The author of these observations, Robin Noble, is an environmental writer and teacher who has spent most of his working life in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland, especially in Assynt. Between 1959 and 1972 his family’s holiday home was a cottage at Glenleraig. This cottage became his home from 1995 to 2010, during which time he was, for ten years, Chair of the Assynt Community Council.
He has taken a particular interest in Assynt’s woodlands and in 2000 produced a comprehensive account of them in The Woods of Assynt, a 156 page report of a project carried out for the Assynt Crofters’ Trust. He also made a major contribution to Muirburn in Assynt: a project by the Assynt Field Club, 2004-2006, the text of which is available on the Field Club website here.
His experience and knowledge of the Assynt landscape gives him a unique perspective on the changes that have occurred in it over a long period, which is reflected in his delightful book Under the Radiant Hill (Birlinn, 2023; photo 1).
Another view on the significance of shieling grounds in Assynt is provided by the paper on Land use by summer shielings by Ronald Miller, published in Scottish Studies 11, 194-221 (1967). His map, reproduced here (photo 2), shows the location ‘of some 200 of the 246 shiels’ listed by John Home in his 1774 survey of the parish (see Adam, R.J., John Home’s Survey of Assynt. Scottish History Society, Edinburgh, 1960).
Ian M. Evans