INVERNESS, royal burgh, seaport and county town, In verness-shire, Scotland. Pop. (1931) 22,582. It lies on the Ness. It is an important railway centre, 118 m. N. of Perth by the L.M.S.R. Owing to its situation at the north-east of Glen More, the beauty of its environment and its fine buildings, it is held to be the capital of the Highlands ; and in summer it is visited by many tourists. The present castle dates from 1835, and stands on the site of the ancient fortress, blown up by the Jacobites in 1746. Of the churches, the High or Parish church has a tower containing one of the bells which Cromwell removed from Fortrose cathedral. On the left bank of the river stands St. Andrew's Episcopal Cathedral, erected in 1866. Public buildings include a library and museum, with a collection of Jacobean relics, in Castle Wynd. In front of the Town Hall (1882) stands the Forbes memorial fountain, and near it is the old town cross of 1685; at the foot of the latter, protected since the great fire of 141I, is the famous stone called Clach-na-Cudain (Stone of the Tubs), from its having served as a resting-place for women carrying water from the river. The old gaol spire, slightly twisted by the earthquake of 1816, serves as a belfry for the town clock.
Half a mile to the west of the Ness is the hill of Tomnahurich (Gaelic, "The Hill of the Fairies"). The open spaces include Vic toria park; the Ness islands, connected by a bridge with the mainland ; and the ground where the Northern Meeting—the most important athletic gathering in Scotland—is held.
Inverness is the great distributing centre for the Highlands, and the annual sheep and wool market is well known. Petroleum is the largest import. Its industries, however, are not extensive, and consist mainly of tweed manufactures, brewing, distilling, nurseries, saw-mills, granite works, an iron foundry and railway shops. There is some shipbuilding and a considerable trade with Aberdeen, Leith, London and the east coast generally. The Cale donian Canal passes within 1 m. of the town on its western side. In Muirtown Basin are wharves and at Clachnaharry the Canal enters Beauly firth. The harbour, formed by the mouth of the Ness, covers about three acres. There are piers and a breakwater at Kessock at the river mouth, with excellent anchorage and a slipway at the junction of the Ness with the Firth. The river at Inverness is crossed by four bridges and a railway viaduct.
Inverness was one of the chief strongholds of the Picts, and in 565 was visited by Columba with the intention of converting the Pictish king Brude, who is supposed to have resided in the vitrified fort on Craig Phadrick, I z m. W. of the town. The castle is said to have been built by Malcolm Canmore, after he had razed the castle in which Macbeth according to tradition murdered Duncan. William the Lion (d. 1214) granted the town four charters, by one of which it was created a royal burgh. Of the Dominican abbey founded by Alexander III. in 1233 hardly a trace remains. On his way to the battle of Harlaw in 1411 Donald of the Isles burned the town, and 16 years later James I. held a parliament in the castle to which the northern chieftains were summoned, of whom three were executed for as serting an independent sovereignty. The house in which Queen Mary lived in 2562, when denied admittance to the castle, stands in Bridge street. At the north end of the town Cromwell built a large fort, but with the exception of a portion of the ramparts it was demolished at the Restoration.
highland county, Scotland, bounded north by Ross and Cromarty, and the Beauly and Moray firths, north-east by the shires of Nairn and Elgin, east by Banff and Aberdeen shires, south-east by Perthshire, south by Argyllshire and west by the Atlantic. It includes the Outer Hebrides south of the northern boundary of Harris, and several of the Inner Hebrides and is the largest shire in Scotland. Its area (excluding water) is 2,695,094 ac., of which more than one-third belongs to the islands. The county comprises the districts of Moidart, Arisaig and Morar in the south-west, Knoydart in the west, Lochaber in the south, Badenoch in the south-east and the Aird in the north. Excepting comparatively small and fertile tracts in the north on both sides of the river Ness, in several of the glens and on the shores of some of the sea lochs, the county is wild and mountainous and the scenery is very beautiful. There are more than so mountains exceeding 3,00o ft., among them Ben Nevis (4,406), the highest mountain in the British Isles, the extraordi nary assemblage of peaks forming the Monadhliadh mountains in the south-east, Ben Alder (3,757) in the south, and the group of the Cairngorms on the confines of the shires of Aberdeen and Banff. Almost the whole mainland part of the county is occupied by the younger highland schists and metamorphic rocks, with many isolated patches of granite, of which the largest is on the eastern boundary, including Cairngorm. Athwart the county from south-west to north-east strikes Glen More, the Great Glen, or Glen More-nan-Albin, an old fault or line of earth-fracture along which displacements have occurred during more than one geologi cal period. It contains Loch Lochy and Loch Ness, and through it was constructed the Caledonian canal (q.v.). Only in the north east of the shire, and extending up Glen More midway along Loch Ness, does the Old Red Sandstone replace the typical high land rocks. (On the islands, see HEBRIDES and SKYE.) Rivers and Lakes.—In the north-west the Beauly river (16 m.) is formed by the confluence of the Farrar and the Glass. The Enrick (18 m.), rising in Loch-nan-Eun falls into Loch Ness, just beyond Drumnadrochit. The Ness (7 m.), emerges from Loch Dochfour and enters the sea to the north of Inverness. The Moriston (19 m.) flows out of Loch Clunie and falls into Loch Ness 4 m. south of Mealfourvounie (2,284 feet). The Lochy (9 m.), issuing from the loch of that name, runs parallel with the Caledonian canal and enters Loch Linnhe at Fort William. The Spean (18 m.), flowing westwards from Loch Lag gan, joins the Lochy as it leaves Loch Lochy. The Nevis m.), rising at the back of Ben Nevis, enters Loch Linnhe at Fort William. The Leven (12 m.) drains a series of small lochs to the north-west of Rannoch, and the Dulnain (28 m.), rising in the Monadhliadh mountains, enters the Spey near Grantown, falling in its course nearly 2,000 ft. The Truim (151 m.), rising close to the Perthshire frontier, flows into the Spey. Three of the larger rivers of Inverness-shire finish their course in other counties. These are the Spey, which for the first 6o m. of its course belongs to the shire ; the Findhorn (7o m.), rising in the Monadhliadh mountains a few miles north-west of the source of the Dulnain; and the Nairn (38 m.), rising within a few miles of Loch Farraline. The two falls of Foyers are celebrated for their beauty, but their volume is affected, especially in drought, by the withdrawal of water for electric power works derived from the river Foyers. Other noted falls are Moral on the Enrick and Kilmorack on the Beauly.
There are many hill tarns and little lakes, considerably more than 200 being named. Loch Ness, the most beautiful and best known, is 221 m. long, m. broad at its widest point and 751 ft. deep. It is the largest body of fresh water in Great Britain, and forms part of the scheme of the Caledonian canal. Loch Oich (4 m. long) and Loch Lochy (91 m.) also form portions of the canal. Loch Arkaig (12 m.) lies in the country of the Camerons, Achnacarry house, the seat of Lochiel, the chief of the clan, being situated on the river Arkaig near the point where it issues from the lake. The old castle was burnt down by the duke of Cumberland, but a few ruins remain. Loch Quoich (6 m.) lies north by west of Loch Arkaig, and Loch Garry (42 m.) a few miles to the north east ; Loch Morar (I 11 m. long by 12 broad) is only about 600 yd. from the sea, to which it drains by the river Morar, which falls over a rocky barrier. The loch is 1,017 ft. deep and is thus the deepest in the United Kingdom. Loch Ericht, partly in Perth shire, is 141 m. long and lies at a height of 1,153 ft., being thus the highest lake of such large size in Great Britain. It is finely situ ated in wild highland country at the foot of Ben Alder. Loch Lag gan (7 m.) and Loch Treig (51 m.) in the south are situated in the midst of natural forests. The principal salt-water lochs on the Atlantic seaboard are Loch Hourn ("Hell's Lake," so named from the wild precipices rising sheer from the water), running inland for 14 m. from the Sound of Sleat and separating Glenelg from Knoydart ; and Loch Nevis (14 m.), a few miles farther south.
The parallel roads of Glen Roy, a glen with a north-easterly to south-westerly trend, a few miles east of Loch Lochy, presented a problem that long exercised geologists. At heights of 1,148 ft.,
1,067 ft. and 835 ft., there run uninterruptedly along each side of the glen terraces of a width varying from 3 to 3o feet. They are now generally taken to be the gently sloping banks of lakes dammed up at different levels successively by glacier ice. Further evidences of glacial action are abundant in many places, in the form of roches moutonnees, striations, moraines, etc. At several points on the coasts remains of old marine terraces are seen at Ioo and 25 ft. above present sea-level.
Among the finer glens are Glen Urquhart and Glen Moriston to the west of Loch Ness, Glen Feshie in the east, and Glen Nevis at the southern base of Ben Nevis. Glen Garry, to the west of Loch Oich, gave its name to the well-known cap or "bonnet" worn both in the Highlands and Lowlands. In Glen Finnan, at the head of Loch Shiel, Prince Charles Edward raised his standard in The great straths or valleys are in the north and east, the chief among them being Strathfarrar, Strathglass and Strathnairn, and the heads of Strathearn and Strathspey.
History.—To the north of the boundary hills of the present counties of Argyll and Perth (beyond which the Romans at tempted no occupation) the country was occupied in Roman times by the Picts. The territory was afterwards called the prov ince of Moray, and extended from the Spey and Loch Lochy to Caithness. These limits it retained until the i 7th century, when Caithness (in 1617), Sutherland (in 1633) and Ross-shire (in 1660 were successively detached. Towards the end of the 6th century Columba undertook the conversion of the Picts, himself baptizing their king, Brude, at Inverness; but paganism died hard and tribal wars prevented progress. In the 11th century, after the death of Duncan, Scotland was divided between Macbeth and the Norwegian leader Thorfinn, who took for his share the land peopled by the northern Picts. Malcolm Canmore, avenging his father, defeated and slew Macbeth (1o57), and at a later date reduced the country and annexed it to the kingdom of Scotland. Insurrections continued until the reign of David I., when colonists of noble birth were settled in various parts of the shire. After the battle of Largs (1263) the Norse yoke was thrown off. In 1300 Edward I.'s expedition to Scotland passed through the northern districts, his army laying siege to Urquhart and Beaufort castles. After the plantation the clan system gradually developed and attained in the shire its fullest power, the chief being the Frasers, Chisholms, Grants, Camerons, Chattan, Macdonalds of the Isles, Clanranald Macdonalds and Macleods. The clans were constantly fighting each other, or their sovereigns.
In many quarters the Protestant movement made no headway, the clansmen remaining steadfast to the older creed. At the era of the Covenant, Montrose conducted a campaign in the interests of the royalists, gaining a brilliant victory at Inverlochy (1645), but the effects of his crusade were speedily neutralized by the equally masterly strategy of Cromwell. Next Episcopacy appeared to be securing a foothold, until Viscount Dundee fell at Killie crankie, that battle being followed by a defeat of the Highlanders at Cromdale in 169o. The futile rising headed by Mar in 1715 led to a combined effort to hold the clans in check. Forts were constructed at Inverness, Kilchumin (Fort Augustus) and Kil mallie (Fort William) ; Wade's famous roads—exhibiting at many points notable examples of engineering—enabled the king's soldiers rapidly to scour the country, and general disarming was required.
Prince Charles Edward's attempt in 1745 had the effect of bring ing most of the clans together for a while; but the clan system was broken up after his failure and escape. Heritable jurisdictions were abolished. Even the wearing of the Highland dress was pro scribed. The effects of this policy were soon evident. Many of the chieftains became embarrassed, their estates were sold, and the glensfolk, impoverished but high-spirited, sought homes in Canada and the United States As time passed and passion abated, a proposal to raise several Highland regiments for the British army was entertained with surprising favour, among the regiments then enrolled being the 79th Cameron Highlanders. Fort George, afterward the depot of the Seaforth Highlanders, 12 m. N.E. of Inverness, was begun in 1748.
Stone axes and other weapons or tools have been dug up in the peat, and prehistoric jewellery has also been found. Lake dwellings occur in Loch Lundy in Glengarry and on Loch Beauly, and stone circles are numerous, as .at Inches, Clava, and in the valley of the Ness. Pictish towers or brochs are met with in Glenbeg (Glenelg), and duns (forts) in the Aird and to the west and south west of Beauly and elsewhere. Among vitrified forts the principal are those on Craig Phadrick, Dundbhairdghall in Glen Nevis, Dun Fionn or Fingal's fort on the Beauly, near Kilmorack, Achterawe in Glengarry and in Arisaig.