Roskeen
Associated Chapels: Seapal-dail a'Mhic' {NH 642728}; Obsdale {NH 665699}; Clach Seipeil Odhair {NH 682750}.
Parish Church: OS Ref: NGR NH 689693 H.E.S. No: NH66NE 13 Dedication: St Ninian
The church, apparently dedicated to St Ninian, seems to have originally stood at Noinikil (Gael. Neo' na Cille 'glebe of the church') a short way from the coast, where its ruins still remain. The the site seems to have been afterwards changed to Roskeen nearer the coast, where the present church was built in 1832. There are still two glebes, one beside each church. However, the St Ninian derivation is impossible and so, therefore, is the dedication. St Ninian is nowhere commemorated in Ross. [Watson (1865), p.lxiii]
This parish was conjoined with that of Newnakle by at least 1274. Their union may have taken place when the Chapter of Ross was re-constituted c.1255/6, at which time they certainly became prebendal churches. However, there are occasions when we find individuals endowed with one or other church only, whereas at other times we find reference to the single prebend of Roskeen and Newnale. Also, on occasion, the same canon was endowed with both prebends. This is a curious situation, not often encountered in the northern dioceses. It would appear that there was a measure of fluidity with respect to the allocation of the fruits of these two churches. Matters are not helped because there is no material proof of their erection into prebendal churches until 1362, when both parsonage and vicarage fruits are annexed and this situation remains so until the time of the Reformation. The cure was served by a single vicar pensioner who attended to the needs of both churches.
A little to the east of the derelict parish church of 1832, but possibly close to the site of the medieval church, there is a 17th-century burial vault of the family of Munro of Newmore and Culrain. George Munro, 1st of Culrain, was the third son of George Munro, 1st of Newmore, who himself was a royalist soldier of the 17th-century and a cadet of the Munro of Obsdale family. A burial enclosure dated 1675 lies to the east.
Near to the church is a 7th-century, Class 1, Pictish symbol stone which is known as Clach a'Mheirlich "The Thief's Stone" {NH 681690}.
