The Township

Defined as a community of rural tenants, our "Township" of "Baile Gean" (Gaelic: "The Township of Goodwill") is based on the original larger Badenoch settlement of Easter Raitts,   situated high up the Spey valley side above the current hamlet of Lynchat. Our early 1700s township recreation is founded on archaeological excavation, both physical and documentary research and practical experimentation.

Raitts, the principal settlement prior to the 1790s "planned town" of Kingussie, was on a pack horse and drove route that crossed the River Spey to an equivalent township of Ruthven on the south side.   Although there is evidence of prehistoric activity at the site, the surviving township remains are thought to be medieval through to the early 1800s.

Survey of the Raitts site has revealed over thirty main structures.   These include dwellings both with and without integral "byres" (cattle bays), barns, corn drying "kiln barns" , enclosures including possibly for the overnight holding of cattle being driven south, and the "head dyke" , a wall of alternating layers of turf and stone that defined the township boundary.

We have used part of the "footprint" of Raitts, indicated by such as surviving stone foundations, doorways, cobbling, byre drains and domestic hearths, on which to base our re-creation. Where we have re-created a structure it is faithful to the revealed archaeological evidence other than our overall township plan which is a mirror image of the original owing to our having to accommodate the Museum site's landscape.

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