Monument record 1421 - GEIRUM MOR, MINGULAY

NL58SW 2 5486 8120.

(NL 54868120) Dun (NR)
OS 6'map, Inverness-shire, 2nd ed., (1904)

The small island of Geirum More, on which a Dun is marked by the OS, is said to have the foundations of a church. There is a boat slip above high water on the eastward end: Not Visited.
RCAHMS 1928.

Wedderspoon (J Wedderspoon 1915) is probably referring to the same site when he notes some 'ancient remains' on a small un-named rock in the sound between Mingulay and Barra-head. 'The rock ... is inaccessible except from the side next Mingulay, where the face is terraced. These terraces may be partly artificial, as they lead by short traverses to the top, which is flat and covered with grass. A low stone breastwork occupies the face of the rock above the terraces, and the latter have been protected on the sea side with similar breastworks'.
'As seen from the boat, the remains of those walls were from two to three feet in height, and built of dry stonework; the rock is at least 60 feet high, and as a place of defence it must have been impregnable.' J Wedderspoon 1915.

The small island of 'Geirum More' is as described above, but no trace of a dun could be found on it. The breastworks mentioned by Wedderspoon (J Wedderspoon 1915) are, in fact, natural layers of rock strata and surround the N, E and S summit of the island.
In the NE sector of the top there are the remains of several oval shielings, and in the S at NL 5486 8120, a rectangular building measuring 7.6m by 4.3m, with walls 2.0m wide, surviving to a height of 0.7m. This building is orientated E and W and maybe the remains of a church or chapel, although it is of drystone construction with no trace of lime or shell mortar: the door, 0.7m wide, is at the E end and is marked by two large stones. These are respectively 1.0m and 0.5m high, and beside these stones, and on top of the tumble, there is a possible lintel stone 2.8m long by 0.4m wide by 0.2m thick. No further information could be obtained about this possible church or the alleged dun, although the existence of the shielings is well known locally. Visited by OS (R B) 18 May 1965; J Wedderspoon 1915.

NL58SW 6 548 812

The grassy summit of Geirum Mor contains ruins of (a) a rectangular building 7.6m by 4.3m, with its entrance 0.7m wide at the E end, 2.0m wide walls and surviving to a height of 0.7m. (b) an oval shieling 4.0m by 2.0m and 0.5m high. (c) an oval shieling 6.5m by 3.7m and 0.6m high. (d) an oval shieling 5.5m by 3.5m, grass-covered footing only. (e) a circular shieling 2.6m diameter and (f) an oval shileing 2.8m by 2.0m and 0.3m high
Visited by OS 18 May 1965

This sounds very much like an early monastic site, on the basis of description only. NL58SW 2 & NL58SW 6 (NMRS records) clearly refer to the same sites, and the later of the two records has therefore been cancelled (NL58SW 6, SMR no. 1425), and the two combined. MML 23.9.99

J Wedderspoon, 1906-12b, Trans Inverness Sci Soc Fld Club, 331-2 (Bibliographic reference). SWE7658.

RCAHMS, 1928, The RCAHMCS 9th Report & Inventory: Outer Hebrides, Skye and the Small Isles, 137, No. 468 (Bibliographic reference). SWE5587.