Category: storytelling
The house of many hearths: Fireside stories from Glencoe
During our 2024 and 2025 seasons excavating at the township of Achnacon we uncovered a large turf-walled house. Within the structure three hearths were identified, one within a stone setting flush with the floor surface and close to the Northern gable wall, another in the structure’s centre within a pit sealed with a cauldron fragment…
Digging for Britain!
You can check out some of the findings from our 2024 and 2025 seasons at Achnacon on Digging for Britain now via BBC IPlayer. Their team joined us this summer to explore our exciting findings which shed new light on life before and after the Glencoe Massacre of 1692. Tori from Digging for Britain, does…
The Tarbh Uisge of Loch Achtriachtan: Fireside stories from Glencoe
A film by Lív Brownlie, Lauren Blackburn, Beatrice Sumner, and Alex Thomson, with contributions from Rhiannon Bramham and Mara Campbell. In the middle of Glencoe, at the foot of the three sisters, beside the white cottage at Achnambeithach, is Loch Achtriachtan. This loch presumably took its name after the township of Achtriachtan, where the remains…
Big Archie and the Stranger: Fireside stories from Glencoe
A story by Prof Michael Given The great thing about having a fire in the middle of the room is that you can sit round it. Everyone gets a share of the warmth, and no one is closer than anyone else. The wattled panels cover the turf walls on all sides, the couples stand proud…
The Chief’s coin pot: Fireside stories from Glencoe
A story by Dr Edward Stewart Alisdair Mac Alisdair Ruadh (‘Alexander son of red-haired Alexander‘) Chief of the MacIain MacDonalds of Glencoe. The chief, an old man now, sits by the fire on a chair carved of hewn oak staves, carved when the chief was but his fathers heir, and polished with age and wear.…
Glencoe digital team – poetry in the landscape
While out in Achnacon today, we visited multiple locations each with a very different presence due to their different uses. Recording the sounds of the landscape made us think about the different soundscapes that would have filled the glen throughout history. From the 17th and 18th century when different settlements would have been filled with…