Name: | Tarbat Parish Church | CISP No: | TARBT |
Place: | Portmahomack (Port ma Cholmag) | Grid Ref: | NH 9100 8400 (GB) |
Parish: | Tarbat (Tairbeart) | Stones: | 1 |
County: | Ross and Cromarty , Scotland | Saint(s): | Colman ; Colmán |
Site Type: | ecclesiastical |
Tarbat is situated on the north coast of the Tarbat peninsula, by the sands at Portmahomack.
Higgitt/1982, 318, concludes that Tarbat was the site of an ecclesiastical centre with educated personnel with the knowledge and ability to write and decorate manuscripts in the Insular tradition.
Harden/1994, 221-227, argues that the enclosure which came to surround the ecclesiastical site, may have been an earlier secular, or non-christian enclosure. Harden also discusses the pieces of non-inscribed stone sculpture from Tarbat, and the discovery of eighth to tenth century metal-work and coins. The site also produced a Roman coin of the third century.
Harden/1996, 225, also cites Martin Carver as arguing that the coincidence of a beach site and coins from the Emporium of Quentovic in Gaul might indicate a `beach market site of the first millenium AD'.
For the metalwork and coins also see Graham-Campbell/1995, no. 29.