Worth fighting for: Castle priced £31,000 less than a typical home
THE UK’S most northerly castle is back up for sale – with a starting bid guide price of less than a typical Scottish house.
Muness Castle, on the isle of Unst, is on offer with an “opening bid” price of £149,000.
The average house price in Scotland was at £180,000 at the end of last year, according to the Office for National Statistics.
The protected Grade A-listed building, said to be the most northerly on the Shetland Isles, had been bought last year in a five-hour online auction with a winning bid of £184,000,
£54,000 over the guide price, but could not complete.
Historic Environment Scotland (HES), which runs and maintains the castle as a museum, has previously said it will keep its “guardianship”.
The castle, which is normally free to visit and open all year round was built in 1598 for Laurence Bruce of Cultmalindie, a descendant of Robert the Bruce.
Gavin Forbes Farquhar, the owner of the castle, has said that he wanted to sell the 16th-century castle and other assets he holds in Scotland because of the “communist” SNP Government running the country into the ground.
He bought the land with the castle ruin in the island of Unst for £65,000 in 2006, and said in April last year that circumstances were not favourable for entrepreneurs.
Mr Farquhar, who owns Ecclesgreig Estate at St Cyrus, Aberdeenshire, had planned to open a tourism business at the castle.
Designated as a national monument in 1953, it is being sold as an “opportunity to purchase your own 16th-century castle set within 240 acres of land in stunning location”.
The sale by Future Property Auctions also includes a number of crofter’s cottages.
The auctioneers, who will open the sale today, have stated that it is believed the purchase comes with a barony title, however that has not been investigated.
The auctioneers claim that gold and copper reserves were discovered in a recently commissioned geological survey. But it is unclear whether mining operations will be permitted on the land.
They say the auction provides a “unique opportunity to purchase the most northerly castle in the British isles”.
Today the 73ft by 26ft castle retains circular towers at the north and south
corners. According to the auctioneers, the ground floor and first storey “survive mostly intact with corbelling supports for small turrets on the east and west corners”.
HES has previously said that public access to the castle will not change if the title to the property passes to a new owner.
The agency said it will continue to have full control and management of the property under the guardianship agreement in place.
Muness Castle is a property in care of Scottish ministers under the 1979 Ancient Monument Act, which passes full control and management to Scottish ministers under guardianship,
with HES undertaking that management and control on behalf of ministers.
According to HES, the castle is of national importance “because of what it contributes to our understanding of late 16th to early 17th century domestic and defensive architecture”.
In its guide on the castle it says: “Its significance is further enhanced by the role that its builder, Laurence Bruce, played in the political history of Shetland during the time of the
Stewart earls of Orkney and by the potential that its below-ground remains have for shedding light on the material culture of the period. Its importance is
reflected in its status as a Property in Care of the Secretary of State for Scotland.”
HES further describes it as a “remarkably fine tower house of the late 1500s”.
“Here it’s easy to appreciate how the family, servants and visitors would have used the internal space of the castle,” HES says.
According to HES, the castle has other fine architectural touches, including a variety of gun and shot holes, small turrets with chequer-pattern corbels and dummy gunloops.