Our rewilding estate offers a unique opportunity for people to connect with Scotland’s natural and cultural heritage, and experience rewilding in action. During the development phase of the Dundreggan Rewilding Centre, our local communities highlighted the importance of including Gaelic in our plans. To ensure that all of our visitors experience an element of Gaelic during their time at Dundreggan, we’ve incorporated Gaelic into our interpretation, events and activities.
Over the summer months, we’ve hosted a number of Gaelic-focused events including Gaelic landscape walks on our footpaths Ceum an Aitinn (Juniper Path) and Ceum a’ Ghiuthais (Pine Path). We also held a wonderful event in partnership with the Shieling Project, an off-grid learning centre in nearby Struy. Titled Gaelic Language: Connecting People and Nature, the collaborative event brought people together through Gaelic cultural activities.
The event included a Gaelic place-name walk followed by traditional crafts such as willow weaving, wet felting, and bannock making on the fire. Many locals attended who have a strong interest in Gaelic, and we loved finding out which words people most associated with Gaelic: cultar beò (living culture), history, identity, heritage, community, people and place.
Gaelic is the oldest surviving language in Scotland and for many centuries it has been spoken throughout these glens. For Gaels, their sense of being part of their homeland is summed up perfectly in the word dùthchas which encapsulates belonging, tradition, and an attachment to landscape and all living things.
Rewilding is all about place and how we seek to understand, respect, and work within it. In Glenmoriston, place-names, stories and songs reveal a rich and thriving landscape and 99% of the place-names in our local area come from Gaelic.
Our place-names are very practical. They tell us which trees grow where, and if the land is fertile, or rough and rocky. They tell us where the eagles nest (Creag an Fhìr-eòin - Crag of the golden eagle) and about half hidden streams and crashing waterfalls (Eas an Tairbh - Waterfall of the bull). They describe the shape of high points far better than the words ‘hill’ or ‘mountain’ can: whether they’re smooth and rounded, jagged, craggy peaks, or the small-mounded dwellings of fairies (Sìthean Mullach - Fairy hillock).
They also tell us about the glen’s people: of summer shielings (Bealach na h-Imrich - Pass of the flitting), of hunting grounds, of the Highland Clearances and of emigration – all woven together with song, and dance, and stories of witches and the wee folk.
Nature runs strongly throughout Gaelic culture. Engaging with the language opens a unique window into the landscape and the long relationship between humans and nature in the Highlands. Both Gaelic and our native forests evolved in response to Scotland’s environment, and over time both were pushed to the point of facing extinction.
Now, as we revitalise this landscape, it’s essential that we also nurture Gaelic. Sharing the stories and embracing Gaelic language and culture will help us make wise choices for both the future of the land, and its people.
“Isn’t it the same thing? If we lose the Gaelic language, if we lose the forests ... we will go backwards terribly…We must strive to keep our language, our trees…alive. It won’t happen in a year or ten years. We have to work with patience to save those things.” - Finlay M MacRae MBE, musician, Gael and forest restoration pioneer.
Dundreggan Rewilding Centre is generously supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund, Bòrd na Gàidhlig, the Audemars Piguet Foundation, HIE, SSE Sustainable Development Fund, FERN Community Funds, the Garfield Weston Foundation, and The Natural and Cultural Heritage Fund, which is led by NatureScot and is part funded through the European Regional Development Fund.
