Abernethy, a Speyside parish of E Inverness-shire, till 1870 partly also in Elginshire. It contains the village of Nethybridge, which, standing on the right bank, and 1¼ mile above the mouth of the Nethy, here spanned by a bridge 84 feet long, has a post office (Abernethy) under Grantown, an inn, and a station on the Great North of Scotland, 4½ miles SSW of Grantown, 28½ SW of Craigellachie, 96½ W by N of Aberdeen, 4¾ ENE of Boat of Garden, and 93¼ N by W of Perth.
The parish comprises the pre-Reformation parishes of Abernethy and Kincardine, the former mostly to the E, the latter wholly to the W of the Nethy. It is bounded NE by Cromdale in Elginshire and Kirkmichael in Banffshire, E and SE by Kirkmichael, SW by Rothiemurchus, and NW by Duthil and Cromdale, having an extreme length from NNE to SSW of 165/8, and an extreme width from E to W of 14 miles. The Spey, here 50 yards broad, flows 16 miles along all the north-western border, and glides on smooth and unruffled, throughout this course having only a fall from about 690 to 600 feet above sea-level. The Nethy rises on the eastern slope of Cairngorm, at an altitude of 2700 feet, and after a north-northwesterly course of14 miles, falls into the Spey near Broomhill station. A brook in drought, it is subject to violent spates, the greatest on record being those of 1829 and June 1880, when it flooded great part of Nethybridge village, and changed all the level below into a lake. The Nethy itself receives the Dorback Burn (flowing 9½ miles WNW), and the Duack Burn (6¾ miles N): and 2 affluents of the Avon, the Water of Caiplaich or Ailnack and the Burn of Brown, trace 7 miles of the south-eastern, and 4 of the eastern border. Besides many smaller tarns, Loch Garten (5 x 3 furlongs) lies at an altitude of 726 feet, 2¼ miles SW of Nethybridge: on the Rothiemurchus boundary are Loch Phitiulais (5 x 1½ furlongs, altitude 674 feet), and pine-girt Loch Morlich (8 x 5 furlongs, altitude 1046 feet). Save for the level strip along the Spey, from 3 furlongs to 2¼ miles in width, the surface everywhere is hilly or grandly mountainous, ascending southward to the Cairngorm Mountains, eastward to the Braes of Abernethy, north-eastward towards the hills of Cromdale. To the W of the Nethy the chief elevations are Tor Hill (1000 feet), Carn Rynettin (1549), Craiggowrie (2237), Creagan Gorm (2403), Meall a' Bhuachaille (2654), Mam Suim (2394), An t-Aonach (2117), Airgiodmeall (2118), *Castle Hill (2366), *Creag na Leacainn (3448), and *Cairngorm (4084), where the asterisks mark the summits culminating on the boundary. E of the Nethy rise Carn na Leine (1505), Beinn an Fhudair (1476), Carn Dearg (1378), *Tom Liath (1163), Carn Tuairneir (2250), Baddoch (1863), Tom nan Damh Mora (1742), Tom an Fheannaige (1638), Carn an Fhir Odhair (2257), Carn a Chnuic (1658), Carn Sheilg (2040), Carn Bheur (2636), Beul Buidhe (2385), Geal Charn (2692), Geal Charn Beag (2484), Tamh-dhruim (2463), *Caiplich (3574), and *A Choinneach (3215). Planted or natural pine-forest covers a vast extent, far up the Nethy, around Loch Garten, and in Glenmore on the border of Rothiemurchus: and, whilst loch and river abound in trout and salmon, the glens and mountains teem with all kinds of game, the Earl of Seafield's Abernethy deer-forest letting for £1800 in 1881. The felling, too, of timber on the uplands, thence to be floated down the Nethy to the Spey, forms a great source of wealth, first opened up in 1728 by Aaron Hill, ex-manager of Drury Lane (Chambers' Dom. Ann., iii. 547). The rocks are chiefly granitic and unworked: what arable soil there is-by nature fertile-has been greatly improved by liming: and within the last 30 years many acres of pasture have been brought under the plough, many good farm-buildings erected. In the NE a Roman road is thought to have run from Bridge of Brown to Lynemore, and on towards Cromdale station: Castle Roy, near the church, a reputed stronghold of the Comyns, is 90 feet long, 60 broad, and 30 high, with no roof or loopholes, and but a single entrance. John Stuart, the Gaelic poet, best known as ' John Roy Stuart, ' was born at Knock of Kincardine in 1700. The Earl of Seafield and the Duke of Richmond and Gordon are chief proprietors in Abernethy, which gives name to a presbytery in the synod of Moray. The living is worth £384: the parish church (1000 sittings) stands 7 furlongs NNE of Nethybridge, and is a well-built modern edifice, as also are a Free church and an Established mission church (600 sittings) at Kincardine, 6½ miles SW, on the Spey. Three public schools-Abernethy, Dorback, and Tullock-with respective accommodation for 198,40, and 80 children, had (1879) an average attendance of 88,15, and 35, and grants of £95,3s., £32,9s., and £44,13s. Valuation (1881) £8141,9s. 7d., of which £6552,9s. 4d. belongs to the Earl of Seafield. Pop., mostly Gaelic-speaking (1831) 2092, (1871) 1752, (1881) 1530.—Ord. Sur.,shs. 74,75,1877.
The presbytery of Abernethy, meeting at Grantown, comprehends the civil parishes of Abernethy, Alvie, Cromdale, Duthil, Kingussie, and Kirkmichael, and the quoad sacra parishes of Inch, Inverallan, Rothiemurchus, and Tomintoul. Pop. (1871) 11,700, of whom 1144 were communicants of the Church of Scotland in 1878, the sums raised by the above 10 congregations in that year amounting to £526. There is also a Free Church presbytery of Abernethy, having churches at Abernethy, Alvie, Cromdale, Duthil, Kingussie, Kirkmichael, and Laggan, with 2051 members and adherents in 1880.
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