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Lochgoilhead, Church Of The Three Holy Brethren

Church (Medieval), Font (Period Unknown)

Site Name Lochgoilhead, Church Of The Three Holy Brethren

Classification Church (Medieval), Font (Period Unknown)

Alternative Name(s) Lochgoilhead Kirk

Canmore ID 23614

Site Number NN10SE 4

NGR NN 19851 01461

Datum OSGB36 - NGR

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/23614

Ordnance Survey licence number AC0000807262. All rights reserved.
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Digital Images

Administrative Areas

  • Council Argyll And Bute
  • Parish Lochgoilhead And Kilmorich
  • Former Region Strathclyde
  • Former District Argyll And Bute
  • Former County Argyll

Activities

Field Visit (1 March 1973)

The church is in use. There is no surviving evidence to prove a Celtic site. On display at the E interior of the church are several small inscribed stones.

Suveyed at 1/2500.

Visited by OS (D W R) 1 March 1973.

Field Visit (September 1986)

This building stands in its churchyard 80m from the N shore of Loch Goil and 70m NE of the former manse, which was rebuilt in 1841 (en.1). The main body of the church measures 22.5m from E to W by 5.5m within 0.9m walls, and may incorporate some of the fabric of the late medieval parish church, although the only identifiable feature of that period is an early 16th-century tomb-recess in the N wall of the former chancel. A large aisle was added at the centre of the N wall in the 18th century, and a smaller session-house outside the opposite wall in the early 19th century, when most of the existing large windows were formed or remodelled. A porch was added to the N aisle in 1895, when some internal alterations were carried out, and the building was renovated in 1955 by Ian G Lindsay (en.2).

The masonry is of rubble, rendered externally, and the main block and N aisle have sandstone skews with slightly cavetto skewputts. The session-house has broader skews, terminating in a crenellated ashlar plinth which supports the modern bird-cage belfry, and its quoins of drafted ashlar return as a band across the gable at wall-head level. There are similar dressings in the four large windows in the S wall of the church, two of which are round-headed, and in the three large windows of the N wall. The windows of the N aisle have chamfered jambs and lintels of 18th-century character, as do the two doorways, each having a gallery window above, in the S wall. All of the windows are of sash-and-case type, and the two large round-headed openings have lancet-tracery in thearch-heads. There is no external evidence of the late 16thcenturyCampbell of Ardkinglas burial-aisle which formerly stood against the E wall and was demolished about 1850 (en.3*).

Internally the church preserves its 18th-century T-plan centred on the pulpit at the centre of the S wall, although the existing pews date from 1895. At the W end the early 19thcenturyDrimsynie loft is supported on two timber columns which are prolonged as fluted pilasters dividing the panels of its curved front. The fenestration of the N aisle, with two windows at an upper level in each side-wall, suggests the former existence of a gallery (en.4*), and there may also have been one at the E end, where there is a high-level window above the S door and the cornice of the tomb-recess in the N wall is cut in two places, possibly for joists. This end of the building, the medieval chancel, was later appropriated by the Campbellsof Ardkinglas, whose arms appear on the tomb-recess (infra, number 3), and the E wall is occupied by a large late-16thcenturymonument (number 6) incorporating the blocked entrance to their demolished burial-vault. In this area the floor-level appears to be unchanged, but the remainder of the church has a raised timber floor which is probably considerably above the level of the medieval nave (en.5*).

The existing coved and boarded ceiling was installed in 1888. The pulpit, which has panelled sides with a moulded cornice, was brought in 1955 from the disused church of 1791 at Kiltearn, Ross and Cromarty, and is probably of the same date (en.6*). A door W of the pulpit gives access to the session house, which was provided with an adjacent external door in its W wall and a fireplace in the N wall.

This church serves a parish including both shores of Loch Goil and the area between Loch Long and the watershed W of Hell's Glen and Glen Croe (en.7). During the first half of the17th century it also included Strachur parish, whose status in the medieval period is uncertain (see No. 101), and was united in 1618 with Kilmorich (No. 74). Proposals were made in 1642 to rescind this union, and in 1650 to form three separate parishes, but Lochgoilhead and Kilmorich appear to have remained united, although with separate churches (en.8).

The church is first recorded in the last quarter of the 14th century, and the dedication, mentioned in a papal mandate of 1392 and later sources, was to the ‘Three Holy Brethren', whose identification is uncertain (en.9*). At this period the patronage of the rectory, and probably also the perpetual vicarage, were held by the Campbells of Lochawe, and in 1441 Duncan Campbell assigned their revenues to his new collegiate foundation at Kilmun (No. 80). In the same year a papal indulgence was obtained for those giving alms to repair the church which was 'completely collapsed in its structures, roofs and edifices' (en.10). The close resemblance in plan to Kilneuair Church (No. 81) suggests that Lochgoilhead may have been rebuilt or extensively repaired at this period. In addition to the high altar, mentioned in 1488, a chaplainry at the altar of the Virgin Mary was endowed in 1512 by John Campbell of Ardkinglas, whose arms appear on the tomb recessin the chancel (infra, number 3) (en.11).

Between 1601 and 1618 two successive ministers of Lochgoilhead also held the office of archdeacon of Argyll, and this link was formalised when the chapter of Argyll diocese was restored in 1662 (en.12). The Campbells of Ardkinglas, as principal heritors in the parish, claimed the patronage, although the Earls of Argyll, as superiors, also claimed an interest in it (en.13). Following the reformed church's prohibition of burials inside church buildings, the Campbell of Ardkinglas aisle was probably built at the same time as the monument to Sir James Campbell (infra, number 6), before his death in 1592. Robert and John Douglas, wrights, received £88 Scots in 1644, in part payment 'for building the queir and repaireing of the kirk of Lochgoilshead' (en.14), but the extent of this work is not certain. The period at which the N aisle was added is also unknown, and it may have been a considerable time before 1792, when the building was described as 'old, and in bad order' (en.15). The addition of the session-house and enlargement of the windows may be attributed to the first quarter of the 19th century, and minor alterations including the building of the porch were carried out by the Glasgow architect, Campbell Douglas, in 1894-5 (en.16*).

FONT. The existing font, which is mounted on a modern pedestal, is a block of sandstone with bevelled angles, 0.50mby 0.47m by 0.36m in height. It incorporates a basin 0.32min diameter and 0.25m deep, whose upper part appears to have been widened for a metal bowl. There is no drain-hole, and its origin and date are uncertain.

RCAHMS 1992, visited September 1986

[see RCAHMS 1992 No. 87 for a description of the medieval and post-reformation funerary monuments]

Measured Survey (3 September 1986)

RCAHMS surveyed the Parish Church, Lochgoilhead on 3 September 1986 producing a plan and south elevation at a scale of 1:100. The plan and elevation were redrawn in ink and published at a scale of 1:250 (RCAHMS 1992, 192A). The plan was also included in an illustration of comparative plans of medieval churches and chapels published at a scale of 1:250 (RCAHMS 1992, 11M).

Measured Survey (September 1986)

RCAHMS surveyed the Campbell of Ardkinglas monument, Parish Church, Lochgoilhead in September 1986. The plan and elevation were redrawn in ink and published at a scale of 1:50 (RCAHMS 1992, 196B).

Measured Survey (17 March 1987)

RCAHMS surveyed the tomb-recess at Lochgoilhead Parish Church on 17 March 1987 at a scale of 1:20. The tomb-recess plan, elevation, mason's mark and moulding profile were redrawn in ink and the plan and elevation were published at a scale of 1:50 (RCAHMS 1992, 195A).

Conservation (1998)

NN 198 014. An extensive ongoing conservation programme involving the wholesale exposure of the masonry fabric of the church to the exterior and of the E gable wall on the interior, and limited groundworks in the vicinity of the E end both internally and externally. Monitoring and architectural survey were undertaken from 1995 to 1998.

The recent works have permitted a full assessment of the evolution of the present structure. The body of the existing kirk contains substantial portions of the fabric of its late medieval predecessor within the E, N and W walls. The internal splay of the E window was tentatively identified and S of this a small unadorned aumbry was revealed (and reinstated as part of the conservation works). Two well-preserved blocked windows, rectangular with simple chamfered surrounds, were exposed on the N and W walls. Within the masonry of subsequent rebuildings many moulded architectural dressings had been reused, most doubtless coming from this early structure and some possibly from a monument within. One fragment formed part of a voussoir displaying a glazing groove and a well-formed cusp that was apparently part of the former E window.

Laying of new paving within the E end exposed a small surviving section of a flagstone floor and what may have been the slight truncated remains of a masonry altar, both apparently contemporary with the early church fabric.

The structure is tentatively dated to c 1440 on the basis of documentary source material and similarity of carved details to those of the W tower of the former collegiate church at Kilmun, similarly endowed by Sir Duncan Campbell of Lochawe.

The blocked entrance to the Campbell burial aisle of c 1590 that formerly abutted the E gable was recorded. Exterior trenching at the E end revealed the founds of this structure and a single inhumation within (not disturbed).

A major episode of rebuilding was identified within the standing fabric. This had involved the slight broadening of the nave by the reconstruction of its S wall, the reconstruction of wall-heads throughout and the insertion of a new roof. Payments made in 1644 'for building the queir and repaireing of the kirk of Lochgoilshead' can be identified with this work, as can the occurrence of a distinctive mason's mark in the form of a crossed double-headed arrow.

Subsequent additions of a N aisle, a session house to the S and the insertion of various large nave windows were also defined. The former contained a blocked doorway and displayed a series of mason's marks upon lintels throughout.

The trench along the E end exposed the remains of two substantial mortared footings that clearly lay beneath the existing masonry fabric of the 15th-century church. Whether these represented an immediate predecessor or an Early Christian structure was not determined.

Mortar and harl samples were taken from all phases as a comparative collection for future analysis and vested with the Scottish Lime Centre.

Reports will be lodged with the NMRS.

Sponsors: Historic Scotland, Parish of Lochgoilhead & Kilmorich.

T Addyman 1998

Desk Based Assessment

NN10SE 4.00 19851 01461

NN10SE 4.01 19837 01482 Burial ground

(NN 1984 0145) Lochgoilhead church first appears on record in the 14th century, but there is a tradition that it was a Celtic site. Its dedication "The Church of the Three Brethren" is of a Celtic type. It was granted to the Collegiate Church of Kilmun (NS18SE 1) on its foundation in 1442 (Scott et al 1915-61).

Information from OS

Sources: H Scott et al 1915-61; M Paterson 1970.

Note

NMRS REFERENCE

Lochgoilhead Kirk.

Plans: I. G. Lindsay Collection, W/251

References

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