The feast day of St Columba

John Lorne Campbell of Canna writes extensively of St Columba’s life in his book Canna. He was of the firm opinion that the Isle of Canna was, indeed, the mysterious island of ‘Hinba’ or ‘Himba’ mentioned in the Columban diaries, and believed that Canna was actually the ‘summer home’ of the saint. In the papers, it mentions that Hinba was inhabited, had a monastic settlement and had a considerable sea inlet; it also mentions the island of Eigg. John wrote that archaeological remains on Canna prove beyond doubt that the island was inhabited before Columba’s mission to the Hebrides. There is a well-known monastic site on the island on the far south-west shore, now usually referred to as the nunnery.

This video shows the clear connection between Canna and St Columba – from St Columba’s Chapel to the archaeological remains found at Keill, the most likely site of a Columban monastery. Margaret Fay Shaw writes of the St Columba’s Day celebrations in 1963 in her autobiography From the Alleghenies to the Hebrides. That day was celebrated more recently, in 2018, with the ColmCille Symposium, where keynote speakers Professor Rob Dunbar (University of Edinburgh) and Derek Alexander (National Trust for Scotland archaeologist) presented papers with evidence for John Campbell’s theories.

The video is accompanied by Canna archivist Fiona Mackenzie, singing ‘Laoidh Chaluim Cille’ (‘St Columba’s Hymn’) in St Columba’s Chapel on Canna. She is accompanied by John Lorne Campbell’s recording of the Canna cuckoo, in Canna House Garden in 1952.

‘Glòir don Athair, don Mhac ’s don Spiorad ro naomh
Fad shaoghal nan saoghal, Amen’

(Glory to the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, forever and ever, Amen)