The Medieval Diocese of Dunkeld

The eleventh-century decline in the Scottish Church is well seen in the state of affairs at Dunkeld, but the first half of the twelfth century saw a great effort at renewal. As part of this effort a system of territorial bishoprics was developed, and the first of such bishops at Dunkeld may have taken office in about 1114. Nevertheless, the new order could not be introduced overnight, and for some time there continued to be a community of clergy here of the older style known as Culdees (which probably means servants of God).

A bishop was the cleric in charge of the ecclesiastical affairs of a very defined geographical area known as a diocese. In Scotland, for a variety of reasons, the boundaries of these dioceses could be very complicated, and those of Dunkeld, St Andrews, Dunblane and Brechin were elaborately intermeshed.

Dunkeld even had detached territories along the shores of the Firth of Forth. Several thirteenth-century bishops seem to have felt more fondness for the security of the island abbey of Inchcolm in the Firth of Forth, which was such an outlying part of their diocese, than for their own cathedral, and chose it as their last resting place. Perhaps this was because the community of canons of Inchcolm had originally been destined for its own cathedral, and was only established on Inchcolm when there proved to be difficulties in ousting the existing community of Culdees at Dunkeld.

Initially the main part of the diocese of Dunkeld stretched across to the west coast, but at some date between 1183 and 1189 the western part was separated off to form the distinct diocese of Argyll. The mid-fifteenth century chronicler Walter Bower, who was an abbot of Inchcolm, said this was done at the request of Bishop John Scot (1183-1203) who felt unable to help the Gaelic-speaking part of his flock. But it is perhaps more likely that the division was engineered by King William the Lion who was irritated that John had not been his own choice for bishop.