Law Ting Holm

Law Ting Holm

Old Norse name	Lawthing Holm
Meaning of name	flat island of the parliament
Location
OS grid reference	HU416427
Physical geography
Island group	Shetland
Area	<1 ha
Highest elevation	<5 metres (16 ft)
Administration
Sovereign state	United Kingdom
Country	Scotland
Council area	Shetland Islands Council

Law Ting Holm (also known as Tingaholm) is a small promontory at the north end of the freshwater Loch of Tingwall, Mainland Shetland, Scotland. It was once an islet entirely surrounded by water, joined to the shore by a stone causeway 5'6" wide and 140' long. In the 1850s the levels of the loch were lowered and the holm evolved to its present form. The Loch of Tingwall is west of the town of Lerwick and has one additional island - Holm of Setter.

Law Ting Holm

Norse parliament

Law Ting Holm was the location of Shetland's local parliament until the late 16th Century. There are documents relating to assemblies taking place in Tingwall from as early as 1307, although the only reference to the Thing (assembly) meeting on the holm itself comes from a letter dated 1532. Officials are thought to have sat on stone benches on the holm while delegates gathered on the slope opposite. In poor weather the thing probably met in the neighbouring church.

In the 1570s Earl Robert Stewart moved the thing to nearby Scalloway Castle, although the holm was used once more in 1577 when over 700 Shetlanders brought a complaint against the local Foud, Lawrence Bruce, before royal comissioners from Edinburgh.

Writing in 1774, Low reports that the stone seats had been ripped up to create more room for grazing, although in 1809 Edmonston suggests that the sites of a stone table and bench can still be traced upon the holm. Excavation undertaken in 2011 as part of the HERA funded Assembly Project suggest that there has been activity on the site itself since the Iron Age, and that the causeway continued to be maintained well into the 19th century.

Other Thing Sites

Thing (assembly) sites are found throughout Northern Europe, as a result of a shared Norse heritage. They are often identifiable by their shared thing, ting, ding and fing place names. Examples include Þingvellir in Iceland, Tynwald Hill in the Isle of Man, Fingay Hill in England, and Dingwall in Scotland.

Tingwall is just one of a umber of 'ting' names found in Shetland. The parish names Sandsting, Aithsting, Delting, Lunnasting and Nesting all suggest that a wider network of local thing sites once operated in the islands . The names Gnípnaþing, Þvætaþing and Rauðarþing can also be found in early documents, but have since gone out of use.

THING Project

Law Ting Holm is one of a number of sites included in the Northern Periphery Programme's three year transatlantic THING Project. The Project, which includes partners from Iceland, Norway, the Faroe Islands, Orkney, Shetland, Highland Scotland and the Isle of Man, aims to explore and promote the shared links between the Northern European thing sites, and develop sustainable business and tourism opportunities in each of the partner regions.

References

• Ballantyne, John, H. & Smith, Brian. 2009. 'Shetland Documents 1195-1579', Lerwick. Shetland Times Ltd & Shetland Council. ISBN 1 898852 48 0
• Coolen, J. and N. Mehler, 2011: Archaeological Excatavations at the Law Ting Holm, Tingwall, Shetland 2011. Data Structure Report/Interim Report. TAP Field Report No 4. http://www.khm.uio.no/prosjekter/assembly_project/pdf/Tingwall%20DSR%20small.pdf Accessed 28/05/2012
• Edmonston, Arthur. (1809) 'View of the Ancient and Present State of the Zetland Islands' 1
• Graham-Campbell, James and Batey, Colleen E. (1998) Vikings in Scotland: An Archaeological Survey. Edinburgh University Press. ISBN 978-0-7486-0641-2
• Low, George. (1774 [1879]) A Tour through the Islands of Orkney and Schetland, Kirkwall p.154.
• Smith, Brian, (2009) On the nature of tings: Shetland´s law courts from the middle ages until 1611. 'New Shetlander' No. 250, 2009, 37-45.