Location: On a high promontory about 1 1/4 miles (2 km) NW of the 19th C. village of Salen on the north east coast of the Isle of Mull.  The ruins of Aros Castle stand on an easily defensible headland on the north side of the mouth of the Aros River where it enters Salen Bay on the south shore of the Sound of Mull.  The location provides an excellent view of east and east along the Sound of Mull and was strategically situated to control ship traffic on this key mediaeval trade route. To reach Aros Castle take the minor road east off the A848, just north of its junction at Aros Bridge with the minor road that heads directly north to Dervaig. The area of the castle contains sheer drops partially hidden by vegetation, some less-than-stable stonework, and a population of sheep ticks.

Origin:  Aros Castle may derive its name from the Norse Ar-Os, meaning “river mouth.” The castle is built at the mouth of the Aros River, which flows east through Glen Aros, where it empties into the Sound of Mull.  Aros Castle was originally built by the MacDougalls whose progenitor Dugald had inherited Mull upon the death of his father Somerled in 1164. Somerled had likely held Aros as a fortified site, Somerled, upon an earlier Norse site. Aros Castle was once a vital link in the MacDougall’s ring of power and part of the chain which transmitted warnings through the means of beacon fires.  The sending of beacon fires signals from Aros to Dunollie on the mainland would have to have been via Ardtornish Point on the Morvern side of the Sound. Such a signal would eventually reach the island of Cairn na Burgh (Cairnburgh), the western outpost of the MacDougall Lords of Lorn which guarded the ocean edge of their realm.

Aros Castle passed to Clan Donald about 1310 after the defeat of Clan MacDougall in the Scottish Wars of Independence when King Robert I (Robert the Bruce) granted the Isle of Mull to Alexander MacDonald of Islay. Aros became part of the chain of castles held by the Clan Donald Lords of the Isles. In September 1354, the MacDougall Chief, Johannes de Larin Dominus Ergadie “John of Lorne, Lord of Argyle” as he was styled in the document, made an indenture with John Lord of the Isles to recognize the MacDonald possession of those former MacDougall islands which had been confirmed by charter in 1344 to John MacDonald, Lord of the Isles, by David II King of Scots. This 1354 indenture effectively recognized Bruce’s seizure of these MacDougall properties in 1310 and his grant of them to the victorious MacDonalds.  The MacDougall Chief formally relinquished MacDougall claims to the Isles for Mull, the north part of Jura, Tiree, and the former MacDougall Treshnish Isles fortresses of Cairnburgh and Dunchonnell in favor of the MacDonalds. In turn the MacDougall Chief received the right to build certain ships and MacDonald approval of King David II’s restoration to the MacDougalls of some forfeited Lorn lands held by the crown.

Aros Castle first appears on record (as ‘Dounarwyse’) in the later 14th C. when it was in the possession of the MacDonald Lords of the Isles who used it as an occasional base during the 1400s. After the suppression of the Clan Donald Lordship of the Isles by James IV in 1493, Aros Castle passed to the MacLeans of Duart. It is believed that treasure from a sunken Spanish galleon of the storm driven Spanish Armada of 1588 is buried amongst the ruins. In 1608, the clan chiefs of the Isles met at Aros Castle, where Lord Ochiltree, acting for James VI, lured them aboard his galley under the guise of attending a church service. Once on board, the chiefs were placed under arrest and taken south to imprisonment at Blackness, Dumbarton and Stirling where they were forced to sign limitations on their chiefly powers in what became known as The Statutes of Iona. This was a heavy legal blow against the clan system by King James VI who was seeking to decrease the power of the Gaels to oppose the central government of Scotland. 

For many years the Campbells complained that they were being harassed by the MacLeans. During the terrible religious wars of the 1640s King Charles I called in September 1645 for the loyal clans of Argyll to support their King against the rebelling Scots Covenanters in the Civil War then underway. In response the Macleans, MacDougalls, Lamonts and other loyal clans rallied to support their rightful king against the rebelling Covenanter Campbells but King Charles I surrendered to the Scots Covenanters in May 1646 leaving his loyal Argyll clans to be defeated by the summer of 1647.  Aros Castle then became a possession the Campbell Duke of Argyll before falling into disuse. In the spring of 1675 the MacLeans met at Aros Castle and agreed to garrison Cairnburgh Castle against the Earl of Argyll. In 1688 Aros was described as ‘ruinous, old, useless and never of any Strength’. It appears to have been garrisoned by the Duke of Argyll’s troops in 1690. Throughout the 18th C. the lands of Aros were farmed by a succession of Campbell tacksmen, but there is no record of the castle having been inhabited at this period. Aros had been eclipsed by Tobermory and its more sheltered harbour.

 Description: The MacDougall Chief’s Hall House at Aros Castle on the Sound of Mull was the largest Hall House in Scotland. Built upon an earlier Norse site by the MacDougalls before it was forfeited and passed to the Clan MacDonald around 1310, Aros Castle was once a strong Hall House and courtyard fortress.  Aros Castle is strategically situated on a flat topped promontory 50 ft. (15 m) above the water at the mouth of the Aros River. It stands upon a grassy knoll atop a conspicuous headland of rock with views commanding the central stretch of the Sound of Mull and the land route from the Aros River to the west of Mull. The promontory upon which the castle stands was originally rimmed with a wall composed of large, flat slabs set on end and forming inner and outer facings with rubble fill.

Today the ruins of Aros Castle are a prominent landmark on the south coast of the Sound of Mull. The remains of Aros Castle, one of the largest Hall Houses in Scotland, occupy the NW portion of the promontory summit overlooking the Sound. The Hall House is more or less oblong, measuring about 84 ft. (25.3 m) from N to S by 41 ft. (12.5 m) with walls of roughly coursed basalt rubble and semi dressed quoining which vary from 5 ft. (1.7 m) to 10 ft. (3 m) thick. This structure was built over an unvaulted cellar. Today the walls stand to a maximum height of about 39 ft. (10 m) on the N and E sea facing sides but little remains of the S and W sides of the Hall House. The Hall House appears to have had two main storeys, with a part attic and a parapet walk above. Architectural details suggest that the Hall House was built in the 13th C. with floors of beam and post construction. An interesting window still exists in the remaining N wall of the Hall House.  It has a pointed arch and the remains of a mullion, indicating the earliest form of tracery in the form of a pierced spandrel. Through this large window with its pointed arch, one could have looked northward across the Sound and watched the galleys sailing past the Castle. The view from its battlements would have extended westward up the full length of the Sound of Mull, and far eastward along the Sound.

           

The rest of the summit was enclosed by a stone curtain wall to form an approximately square bailey .47 acres (.19 ha) in area. The interior of the bailey is much overgrown, but the stone footings of a rectangular building may be seen close to the E wall. Traces of another building lie immediately to the NW. The remains of at least five other buildings can be seen SW of the Hall House, some of which may post date the occupation of the Hall House itself. The curtain wall that formerly enclosed the bailey survives only along parts of the W and S sides. It varies in width from 3 ½ ft. (1.1 m) to 4 ft. (1.7 m) which today now rises to a maximum 3 3/4 ft. (1.2 m). Elsewhere the wall is now only a turf grown mound of debris. Where it could be quarried easily along part of the E side it has been robbed of stone and disappeared completely.

On the landward side the approach to the Castle was protected by a fosse and drawbridge, and the two storey Hall House itself. The principal approach appears to have been along a causeway which crossed the N section of the ditch, then passing beneath the SW corner of the Hall House to enter a gateway in the W wall of the bailey. Another track leads westwards from the gateway, crosses the bottom of the ditch and passes through the outer bank. This track is thought to be of comparatively recent origin

Aros was had a man-made harbour protecting ships. On the shore of the Sound of Mull below the E wall of Aros Castle are two incurving stone walls constructed of beach boulders. Enclosing an area of some 20 x 30m behind a 10m-wide entrance, they form a small harbour, regarded as old in August 1772 by Thomas Pennant:

“Aros Castle, seated on a rock above the sea, and once a seat of MacDonald of the Isles.

At the foot of the rock is the ruin of an oval pier, where he secured his boats’.

 

References:

1 – Technical information has been provided by the Canmore Database site of Historic Environment Scotland and their Aros site may be visited at: https://canmore.org.uk/site/22272/mull-aros-castle

2 – See also the Gazetteer for Scotland site Aros Castle at: 

3 – Journeying in MacDougall Country by Walter M. Macdougall, Past President of the Clan MacDougall Society of North America on pages 38, 146, 215, 216 contains descriptions and notes on this site. This excellent book is available from Lulu.com with profits going to the Dunollie Preservation Fund from its book sales at http://www.lulu.com/shop/walter-macdougall/journeying-in-macdougall-country/paperback/product-2242050.html

4 – Undiscovered Scotland has a web page on this site at: http://www.undiscoveredscotland.co.uk/mull/aroscastle/index.html