A plain church shell enriched by dated doorways, burial additions and older carved stones.
Quick facts
- Date
- Post-Reformation church with doorway dated 1694; later burial additions
- Architect / designer
- Builders not established
- Type
- Church ruins and burial ground
- OS grid reference
- NG 25492 47822
The structure
The roofless rubble church has a rectangular plan, a northern burial aisle and remnants of a bellcote above its west gable. A western burial enclosure has a moulded doorway and balustrade dated 1735.
Its story
The standing church served the post-Reformation parish of Duirinish. Its north doorway bears the date 1694. Medieval carved grave slabs indicate an older religious site; later memorials adapted parts of the church for MacLeod burials. Scheduling was added in 2000.
Why it is included
Its fabric records the overlap between parish worship, family commemoration and the continued use of an older sacred place.
What to look for
- The dated north doorway
- The western enclosure and surviving bellcote
Reading the surroundings
The church stands within the old walled burial ground, where carved stones preserve evidence older than the present shell.
Timeline
- 1694 Date on the north doorway.
- 1735 Date on the western burial enclosure.
- 2000 Church and burial ground scheduled.
- 2016 Duplicate listed-building designation removed; scheduling retained.
What we know — and what remains uncertain
Sources differ over the northern aisle: HES describes an eighteenth-century addition, while an Ordnance Survey visit recorded an 1839 date. The earlier medieval church is inferred from site evidence, not identified here as surviving walls.
Sources & further reading
- HES: St Mary’s Church and Burial Ground, SM9249 — Designation, masonry, possible reused doorway and grid reference.
- Highland HER: St Mary’s Church, MHG4782 — Survey accounts, conflicting aisle dates and 2016 removal from the statutory list.
Location
OS grid reference NG 25492 47822 · Location confidence: High: HES National Grid reference converted to WGS84; catalogue point, not an entrance. · Select the marker to open its satellite view in Google Maps. On desktop, drag Pegman (the yellow figure) onto a blue road. On mobile, turn on the Street View layer and tap a blue road. Other photo markers may be user-contributed.
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