We don't have any photos of this building yet. Why don't you be the first to send us one?
Latitude: 57.0605 / 57°3'37"N
Longitude: -4.9681 / 4°58'5"W
OS Eastings: 220115
OS Northings: 800523
OS Grid: NH201005
Mapcode National: GBR GB31.WN7
Mapcode Global: WH2FS.NSGP
Plus Code: 9C9Q326J+6Q
Entry Name: Cruck Framed Barn, Greenfield Farm, Kilmonivaig
Listing Name: Greenfield Farm, Cruck Framed Barn
Listing Date: 22 March 2007
Category: C
Source: Historic Scotland
Source ID: 399384
Historic Scotland Designation Reference: LB50834
Building Class: Cultural
ID on this website: 200399384
Location: Kilmonivaig
County: Highland
Electoral Ward: Caol and Mallaig
Parish: Kilmonivaig
Traditional County: Inverness-shire
Tagged with: Cruck framed barn
Internally, the barn has jointed and pegged crucks set into the wall and ending above ground. Five cruck blades support a ridge pole and trunk purlins (possibly made out of birch, larch or Scots pine). Replacement timber planks support the cruck framework in places. A large entrance opening with ledged, braced doors in the north elevation lead into the adjoining Nissen hut. There are two parallel byres to the east of the cruck-framed barn (one slated and the other in a similar Nissen hut-style) dating from the 20th century.
Historical background
Greenfield was a substantial township in the 18th century, which was largely, but not completely, abandoned in the 1790s and re-occupied as an agricultural settlement in the 1840s-1850s (Highland Historic Environment Record, MHG29829). Greenfield is shown on an estate map of 1840, to the east of the Greenfield Burn, a tributary of Loch Garry.
Greenfield was a tenanted farm on the Glengarry estate. The estate was historically owned by the MacDonnells of Glengarry and was sold to the Marquis of Huntly in 1836. In 1860 the Glengarry estate was bought by Edward Ellice MP and added to his Highland sporting estate portfolio. The farm at Greenfield was a sheep farm and raised the Cheviot breed with the capacity for a supplementary stock of cattle. The farm included meadow land and arable land (Inverness Courier, 12 May 1870). Newspaper advertisements from the 1870s and 1880s indicate that Greenfield Farm was let as one holding together with the neighbouring Garrygualach Farm to the west.
The barn at Greenfield is one of a very small number of surviving buildings in Scotland with a cruck-frame and is a rare example of a pre-Improvement period agricultural barn.
While some later fabric has been added, such as the corrugated iron roof, cement render and additional timbers to support the roof covering, overall there is a significant amount of surviving original fabric, demonstrating traditional vernacular building techniques.
The building's relationship with its setting is typical for its building type and is of special interest in listing terms. The barn forms part of a complex of later agricultural buildings at Greenfield Farm and is built into the landscape to the south.
The barn shows traditional construction techniques and retains a substantial amount of later 18th century fabric, including timber-pegged cruck blades. This example has been adapted over time, in particular to the pitch of the roof when the original thatched roof was replaced with corrugated iron, importantly, however, the trusses remain in their mural slots. The positioning of the doors opposite each other on the east and west elevations suggest the building was used as a threshing barn (Highland Historic Environment Record, MHG29828).
Cruck framing was a building technique used throughout Scotland prior to the agricultural improvement era, with the exception of the Islands where timber was scarce. This method of construction was made obsolete when improvements in transportation routes made standardised building materials cheaper and more widely available. As a result, surviving examples of cruck-framed buildings are now very rare.
The structure of this barn is not constructed of large curved timbers, but the term cruck-framed is nevertheless accurate as it can also mean 'smaller timbers jointed and pegged together to form a continuous support'. (Walker, MacGregor and Little, p.126). The building now forms part of a complex with later agricultural buildings and a Nissen hut style barn with a corrugated iron roof is now adjoined to the north elevation of the cruck-framed barn.
Supplementary information in the listed building record revised in 2021.
External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.