wouldn't get on as a child for fear it would be the ''each-uisge''."
[ Edited by Ronald Black (2002), ''Eilein na h-Òige: The Poems of Fr. Allan MacDonald'', Mungo Press. Pages 5-6.]
References
Notes
Bibliography
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External links
{{DEFAULTSORT:Linnhe, Loch
Lochs of Argyll and Bute
Lochs of Highland (council area)
Scottish folklore
Scottish mythology
Sea lochs of Scotland