Ullinish is a crofting township

Croft (land)

A croft is a fenced or enclosed area of land, usually small and arable with a crofter's dwelling thereon. A crofter is one who has tenure and use of the land, typically as a tenant farmer.- Etymology :...

 on Loch Bracadale

Loch Bracadale

Loch Bracadale is a sea loch on the west coast of Skye in Scotland.Loch Bracadale and its associated inner lochs - Harport, Vatten, Caroy, Bharcasaig, na Faolinn and Loch Beag - form one of the largest areas of semi-enclosed inshore waters around the Skye coast. The shallow waters are exploited for...

, on the southwest coast of Skye

Skye

Skye or the Isle of Skye is the largest and most northerly island in the Inner Hebrides of Scotland. The island's peninsulas radiate out from a mountainous centre dominated by the Cuillin hills...

, Scotland

Scotland

Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...

. The only promontory fort

Promontory fort

A promontory fort is a defensive structure located above a steep cliff, often only connected to the mainland by a small neck of land, thus utilizing the topography to reduce the ramparts needed. Although their dating is problematic, most seem to date to the Iron Age...

 on Skye is located at Ullinish. It is situated to the west of Struan

Struan

Struan is a small village situated on the west coast of the island of Skye, on the shores of Loch Beag, itself an inlet of Loch Harport. "Struan" is the anglicized form of the Scottish Gaelic word sruthan, meaning "small stream", or the flow at the point where a spring appears.It has a...

 and just south of the hamlet of Ebost. Historically, Ullinish is associated with the MacLeod family. Of literary note, Samuel Johnson

Samuel Johnson

Samuel Johnson , often referred to as Dr. Johnson, was an English author who made lasting contributions to English literature as a poet, essayist, moralist, literary critic, biographer, editor and lexicographer...

's views and denunciation of James Macpherson

James Macpherson

James Macpherson was a Scottish writer, poet, literary collector and politician, known as the "translator" of the Ossian cycle of poems.-Early life:...

's Ossian

Ossian

Ossian is the narrator and supposed author of a cycle of poems which the Scottish poet James Macpherson claimed to have translated from ancient sources in the Scots Gaelic. He is based on Oisín, son of Finn or Fionn mac Cumhaill, anglicised to Finn McCool, a character from Irish mythology...

were confirmed while Johnson was in Ullinish.

Etymology

The name Ullinish is from Old Norse

Old Norse

Old Norse is a North Germanic language that was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and inhabitants of their overseas settlements during the Viking Age, until about 1300....

, and means "promontory of the wolves". In Gaelic, it is sometimes spelt as Uilinis or Uilbhinis.

Geography

Located on the Inner Hebrides

Inner Hebrides

The Inner Hebrides is an archipelago off the west coast of Scotland, to the south east of the Outer Hebrides. Together these two island chains form the Hebrides, which enjoy a mild oceanic climate. There are 36 inhabited islands and a further 43 uninhabited Inner Hebrides with an area greater than...

, Ullinish lies on a small peninsula, with a bog

Bog

A bog, quagmire or mire is a wetland that accumulates acidic peat, a deposit of dead plant material—often mosses or, in Arctic climates, lichens....

gy moorland

Moorland

Moorland or moor is a type of habitat, in the temperate grasslands, savannas, and shrublands biome, found in upland areas, characterised by low-growing vegetation on acidic soils and heavy fog...

 ending at Ullinish Point. Loch Caroy is situated between Ullinish Point and Harlosh Island

Harlosh Island

Harlosh Island is an island in Loch Bracadale just off the coast of the Minginish and Harlosh peninsulas of Skye in Scotland.The island is about in extent and the coastline, which is largely cliff-lined, has a cave on the west coast. At low tide it is only about from mainland Skye...

. The small tidal island

Tidal island

A tidal island is a piece of land that is connected to the mainland by a natural or man-made causeway that is exposed at low tide and submerged at high tide. Because of the mystique surrounding tidal islands many of them have been sites of religious worship, such as Mont Saint Michel with its...

 of Oronsay

Oronsay, Inner Hebrides

Oronsay , also sometimes spelt and pronounced Oransay by the local community, is a small tidal island south of Colonsay in the Scottish Inner Hebrides with an area of just over two square miles....

 is joined to Ullinish Point at low tide, and separated by a breakwater

Breakwater (structure)

Breakwaters are structures constructed on coasts as part of coastal defence or to protect an anchorage from the effects of weather and longshore drift.-Purposes of breakwaters:...

.

The town is overlooked by the low, basalt

Basalt

Basalt is a common extrusive volcanic rock. It is usually grey to black and fine-grained due to rapid cooling of lava at the surface of a planet. It may be porphyritic containing larger crystals in a fine matrix, or vesicular, or frothy scoria. Unweathered basalt is black or grey...

 cliffs of the Cuillin Hills

Cuillin

This article is about the Cuillin of Skye. See Rùm for the Cuillin of Rùm.The Cuillin are a range of rocky mountains located on the Isle of Skye in Scotland. The true Cuillin are also known as the Black Cuillin to distinguish them from the Red Hills across Glen Sligachan...

, and MacLeod's Table

Healabhal Bheag

Healabhal Bheag is a hill located on the Duirinish peninsula of Skye in the Inner Hebrides. It is also known as MacLeod's Table South and is part of the prominent pair of peaks known as MacLeod's Tables that dominate the views to the west of Dunvegan and to the north of the Harlosh peninsula....

. Knock Ullinish is a small hill east of Ullinish.

Fauna and flora

The Common Teal

Common Teal

The Eurasian Teal or Common Teal is a common and widespread duck which breeds in temperate Eurasia and migrates south in winter. The Eurasian Teal is often called simply the Teal due to being the only one of these small dabbling ducks in much of its range...

 nest in Ullinish. Other avifauna include the Common Raven

Common Raven

The Common Raven , also known as the Northern Raven, is a large, all-black passerine bird. Found across the northern hemisphere, it is the most widely distributed of all corvids...

, Long-eared Owl

Long-eared Owl

The Long-eared Owl - Asio otus is a species of owl which breeds in Europe, Asia, and North America. This species is a part of the larger grouping of owls known as typical owls, family Strigidae, which contains most species of owl...

, Hen Harrier

Hen Harrier

The Hen Harrier or Northern Harrier is a bird of prey. It breeds throughout the northern parts of the northern hemisphere in Canada and the northernmost USA, and in northern Eurasia. This species is polytypic, with two subspecies. Marsh Hawk is a historical name for the American form.It migrates...

, Merlin

Merlin (bird)

The Merlin is a small species of falcon from the Northern Hemisphere. A bird of prey once known colloquially as a pigeon hawk in North America, the Merlin breeds in the northern Holarctic; some migrate to subtropical and northern tropical regions in winter.-European and North American...

, Osprey

Osprey

The Osprey , sometimes known as the sea hawk or fish eagle, is a diurnal, fish-eating bird of prey. It is a large raptor, reaching more than in length and across the wings...

, Black Grouse

Black Grouse

The Black Grouse or Blackgame is a large bird in the grouse family. It is a sedentary species, breeding across northern Eurasia in moorland and bog areas near to woodland, mostly boreal...

, and Bar-tailed Godwit

Bar-tailed Godwit

The Bar-tailed Godwit is a large wader in the family Scolopacidae, which breeds on Arctic coasts and tundra mainly in the Old World, and winters on coasts in temperate and tropical regions of the Old World...

.

Landmarks

The largest building in the area is the Ullinish Country Lodge, a historic hotel which contains six rooms. Originally a farmhouse, it was built in 1757. The building is sheltered by a small brae

Brae

Brae is a settlement on the mainland of the Shetland Islands in Scotland. It is located at the northeast end of Busta Voe, on the narrow isthmus that separates the mainland from Northmavine...

 and surrounded on three sides by loch

Loch

Loch is the Irish and Scottish Gaelic word for a lake or a sea inlet. It has been anglicised as lough, although this is pronounced the same way as loch. Some lochs could also be called a firth, fjord, estuary, strait or bay...

s. James Boswell

James Boswell

James Boswell, 9th Laird of Auchinleck was a lawyer, diarist, and author born in Edinburgh, Scotland; he is best known for the biography he wrote of one of his contemporaries, the English literary figure Samuel Johnson....

 and Doctor Johnson stayed in the farmhouse between September 21–23, 1773 during their famous literary tour of the Hebrides

Hebrides

The Hebrides comprise a widespread and diverse archipelago off the west coast of Scotland. There are two main groups: the Inner and Outer Hebrides. These islands have a long history of occupation dating back to the Mesolithic and the culture of the residents has been affected by the successive...

, documented in The Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides

The Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides

The Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides with Samuel Johnson, LL.D. is a travel journal by Scotsman James Boswell first published in 1785. In 1773, Boswell enticed his English friend Samuel Johnson to accompany him on a tour through the highlands and western islands of Scotland. Johnson was then in...

that was published in 1775. While in Ullinish, Johnson's views and denunciation of Macpherson's Ossian were confirmed. Here, too, Boswell remarked that the mountain view reminded him of those seen in Corsica

Corsica

Corsica is an island in the Mediterranean Sea. It is located west of Italy, southeast of the French mainland, and north of the island of Sardinia....

. After two nights in Ullinish, they departed by boat for Talisker

Talisker

Talisker is an Island Single Malt Scotch whisky produced by the Talisker Distillery, Carbost, Scotland; the only distillery on the Isle of Skye. The distillery is operated by United Distillers and Vintners for Diageo, and is marketed as part of their Classic Malts series...

.

Remains of a chambered cairn

Cairn

Cairn is a term used mainly in the English-speaking world for a man-made pile of stones. It comes from the or . Cairns are found all over the world in uplands, on moorland, on mountaintops, near waterways and on sea cliffs, and also in barren desert and tundra areas...

 consisting of a denuded

Denudation

In geology, denudation is the long-term sum of processes that cause the wearing away of the earth’s surface leading to a reduction in elevation and relief of landforms and landscapes...

 circle of boulders are found just north of the lodge. Also of archaeological interest is a partly destroyed Earth house

Earth house

An earth house is an architectural style characterized by the use of natural terrain to help form the walls of a house. An earth house is usually set partially into the ground and covered with thin growth...

 on the east side of the northern extremity of Knock Ullinish.

Notable people

• Sergeant Donald McLeod
  Donald McLeod
  Donald McLeod was an Australian politician. Born in Strathmerton, Victoria, he received a primary education before serving in the military 1914-18. He returned as a soldier settler to Gringegalgona. In 1940, he was elected to the Australian House of Representatives as the Labor member for Wannon...
  
   (June 20, 1688-?)
• Mary MacLeod
• Sheriff Alexander MacLeod, one of the first sheriffs in Skye

External links

• Official site of Ullinish Country Lodge