The Highland houses of the eighteenth century were built for a completely different lifestyle from the one we enjoy today, and were in fact very practical. When building them people had to take account of the materials locally to hand and the climate that the house had to protect them from.
Not only by today’s standards, but even by the standards of many 18th century travellers, the Highlanders’ cottages were dark and dingy, dirty and full of smoke. All these things are true, and yet the design of the houses gave the maximum warmth and protection from the elements using the materials available to the people.
Highland Folk Village, Kingussie, showing the different 18th century village buildings
There were three main types of old Highland cottages. In the Hebrides the earliest houses were circular, and were known as beehive houses, but later more rectangular houses were built in this area. As the Hebrides do not have many trees, timber was precious, and so the houses were built with low drystone double walls, with a layer of sand between for insulation, and the corners of the rectangle were rounded. The frame of the roof was made of pairs of pieces of wood, the bottom part of which rested on the inner wall, the tops tied together. Along the tops of these was laid the roof tree. Heather rope or wooden pegs were used to join them together.
The wide tops of the walls formed a warm seat, dry and sheltered from the winds.
In more wooded areas on the mainland the houses were built higher with steeper rooves that the rain could run off, which required more wood, and in places like Skye the walls were single rather than double and the roof sprung from the top of the wall so that the thatch roof projected.
Above the wooden framework of the rooves was a layer of sods and then thatch, which could be of straw, moor grass, broom, rushes or bracken. Straw was the longest lasting, but as it was also livestock food, was not used unless there was an excess of it. Heather thatch was sometimes used, especially for churches. It is more durable than other sorts of thatching, but also much heavier and more likely to fall in when very wet.
Homes in the Highland Village – Highland Folk Museum, Kingussie
After the house had been thatched it was often secured with ropes weighed down with stones, to stop it blowing away. The thatching did not last for long and would be regularly replaced – usually every summer. The old thatch, imbued with peat from the fires inside the cottages, made excellent compost.
Not all the cottages had windows, as glass was an exotic product for the people. Those who did have glass often had tiny panes in the upper part of the window, and the lower part had wooden shutters, or leather covers. The doors were generally made of wood, including the door hinges, as iron was a luxury, and not used if another material would suffice. I refer to this in Book Five of the Jacobite Chronicles, Pursuit of Princes, when Kenneth charges the door of a hut, knocking it off its hinges, then later repairs it with a piece of wood.
The earlier cottages usually had a central fire around which people would sit on low stools. There was often a hole in the roof above (not directly over the fire, or the rain would put it out!) and the peat smoke would rise and find its way out of either the main hole or the gaps in the thatching. This helped to keep the thatch dry, but had the nasty side effect that when it rained, the water dripping periodically down into the home would be black from the accumulation of soot on the inside of the thatch.
Inside a cottage. Note the fire in the middle of the room
Later, hearths were built against the wooden partition separating the living room and bedroom, and sometimes the fire was raised from the floor by means of a grate made by a local blacksmith. These fireplaces would have a hanging chimney over them, which was a wide wooden hood above the hearth connected to a wooden flue. Later chimneys were built in the gable end.
Cooking was done on the fire, and the cooking pot was hung over the fire on an iron chain attached to a crosspiece in the roof. As iron was a luxury, the thickness of the chain told something of the status and wealth of the inhabitant.
Life literally revolved around the fire. Food was cooked on it, people sat round it to keep warm, and it provided light at night. In the dark nights of winter people would gather in one house for a ceilidh, and sing and tell stories while seated around the fire. In the west of the country the fire was never allowed to go out. In the evening the peat fire was smoored, and in the morning the still-red embers were kindled again. It was important that a fire was kept alight at all times; partly for warmth, but also to keep the atmosphere inside the house dry, which kept the sods of the roof also dry. Otherwise, if they got waterlogged they would collapse, bringing the roof down inside the house.
The floors were generally of hard beaten earth, but were sometimes sprinkled with sand, and sometimes cobbles or flags were used. People would put plaited grass or straw mats or rag rugs down too.
Partitions between the rooms did not usually reach the ceiling and were often made of rough boards with wide gaps between them, so privacy was not possible. Box beds did provide privacy in bed at least and the beds themselves were used as partitions.
Example of box beds.
There was virtually no privacy in Highlanders’ homes – several people if not the whole family lived and slept in the same room, and this was accepted. Many houses had three rooms – a cow byre, a living room and a sleeping room. The cows of the day were smaller than the ones we know now, weighing no more than 150kg, and they provided warmth to the house. In the vicious winter weather it was much easier to tend them if they were in the same building, and due to the lack of winter fodder, the cattle were more likely to survive if they did not have to fight the cold as well as hunger.
Byre for cattle in one of the houses
The lack of light in the houses was not the problem it would be to us – the Highlanders were renowned for their hardiness and imperviousness to cold and rain, and much of this was because of their way of life – they lived their lives in the main out of doors in a country not renowned for its hot sunny climate, going inside only to sleep, eat and in extreme weather.
The chiefs of the clans, I must add, did not generally live in the kinds of houses I’ve described here. The powerful ones lived in castles, although some of them lived in more homely houses. There is a tale of a chief of the MacGregors who lived in a house in the fifteenth century, where the poet bands went to feast and drink wine. It was described as narrow, but never too crowded, and was lit by many wax candles.
Tacksman’s house. One of the most important people, so the quality of his house reflects this.
I must end this blog by saying I learnt an awful lot about the houses and the Highlanders’ way of life from visiting the excellent Highland Folk Museum at Kingussie, which has a complete township rebuilt there, and very friendly and informative staff members. Anyone interested in knowing more about the Highlanders’ way of life in the past would do well to visit! All of my pictures in this blog were taken on my visit there.
