Durness is a village and civil parish in the north-west Highlands of Scotland. It lies on the north coast of the country in the traditional county of Sutherland around 120 miles (190 km) north of Inverness. The area is remote and the parish is huge and sparsely populated covering an area from east of Loch Eriboll to Cape Wrath, the most north-westerly point of the Scottish mainland.
The name was originally Norse "Dyrnes", meaning "deer headland". No one knows for sure where the name derives; it has variously been translated as from "Dorainn nis" tempest point, or "Dhu thir nis" the point of the black land; or from the Norse for deerpoint. Or even from the main village "Durine" which would translate as "Dhu Rinn" the black (or fertile) promontory, with the Norse "ness" tacked on to an existing Gaelic name.
The population is dispersed and includes a number of townships including Kempie, Eriboll, Laid, Rispond, Sangobeg, Leirinmore, Smoo, Sangomore, Durine, Balnakeil, and Keoldale.
The area has been inhabited since stone age times and there are many places of historic interest. Durness was formerly a part of the bishopric of Caithness and the old house at Balnakeil was originally the Bishop's summer residence. The church at Balnakeil dates back to the Culdean monks but the existing ruined church is said to have been built by the monks from Dornoch Cathedral in the 13th century. On Faraid Head is Seannachaisteal, presumably a broch, but it is now completely enveloped in sand and no dig has ever been carried out to see what it was and from which time in history. A few years ago, the body of a young Viking boy was discovered exposed by the erosion of the sand dunes at Faraid. And at Sangobeg beach, the body of a Pictish boy was discovered.
At Ceannabeinne lies "Clach a Breitheanas" or the Judgement Stone. This was said to be where judgement was meted out to malefactors and those found guilty were thrown over the cliff to their doom below.
The parish of Durness was for centuries a part of Duthaich MhicAoidh, the land of the Clan Mackay, who held their title to the land extending from Melvich in the East to Kylesku in the West; it was said that at his most powerful the Chief of Mackay could call on 4,000 fighting men when Loch Eriboll was used by the battle fleet of King Hakkon of Norway on its way south to the disastrous Battle of Largs in 1266. During the Second World War, the battle cruiser "Jamaica" sustained an outbreak of measles on board and it was quarantined in the loch for months and at cessation of hostilities in 1945 it saw the surrender of some 30 German U-boats. During World War II, the RAF built a Chain Home radar station at Sango near Durness. After the war there was also a ROTOR radar station at Faraid Head near Balnakeil, part of which is used by the modern military range and the accommodation area is used for various crafts.
The population today is much diminished with the whole of the Durness area suffering greatly from the Highland Clearances, the first in 1819 and thereafter throughout the greater part of the 19th century until the Crofting Act of the 1886 finally gave crofters a measure of security of tenure. The Durness Riots of 1846 were caused by such clearances when the women of Ceannabeinne area defied the Sheriff's Officer sent to deliver the summons of eviction and subsequent disorder occurred in the village inn in Durness when a second attempt was made, causing the officers to be again run out of town
