Knocklearoch, in Islay, stands for Cnoc-Cleireach – i.e., the Hill of the Clerics. The following tradition regarding the locality, as told by Mr Hector MacLean of Ballygrant, Islay, is cited by Captain Thomas: “There is a tradition that two clerics were hanged, and that the day on which they were hanged was remarkably stormy. So it has been a byword in Islay ever since I remember, when a cold and stormy day came on, ‘This day is worse than the day on which the clerics were hanged.’ At Knocklearoch are two monoliths called Na Cleirich, ‘The Clerics,’ and under these, tradition relates, the two clerics were buried. (PSAS vol. xvi, p267).
From The influence of the pre-reformation church on Scottish place-names, 1904, by J.M. Mackinlay.
Fab, no sooner do we have pictures than we have folklore.
One tries (intermittently).
It's just nice that these places were / are found notable enough by people living in the same landscape to require an explanation. And the stories might seem a bit thin compared to the experience of actually being there. But I like that it's a reminder that someone built them once, because often they seem very undomesticated to me when you have to travel to these wild places. We don't really know what the real reasons for building them were. I mean they could be a lot more mundane than religious people being put to death on a stormy day.
One would assume that stones back then were not at a jaunty angle :-)