It´s been a long day already but there was one last spot I wanted to visit before driving to my place for the night in Ardgay – the Pictish stone (cross): Hilton of Cadboll Stone on the East coast of the Tarbat Peninsula in Easter Ross.
Just a short walk through the fields and suddenly there is the view of the sea and the replica of the Hilton of Cadboll Stone, a Pictish cross. Left to the cross are the overgrown remains of “Our Lady´s Chapel”. The original cross was carved around 800 AD.
The cross-slab’s had a chequered history. Carved around AD 800, it soon apparently snapped at the tenon – the extension lodged in the ground to hold it upright – and toppled. It was re-erected, using the lower part of the stone as the tenon, and stood until 1674, when it broke again in a strong wind. (Historic Environment Scotland)
Alexander Duff had the stone reworked in 1676 and used it as a gravestone, one side of the carvings were destroyed and replaced by an inscription.
Our Lady´s Chapel
The upper section of the cross-slab was found next to the chapel in the 19th century. Today the remains of this small rectangular chapel lie in the field next to the cross hidden under the turf.
In Hilton of Cadboll a chapel dedicated to the Virgin ‘Our Lady’s Chapel’ was mentioned in 1610.
The remains of Hilton of Cadboll Chapel imply a simple, rectangular medieval chapel. There is a tradition of the site being used for the burial of unbaptised infants until the end of the 1800s. By 1856 the chapel was being used as a shed. (Historic Environment Scotland)
