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North Ronaldsay
North Ronaldsay (, also , ) is the northernmost island in the Orkney archipelago of Scotland. With an area of , it is the fourteenth-largest.Haswell-Smith (2004) p. 334 It is mentioned in the ''Orkneyinga saga''; in modern times it is known for its historic lighthouse, migratory bird life and unusual breed of sheep. Name The name comes from the Norse ''Rinansey'', meaning the island of St Ninian. By the 1300s the name was being confused with ''Rognvaldsey'', the island of St Ronald, in the south of Orkney that they were named North Ronaldsay and South Ronaldsay to distinguish them from the other. Geography North Ronaldsay lies around north of its nearest neighbour, Sanday, at . It is around long and is defined by two large sandy bays; Linklet Bay on the eastern shoreline and South Bay at the south. The west of the island is very rocky, with many skerries. North Ronaldsay is low-lying and exposed; its climate is extremely changeable and frequently inclement. The surroun ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Mainland, Orkney
The Mainland, also known as Pomona, is the main island of Orkney, Scotland. Both of Orkney's burghs, Kirkwall and Stromness, lie on the island, which is also the heart of Orkney's ferry and air connections. Seventy-five per cent of Orkney's population live on the island, which is more densely populated than the other islands of the archipelago. The lengthy history of the island's occupation has provided numerous important archaeological sites and the sandstone bedrock provides a platform for fertile farmland. There is an abundance of wildlife, especially seabirds. Etymology The name Mainland is a Language change, corruption of the Old Norse . Formerly the island was also known as meaning 'horse island'. The island is sometimes referred to as ''Pomona (mythology), Pomona'' (or ''Pomonia''), a name that stems from a 16th-century mis-translation by George Buchanan.Buchanan, George (1582''Rerum Scoticarum Historia: The First Book''The University of California, Irvine. Revised 8 Marc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vikings
Vikings were seafaring people originally from Scandinavia (present-day Denmark, Norway, and Sweden), who from the late 8th to the late 11th centuries raided, pirated, traded, and settled throughout parts of Europe.Roesdahl, pp. 9–22. They also voyaged as far as the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean, North Africa, the Middle East, Greenland, and Vinland (present-day Newfoundland in Canada, North America). In their countries of origin, and some of the countries they raided and settled in, this period is popularly known as the Viking Age, and the term "Viking" also commonly includes the inhabitants of the Scandinavian homelands as a whole. The Vikings had a profound impact on the Early Middle Ages, early medieval history of Northern Europe, northern and Eastern Europe, including the political and social development of England (and the English language) and parts of France, and established the embryo of Russia in Kievan Rus'. Expert sailors and navigators of their cha ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kirkwall
Kirkwall (, , or ; ) is the largest town in Orkney, an archipelago to the north of mainland Scotland. First mentioned in the ''Orkneyinga saga'', it is today the location of the headquarters of the Orkney Islands Council and a transport hub with ferries to many locations. It is the centre of the St Magnus Festival, St Magnus International Festival and is also a popular stopping off point for cruise ships. St Magnus Cathedral stands at the heart of the town. Etymology The name Kirkwall comes from the Old Norse, Norse name meaning "church bay", the settlement having been established by the Norsemen in the 11th century. As late as 1525 the name is recorded as Kirkevaag. This became in time "Kirkwaa" and then eventually Kirkwall - but how the second syllable came to be spelled "wall" is not certain. MacBain quotes F. W. L. Thomas: "How, I ask, could ''vágr'' come to be represented by wall? Whence came the ''ll''? Was it that Scottish immigrants finding the sound of ''vá'' repre ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
North Ronaldsay Airport
North Ronaldsay Airport is located on North Ronaldsay island, northeast by north of Kirkwall, Orkney Islands, Scotland Scotland is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It contains nearly one-third of the United Kingdom's land area, consisting of the northern part of the island of Great Britain and more than 790 adjac .... North Ronaldsay Aerodrome has a CAA Ordinary Licence (Number P538) that allows flights for the public transport of passengers or for flying instruction as authorised by the licensee (Orkney Islands Council). The aerodrome is not licensed for night use. Airline and destinations References External links Official website Airports in Orkney North Ronaldsay {{UK-airport-stub ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Northern Lighthouse Board
The Northern Lighthouse Board (NLB) is the general lighthouse authority for Scotland and the Isle of Man. It is a non-departmental public body responsible for ocean, marine navigation aids around coastal areas. History The NLB was formed by an act of Parliament, the (26 Geo. 3. c. 101), as the Commissioners of Northern Light Houses, largely at the urging of the lawyer and politician George Dempster of Dunnichen, George Dempster ("Honest George"), to oversee the construction and operation of four Scottish lighthouses: Kinnaird Head, North Ronaldsay, Scalpay, Outer Hebrides, Scalpay and Mull of Kintyre#Lighthouse, Mull of Kintyre, for which they were empowered to borrow up to £1,200. Until then, the only major lighthouse in Scotland was the coal brazier mounted on the Isle of May#Lighthouses, Isle of May in the Firth of Forth, together with some smaller lights in the Firths of the River Tay, Tay and River Clyde, Clyde. None of the major passages around Scotland, which led thro ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Thomas Smith (engineer)
Thomas Smith (6 December 1752 – 21 June 1815) was a Scottish businessman and early lighthouse engineer. He was appointed as the first Chief Engineer to the Northern Lighthouse Board in 1786. Early life Smith was born in Broughty Ferry near Dundee on 6 December 1752. His father, a skipper, drowned in Dundee harbour while Thomas was still young. As a result, his mother encouraged him towards a career onshore, leading him initially into ironmongery. While his widowed mother remained in Broughty Ferry, Smith went on to establish himself in Edinburgh. Professional career In Edinburgh Smith founded and appears to have been the sole proprietor of a successful business in lamps and oils called the Greenside Company's Works. Smith won a contract to provide improved street lighting for Edinburgh's burgeoning New Town. The oil lamps he provided featured parabolic reflectors made from burnished copper, which concentrated the light and enhanced its brightness. Manufacturing such refle ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Robert Stewart, 1st Earl Of Orkney
Robert Stewart, 1st Earl of Orkney and Lord of Zetland (Shetland) (spring of 1533 – 4 February 1593) was a recognised illegitimate son of James V, King of Scotland, and his mistress Eupheme Elphinstone. Robert Stewart was half-brother to Mary, Queen of Scots and uncle to James VI and I of Scotland and England. Biography In 1539 Robert Stewart was made Commendator of Holyrood Abbey, and Commendator of Charlieu Abbey in France by 1557. Clothes for "lord Robert of Halyrudhous" and his brothers were made by the king's tailor, Thomas Arthur. In 1550, after the conclusion of the war known the Rough Wooing, he accompanied his step-mother Mary of Guise on a visit to the French court. In July 1553, his sister Lady Jean Stewart was contracted to marry Archibald Campbell, 5th Earl of Argyll. Her cash dowry of 5,000 merks was to be paid by Mary of Guise and her brothers, the Commendators of Kelso, Holyrood, and Coldingham. During the Reformation Crisis, on 9 February 1560 he ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
King's Lynn
King's Lynn, known until 1537 as Bishop's Lynn and colloquially as Lynn, is a port and market town in the borough of King's Lynn and West Norfolk in the county of Norfolk, England. It is north-east of Peterborough, north-north-east of Cambridge and west of Norwich. History Toponymy The etymology of King's Lynn is uncertain. The name ''Lynn'' may signify a body of water near the town – the Welsh word means a lake; but the name is plausibly of Old English, Anglo-Saxon origin, from ''lean'' meaning a Tenure (law), tenure in fee or farm. The 1086 Domesday Book records it as ''Lun'' and ''Lenn'', and ascribes it to the Bishop of Elmham and the Archbishop of Canterbury. The Domesday Book also mentions saltings at Lena (Lynn); an area of partitioned pools may have existed there at the time. The presence of salt, which was relatively rare and expensive in the early medieval period, may have added to the interest of Herbert de Losinga and other prominent Normans in the modest parish ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Odin
Odin (; from ) is a widely revered god in Norse mythology and Germanic paganism. Most surviving information on Odin comes from Norse mythology, but he figures prominently in the recorded history of Northern Europe. This includes the Roman Empire's partial occupation of Germania ( BCE), the Migration Period (4th–6th centuries CE) and the Viking Age (8th–11th centuries CE). Consequently, Odin has hundreds of names and titles. Several of these stem from the reconstructed Proto-Germanic theonym ''Wōðanaz'', meaning "lord of frenzy" or "leader of the possessed", which may relate to the god's strong association with poetry. Most mythological stories about Odin survive from the 13th-century ''Prose Edda'' and an earlier collection of Old Norse poems, the ''Poetic Edda'', along with other Old Norse items like '' Ynglinga saga''. The ''Prose Edda'' and other sources depict Odin as the head of the pantheon, sometimes called the Æsir, and bearing a spear and a ring. Wid ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Caithness
Caithness (; ; ) is a Shires of Scotland, historic county, registration county and Lieutenancy areas of Scotland, lieutenancy area of Scotland. There are two towns, being Wick, Caithness, Wick, which was the county town, and Thurso. The county includes the northernmost point of mainland Britain at Dunnet Head, and also the most north-easterly point at Duncansby Head near John o' Groats. The Flow Country is the largest blanket bog in Europe, and covers a large inland area in the west of the county. Caithness has a land boundary with the historic county of Sutherland to the west and is otherwise bounded by sea. The land boundary follows a drainage divide, watershed and is crossed by two roads (the A9 road (Great Britain), A9 and the A836 road, A836) and by one railway (the Far North Line). Across the Pentland Firth, ferries link Caithness with Orkney, and Caithness also has an airport at Wick, Highland, Wick. The Pentland Firth island of Stroma, Scotland, Stroma is within Caithne ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Harald Finehair
Harald Fairhair (; – ) was a Norwegian king. According to traditions current in Norway and Iceland in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, he reigned from 872 to 930 and was the first King of Norway. Supposedly, two of his sons, Eric Bloodaxe and Haakon the Good, succeeded Harald to become kings after his death. Much of Harald's biography is uncertain. A couple of praise poems by his court poet Þorbjörn Hornklofi survive in fragments, but the extant accounts of his life come from sagas set down in writing around three centuries after his lifetime. His life is described in several of the Kings' sagas, none of them older than the twelfth century. Their accounts of Harald and his life differ on many points, but it is clear that in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries Harald was regarded as having unified Norway into one kingdom. Since the nineteenth century, when Norway was in a personal union with Sweden, Harald has become a national icon of Norway and a symbol of ind ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
