Kilfinan
Principal Sources
RMS II (1059) 1472
RMS III (309) 1525, (1447) 1534-5, (1689) 1536, (1882) 1538-9
RMS IV (756) 1552-3, (1816) 1568
RMS V (1320) 1587, (1540) 1588, (2070) 1591-2, (2095) 1592
RMS VI (215) 1594-5, (1065) 1600
AS I (64) 1618, (116) 1620, (247, 260-2, 269-270) 1643, (283-285) 1646, (345) 1651, (393-4) 1659, (403) 1659, (459) 1660, (510) 1674, (613) 1675
AS II (84-5) 1620, (340) 1630, (374, 397) 1631, (467) 1633, (537) 1635, (709-710) 1643, (741) 1646, (800, 802-5) 1653, (830) 1654, (980) 1658, (984) 1659, (1050, 1062-6) 1662, (1089, 1114) 1663, (1170) 1664, (1187, 1189, 1196-7, 1206) 1665, (1292) 1666, (1404, 1437, 1452) 1668
ER V p 667 1451-4
ER X p 178 1488-90
ER XIV p 626 1519-20
NAS RH2/2/14/3
Highland Papers IV pp 93, 95, 103
Historical Manuscripts Commission IV p 478 1479
ILP (10) c. 1295, (13) 1309-25, (16) 1356, (35) 1454, (39) 1458, (43) 1465, (48) 1468, (55) 1476-7, (82) 1499, (91) 1519, (95) 1522, (102-3) 1525, (105) 1526-7, (110-111) 1530, (118) 1534, (131-2) 1536, (134-6, 139-40) 1537, (142) 1538-9, (191) 1552-3, (197) 1554, (213) 1559, (267) 1568, (276) 1569-70, (278) 1570, (361) 1597-8, (365) 1597, (1444-6) 1558
Argyll Retours (6) 1599, (25) 1621, (55) 1635
Settlements in Kilfinan are often referred to as being in Kerry of Cowal – the ceatramh of quarter of Cowal. The following farms are all described (in one document or another) as being in Kerry of Cowal: Achadachoun, Kames, Kilbride, Auchadalvorie, Auchnascheloch, Morallauch, Auchnaskeioch, Barpuntaig, Auchaleik, Inveryne, Kilfinan, Achinhay.
In 1794 Rev Alexander M’Farlane wrote for the Statistical Account:
The parish is divided by a small water that runs past the church … into 2 unequal parts. The southern division is called Kerriff or Kerry which … signifies a quarter or fourth part of any thing; and as it is by far the most extensive division, and the church standing upon it, the whole parish often goes by the name of the parish of the Kerry … The northern division is called Otter.
The implication of this statement seems to be that Otter was not part of the Kerry or quarter of Cowal. J Smith gave 178m for Kilfinan in his General View of the Agriculture of the County of Argyll, 1798. I find 183½m in the whole parish but perhaps only 143½m of this should be counted as Kerry proper. (In this case the true total for Kerry was probably 160m. Land-ownership to the west and south-west of Loch Ruel is not so well-documented in the public archives and it is quite possible that there are some missing merklands here).
It is certain that in Otter (which was a 40 merk unit) the exchange rate between ouncelands and merklands was 1 ounceland to 80 merks or 1d to 4 merks. The clearest indication of this comes in AS I (393) of 1659 where the 40m barony of Otter is laid out as 5 individual pennylands (each of which we also know was worth 4m) plus 2 more units of 4m and 2 units of 6m. The arithmetic makes certain that this was a 10d or 40m district. We also know that Auchagoyle was worth 1d or 4m. The evidence from other units of the parish is not so clear-cut but it seems probable that the whole parish of Kilfinan was 2½ ouncelands or 200 marklands). If we exclude Otter from Kerry then this would imply that Cowal as a whole was 8 ouncelands; if we include it then Cowal was 10 ouncelands.
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