Beehive Dwellings of the Hebrides - Book Review

Note: I will be pausing the blog until May, when I hope to be able to share the stories of some new Hebridean adventures. 

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The following review of Beehive Dwellings of the Hebrides appeared in the Stornoway Gazette. The review was written by Frank Rennie, who has allowed me to reproduce it here. The book can be purchased via the following link:  Beehive Dwellings of the Hebrides

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Stornoway Gazette, August 29, 2021

There sometimes appears a book that you return to again and again, browsing the pages to discover (and re-discover) the delights of the contents. This is one of those books. This is a book for armchair reading that will inspire you to check the weather forecast and look out your old walking boots, because you will want to investigate for yourself the gems listed in these pages. There has been very little written about the beehive structures of the Hebrides, and much of what has been published is in a format of academic writing that may capture the details, but often lacks the excitement and the essence of exploring these buildings in their natural landscape. This book by Marc Calhoun does both, superbly. At 260 pages of large format text and beautifully illustrated with 285 colour photographs, plus diagrams, and orientation sketch maps, this is undoubtedly the most comprehensive, and the most readable, account of the beehives yet produced. It is not a small, pocket-sized publication, but rather a well-documented account to spread out on your lap in your favourite armchair and savour the planning of innumerable journeys to view the locations for yourself.

The text is written in an easy, informal style, but it takes the reader along on the journey of the expeditions and explorations of his 20+ years of visiting these strange structures. The beehive dwellings get their name from the curious domed structure of their dry-stone construction, like small, rounded, dumps of stone on the landscape of the moor and hill. In reality, they were used for several different purposes, from small summer shielings to storage rooms, or as cells of the early Celtic clerics, and possibly even some of them as the homes of the earliest hunter-gathering communities to settle in these islands. All of this contributes to a rich heritage in stone that, although resilient in its building components, is fragile in its construction and even more tenuous in its recorded history. In Lewis, Harris, and North Uist, in the scattered islands of the Inner Hebrides and the outliers of the far northwest, the author has visited, catalogued, and described a hundred or so beehive structures, giving each a short text accompanied by a precise grid reference and map description, and where relevant the identification number in the Canmore archaeological archive.

You may be surprised to find that you can write so much about such simple ruins, but you would be mistaken. If you know the region at all, you will want to turn to your favourite location(s) (the list is presented geographically) and study how to find the beehives in that area, (if there are any, for these are uncommon relics of the past). There is a fair chance that, unless you have prior knowledge, you may have walked close by a tumbled-down beehive without realising it. If you are not familiar with the off-road parts of these islands, but you like walking and you have even a passing interest in heritage or archaeology, then you will likely next reach for your collection of OS maps to prepare for your next walking trip.

One of the beauties of this publication is that not only is it the most comprehensive account to date of the beehive dwellings over the whole range of the Inner and Outer Hebrides, (including a detailed appendix giving the sources of further archaeological and historical information on each area) but that the author has personally visited each location. His enthusiasm and dedication to charting the history and geographical distribution of these ancient buildings is evident throughout the book. The text is sprinkled with passing references to the appearance of a structure, or the views from the door, or simply a memory of a visit, and these anecdotes bring to life the discoveries. As you flip through the pages, the wonderful colour photographs highlight different aspects of interest (archaeological, architectural, and historical) and provide an important record of this aspect of our heritage that has generally been neglected (apart from the dry descriptions in old academic journals). The author has a word of caution about visiting some of these sites, because the dry-stone walls are sometimes precariously balanced after years of neglect, but the locations of most of them mean that we are unlikely to see a flood of visitors seeking to clamber over the remains. Part of the attraction in these buildings is also part of the reason that they were built, and why they have lasted intact for so long, namely that they are generally far from roads and villages. Simply getting to the sites (and being able to find the structure once you get there!) will require more than a little effort, and is a large part of the reward for that effort. If you are not able to trek the moor to see them in real life, this book, for the first time,  provides a satisfying proxy to enjoy the journey from your armchair.

This is a scholarly publication that is a pleasure to read simply for fun. I am dipping into it, in no particular order, and the multiple joys that this book contains are suggesting not one, but many day trips and island walks that will combine physical and mental stimulation in the outdoors during the coming months. This book will be available for consultation on my coffee table for quite some time before it gets archived on my bookshelf.

Marc Calhoun Beehive dwellings of the Hebrides: A photographic record.
Acair: Stornoway. ISBN 9-781-78907-077-4 £20.00