Loch Arkaig & Glen Loy Summary

Loch Arkaig & Glen Loy

 

Principal Sources

 

RMS II (1243) 1476

RMS III (533) 1527-8, (3015) 1544 – confirming charter of 1505

RMS IV (704) 1552, (854) 1553, (2438) 1574-5

RSS II (2994) 1539

AS I (606) 1675

 

Inverness Retours (21) 1608, (26) 1615, (41) 1623, (86) 1661, (118) 1695

Mackintosh Muniments pp 10, 17, 54

 

D Bruce’s rental of Lochiel 1748-9 in E768/1 & E768/2/1(1)

M Campbell’s rental of Lochiel 1755 in E768/2/5/1 & E768/2/4

E768/56/1(1) Rental of Lochiel 1770

E768/56/3(1) Rental of Lochiel 1774

E786/50 – Lochiel, Callart & Ardsheall : Plans & Estimates 1774

RHP 6591

RHP 11608 – Plan of Road from Loch Nevis to Achnacarry, G Brown, 1796

RHP 22810 – J Anderson, 1825

RHP 22811 – J Anderson, 1825

R Pringle, State of the Process of Valuation of … Lochiell, 1761, MS copy in West Highland Museum

W Morison, Report on … Annexed Estate of Lochiel, 1772, copy in Fort William Library

J Munro (ed), The Lochiel Inventory, Edinburgh, 2000, p 32, p 81, p105, p 110

1. Fraser-Mackintosh, Celtic Magazine XIII p 468, Rental 1642

 

 

The lands of Glen Loy and Loch Arkaig were apparently granted to the Mackintosh family as early as 1336. (Munro ALI, No 4 p 4). We have a reference to:

 una davata cum dimidia de Locharkage

(1½ davachs (30d) of Loch Arkaig, RW Munro, ALI No 7 pp 10-11, dated 1346 x 1372-3).

 

Munro No 86 (p 137), also offers a reference, dated 1464, to the ‘lands of Glenluy, Stronchur and the Davoch of Locharkaig’. (Glen Loy, excluding Strone, was about 10d, Strone was 2d which, with the davach (20d) of Loch Arkaig would total c. 32d).

See also Munro, ALI pp 197-9 1492/5

 

In Celtic Magazine XIII p 468 Fraser-Mackintosh listed the possessors of ‘Glenlui’ and both sides of Loch Arkaig in 1642. The values are all in pennylands and total 51d or 52d. He also lists some other names which he thinks may have taken the total to 60d or 40m – which he thought was the total valuation. Certainly the lands of Glen Loy and Loch Arkaig were often referred to as a 40m land (RMS III 533 of 1527-8, RSS II 2994 of 1539, Lochiel Inventory p 32 & p 105).

 

The problem is that by analogy with the lands of Glengarry to the north (20d=20m) and also by comparison with the lands of Lochiel to the south, we would expect 60d to be equal to 60m and not 40m. I find totals of 46⅞ m and 52½d which suggest figures of 60d and 60m. The merkland valuations are generally later than the 1642 pennyland rental and quite probably suffered from more attrition. Overall I think that Glen Loy and the two sides of Loch Arkaig came to 3 davachs or ouncelands (=60d) and that the exchange rate between ouncelands and merklands was here 1:20.