Loch Assynt
Loch Assynt is a freshwater loch in Sutherland, found five miles east of Lochinver.
The lake lies in a spectacular setting between the heights of Canisp, Quinag and Beinn Uidhe. It receives the outflow from Lochs Awe, Maol a' Choire, and Leitir Easaich and discharges into the sea at Loch Inver, by the River Inver.
The general trend of the loch is west-north-west and east-south-east, while the western end bends sharply at Loch Assynt lodge to the south-west.[1]
The loch is six miles long, and about a mile in maximum breadth. The total area is approximately three square miles and its drainage basin is over 1,950 acres. The total volume of water contained in the loch is estimated at 323 million cubic yards and the maximum depth 282 feet.[1]
The elevation of the loch's surface above sea level varies with the levels of rainfall but has been measured as 215 ft.[2]
In and about the loch
There is excellent fishing for trout, sea-trout, and salmon.
Ardvreck Castle, once held by the MacLeods and Mackenzies, stands shattered a promontory on the north shore, west of Inchnadamph.
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The Mermaid of Assynt
Whispered amongst the locals of Inchnadamph, the area surrounding the castle, legend tells of MacLeod's lost daughter, Eimhir, and her continued presence at Loch Assynt. The story says that Eimhir was pledged to be married to the Devil, as his price for helping her father to build Ardvreck Castle, but rather than submit she leapt to her death. Local legend has it though that Eimhir plunged into the caverns of the Loch, hiding from the Devil, and made a new home beneath the water's surface, becoming the elusive 'Mermaid of Assynt'.
The locals also use this legend to account for natural changes in the landscape. When the loch's water rise above their normal levels, legend tells that these are Eimhir's tears mourning her life lost on the land. Some even claim to have sighted her weeping on the rocks, her body now transformed into half woman, half sea creature. Some contest her form, instead calling her Selkie, the Nordic mythological figure of the sea, who must first shed tears into the water in order to become visible again to the human eye.
The legend also accounts for the geology of Inchnadamph. Clootie, infuriated by the broken promise of marriage summoned meteoric rocks from Chaos[3] to obliterate Inchnadamph and MacLeod's kingdom.
These legends are invoked to offer some mythical explanation for the unique geological and topographical character of Inchnadamph.
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Murray and Pullar (1910) "Lochs of the Inver Basin" Page 149, Volume II, Part I. National Library of Scotland. Retrieved 20 July 2010.
- ↑ Murray and Pullar (1910) "Lochs of the Inver Basin" Page 150, Volume II, Part I. NLS
- ↑ Steenburg, David (1 January 1991). "Chaos at the Marriage of Heaven and Hell". The Harvard Theological Review 84 (4): 447–466. doi:10.2307/1510184.
- Murray, Sir John and Pullar, Laurence (1910) Bathymetrical Survey of the Fresh-Water Lochs of Scotland, 1897-1909. London; Challenger Office.
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