Eynhallow

Eynhallow, the " Holy Island " from Old Norse Eyin Helga, is an uninhabited, 75 -acre island in the same sound ( Sound ) between The Mainland Orkney and Rousay. It reaches a height of 40 meters.

When the island in 1851 they conceded during an epidemic and wanted to make the building uninhabitable, it was found that, surprisingly, one of the houses was originally a church.

Eynhallow Church is located on the south side and is a building from the 12th century, which was used until the 16th century as a church, then as a residential and commercial buildings. It is probably the succession to an older monastery, to which the Orkney Inga Saga ( Chapter 97) refers. The well-known British architectural theorist and architect WR Lethaby, who have not yet preserved ruins in 1897 and went to the baustrukturellen condition described in detail, interpreted the found overall system as a monastery - a position that is no longer represented today. Rather, the remaining remnants of buildings and courtyard walls are interpreted as remnants of the subsequent use as a farm and residential buildings.

On the island there are 25 more registered ground monuments, including at Little Kyarl and Munkerness the foundations of two possible round houses. The information presented on the island Cairns ( NMRS Number: HY32NE 14 (The Grand) and HY32NE 30) are addressed medieval today as the earliest. So you are not prehistoric but of recent origin as a result of agricultural use of the island.

The former meaning the island is underlined by numerous legends. The peasants of the neighboring islands bring earth from the island, which is to protect their grain from vermin. A coming of Eynhollow stone was built into the house entrance.

Eynhallow houses one of the largest fulmar colonies of the British Isles.