Bragar

Bragar
Scottish Gaelic: Bràgar
Language Scottish Gaelic
English
Council area Na h-Eileanan Siar
Country Scotland
Sovereign state United Kingdom
Police Northern
Fire Highlands and Islands
Ambulance Scottish
EU Parliament Scotland
UK Parliament Na h-Eileanan an Iar
Scottish Parliament Western Isles
List of places: UK • Scotland •

Bragar (Scottish Gaelic: Bràgar) is a village on the west side of the Isle of Lewis in Scotland, 14 miles from the island's only town, Stornoway.

Residents are mainly Gaelic speaking, and many work as crofters.

The village's best-known landmark is a whalebone arch, made in 1921 from the jawbone of an 80 foot long blue whale which was beached on the shore the year before. It also has a post office, a war memorial, and a school.

A ruined Iron Age broch, Dun Bragar, stands in Loch an Dùin in South Bragar, 80 metres from the road and connected to the lochside by a causeway. In the mid-20th century local people took away many of its stones, and the structure is no longer safe.

The remains of a chapel, Teampall Eòin (the Temple of John the Baptist), built in the 15th century or earlier, lie inside a walled compound. This also contains a cemetery, now known as Cill Sgàire (Zechariah's cemetery) after Zechariah MacAulay who fell in a skirmish between the MacAulays of Uig and the Morrisons of Ness.

Rory 'Dall' Morison (Roderick Morrison), an Clàrsair Dall, the harpist who wrote Òran Mòr MhicLeòid, was born in Bragar in 1656.

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