Rabbit Islands

(Eilean nan Gaill)

A historical perspective, drawn from the Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland: A Survey of Scottish Topography, Statistical, Biographical and Historical, edited by Francis H. Groome and originally published in parts by Thomas C. Jack, Grange Publishing Works, Edinburgh between 1882 and 1885.

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Rabbit Islands, three islets of Tongue parish, Sutherland, in the mouth of Tongue Bay. The two largest rise to a height of 100 feet, and all three have a sandy soil covered with verdure. They take their name from being occupied by swarms of rabbits, but they were anciently designated Eilean-na-Gaeil. signifying the island of strangers; and they are said to have got that name from having been a landing place of the Danes. They enclose good anchorage for ships of any burden.—Ord. Sur., sh. 114, 1880.

An accompanying 19th C. Ordnance Survey map is available, or use the map tab to the right of this page.

Note: This text has been made available using a process of scanning and optical character recognition. Despite manual checking, some typographical errors may remain. Please remember this description dates from the 1880s; names may have changed, administrative divisions will certainly be different and there are known to be occasional errors of fact in the original text, which we have not corrected because we wish to maintain its integrity. This information is provided subject to our standard disclaimer