The Appin Head

The Appin Head

(on long-term loan from Kilmartin House Museum) This human face carved on a natural boulder of local igneous stone (37 x 26 cm; 50kg) has been identified by the National Museum of Scotland as a Pagan Celtic Stone Head, dating from the Iron Age1. Jean and the late...

Gunpowder flasks

Gunpowder flasks

Before the introduction of manufactured cartridges and bullets from the mid-19th century, powder flasks were required to deliver gunpowder down the barrel of muzzle-loading guns.   The ball, bullet or shot was then driven into place with a ramrod, and secured with a...

Victorian Bibles

Victorian Bibles

It was not until 1801 that a full translation of the bible into Gaelic, by the Rev John Stuart of Luss, was published but, by the time that Victoria ascended to the throne, even if there were no other books in a West Highland household, there would always be a bible,...

Smoothing irons

Smoothing irons

The museum has a collection of four smoothing irons, which demonstrate different approaches to ironing clothes and bed sheets before the arrival of mains electricity in 1970. Up to the early twentieth century, the iron itself or a metal "slug", which fitted into the...