St Maelrubha

One cannot study the history of the Early Church in Alba without spending some time taking in the accounts of St Maelrubha. His influence was felt most strongly on the west coast but there are dedications in the north east which indicate the great extent of his influence.

On his father's side Maelrubha was eighth in descent from the famous Niall of the Nine Hostages, King of Ireland, and through his mother he belonged to the kindred of St Congal of Bangor. He was born on 3rd January 642 AD, probably in the south-east part of what is now Londonderry. After residing for some time in the monastery at Bangor, he embarked for Scotland in 671 AD.

His early missionary enterprises were concentrated in districts now included in Argyll, planting churches at Kilarrow in Islay,¹ and on the mainland at Killarow in the modern Killean and Kilchenzie parish;² Kilmory, now Strathlachlan parish;³ and Kilmorrie near Dunstaffnage Castle.⁴

In 673AD St Maelrubha arrived at Apercrossan, now Applecross, in Ross-shire, and made it the nucleus of his Christian missionary work throughout that part of the west coast and eastwards as far as the shores of the North Sea. He continued to be the abb of the muinntir for an incredible fifty-one years and died on 21st April 722AD. The privileged ground around the monastery, its garth or sanctuary, extended six miles in all directions and came to be known in the Gaelic as A'Chomraich, i.e. the sanctuary, a name still applied in the Highlands to the present parish of Applecross. Not surprisingly, Maelrubha was considered to be, "the patron of all the coast, from Applecross to Loch Broom."

Traditions in the Black Isle tell us that St Maelrubha was martyred in the parish of Urquhart and that his body was carried back to Applecross for interment. According to another tradition, he was killed by Scandinavian pirates in Strathnaver in Sutherland, and was buried at a spot close to the river Naver, about nine miles from its mouth. It is said that the spot was marked by a rough stone bearing an incised cross. You have to make your choices in these matters but personally, I favour the Strathnaver version of the story.

The churches of Forres in Moray and Fordyce in Banffshire were dedicated to St Laurence and St Talarican respectively but, since there was, in each of these parishes, a fair - known as Samareve's in the former,and New Summaruff's in the latter - the reader might conclude that there must have been some dedication to St Maelrubha in both parishes. There was also a Samarive's Fair in the parish of Keith, whose church was under the invocation of Maelrubha, giving the township its ancient name of 'Kethmalruf'. These are possible exaamples of old "Celtic dedications" being supplanted with new dedications which were more acceptable to the medieval Church as it became more Roman in its outlook.

The community at Applecross played a major rôle in the advent of Christianity in the north and north-west of Scotland. It acted, in those parts, in the same way that Iona did in Dalriada and the western isles. It is not surprising to find that its influence spread as far as the north east.

 

Above: Can you wonder that Maelrubha and his colleagues chose Applecross to found a muinntir!