Clach a’ Choire

Also known as:
Clach na Choire, Clach-a-Coille and The Ringing Stone (Balephetrish)
Nearest town:
Tobermory (49km ENE)
OS reference:
NM027487
OS sheet:
46
Latitude:
56° 32' 9.5 N
Longitude:
6° 50' 12.21 W
Added to TMA by

Images

Image of Clach a’ Choire (Cup and Ring Marks / Rock Art) by thelonious

01/09/2018 – Clach a’ Choire. The cup marks are big. They looked to me like they have been have polished (if that’s the right word to use?) over the years by the many hands of visitors to this great stone.

thelonious
thelonious Sep 8, 2018
Image of Clach a’ Choire (Cup and Ring Marks / Rock Art) by Howburn Digger

The late prof Mick Ashton next to Clach a’ Choire.

Image credit: Howburn Digger's British Archaeology Mag Scans Archive.
Howburn Digger
Howburn Digger Jan 2, 2015

Articles

Clach a’ Choire

markj99
markj99 Oct 26, 2025

I flew into Tiree from Glasgow via Loganair: there was only a curtain separating the 6 passengers from the pilots. I picked up a hire car from the airport and spent a pleasant week touring this peaceful island. I would definitely recommend enthusiastic TMA’s to follow in my footsteps.

Directions to Tiree Ringing Stone: Take the B8068 N out of Scarinish. After c. 0.7 mile turn right onto the B6089 Caoles road. Follow it for c. 1.4 miles, then turn left for Vaul. Stay on this single track road with passing places for c. 1.2 miles until you reach a grassy car park at the end of the public road at NM 04549 49069. Walk NW along a grass track towards the sea for c. 175 yards. Turn right for c. 130 yards towards a ruined croft. Dun Beag Vaul is c. 70 yards NE of the croft on the edge of the coast. Walk c. 200 yards SW to rejoin the path. Follow the winding path W for c. 175 yards to Dun Mor (Vaul). Continue along the coastal path heading SW then W for c. 1.1 miles to reach a sandy bay at NM 0271 4864. The Ringing Stone is a large grey boulder c. 75 yards NNW in a rocky strip beyond the sand. The stone is unmistakable: it has multiple large cup marks, 53 in total according to the nearby info board. It is located at NM 02679 48689. My walking route is viewable on Clach a’ Choire (The Ringing Stone), Tiree.

Clach a’ Choire

markj99
markj99 Sep 6, 2018

I approached Clach a’ Choire from Vaul. I visited Dun Mor Vaul first then struck out west along some moorland hugging the coast. After about a mile I saw a large boulder on the edge of the sea. As well as taking photos I tried the ringing experiment with a large rock with surprisingly resonant results. The number of cup marks on the rock are impressive, though I didn’t feel it necessary to check the 53 suggested by the imaginative info board. All in all, a curious site. Further details of Clach a’ Choire are available in Tiree, Balephetrish.

Folklore

Clach a’ Choire
Cup and Ring Marks / Rock Art
Rhiannon
Rhiannon Jul 11, 2013

Perhaps, unless we except the so-called “Druidical” Standing-stone in Balinoe, the oldest memorial in Tyree, older even than the Culdee Churches, is the Clach a Choire, the ringing-stone – literally the “kettle” stone- which stands a little removed from the shore near Balephetrish, not far from the old marble quarries. It is a mass of stone, roughly cubical, balanced upon one edge, and computed to weigh about ten tons. When struck, no matter where, or however slightly, it sends forth a clear ringingnote. The people have a tradition that the stone is hollow and contains gold, but happily they have also another tradition to the effect that when the ringing-stone is cleft, Tyree will sink. On the surface of the stone are some thirty circular indentations, which I think most persons familiar with such things in other places, would unhesitatingly suppose to be cup-markings, but which, it is only fair to say, are also explained away as traces of many years of experimental stone-tapping. Apart from the fact that it seems hardly likely that even in the course of ages, native curiosity would compass so prominent a result, there is nothing to differentiate this rock from others admittedly “cup-marked” elsewhere, and they are found in great numbers in the British Isles and in Scandinavia.

From The Outer Isles by A Goodrich-Freer, 1902.

I rather like the wording of this earlier commentary on the rock:

At Balphetrish there is the famous Ringing Stone. Its dimensions are 7 feet by 6 square, and 4 1/2 feet thick. It is of a dull grey colour, very hard and compact, and totally different from the surrounding rocks. It is evidently spotted with stars of black mica. Its hardness is so great that it is not possible with a common hammer to break off even the smallest bit. It is not intersected by any vein or cutter. Its solidity and equal texture must account for the clear metallic sound, for when struck on any place with a stone or a hammer, it sounds or rings like brass or cast iron. It has for ages past excited the admiration of the common people.

It excites my admiration too and I’d definitely like to see it, but I would try to resist trying to break a bit off.
From The Scots Magazine volume 60 (1798).

Link

Clach a’ Choire
Cup and Ring Marks / Rock Art
Rhiannon
Rhiannon Sep 2, 2004
Canmore

Photos of the cup-marked stone in its dramatic bay.

The record says “There can be no doubt that these markings are artificial and, while several of them are unusually large, the presence among them of many small circular cups, indistinguishable from prehistoric cup-markings, suggest that the whole assemblage may be prehistoric in origin (RCAHMS 1980). ”

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