Welcome Stone
Photograph of the Welcome Stone carved by Peter Wild which is top be mounted at the entrance to the Historylinks Heritage Hub extension.
Carved in Caithness Stone, it features a Pictish Horseman and welcome messages in English, Gaelic, Viking Runes and Ogham.
Peter gives the following background information:
"Retired industrial chemist and blacksmith Peter Wild is a past curator of the museum and has been involved with Historylinks since it was built.
Discussing the background to the project he said: “The original museum was opened about 24 years ago and it was felt an extension was needed to house its ever-increasing collections. After many years of planning and fundraising the extension is now complete and ready for fitting out. Part of the vision was to have an artwork at the new entrance welcoming visitors.
I started the craft of letter cutting and relief carving some 20 years ago and designed the word ‘Welcome’, to be spelt out and carved in several languages including Gaelic, Viking and ancient Ogham, all of which are appropriate in East Sutherland.
Strictly speaking Runes and Ogham are just alphabets and can therefore be used to write in any language so I wrote the Ogham translated from the Gaelic ‘Failte’. The Runes are a copy of a runic inscription in Lye Church on Gotland which translates ‘All are welcome’.
The final element is a copy of the Pictish horseman taken from the Edderton church stone as they had no written language. They sometimes added Ogham to their symbol stones as can be seen in the Golspie cross slab in Dunrobin.
Using Caithness Flagstone, it took me several weeks to chisel and is now built into the wall."
Dimensions: digital recording