MacLeod's Tables — The Feast Refused

Healabhal Mhor and Healabhal Bheag, Duirinish, Isle of Skye, Scotland

Two flat-topped hills above Dunvegan where the MacLeod chief once held a feast for King James V on the open mountain, after being mocked for his "poor table".

Healabhal Mhor and Healabhal Bheag — the Great and Little Holy Mountains — are two flat-topped basalt peaks on the Duirinish peninsula of Skye. Their summits are unnaturally flat, as if planed by hand. They are visible from most of western Skye and have been used as a landmark by fishermen for a thousand years. The folklore comes from a true event in 1538. James V of Scotland, visiting Edinburgh-fashioned nobles, was overheard remarking that the MacLeod chief of Dunvegan kept "but a rude table for so great a hospitality." The remark made its way to Skye and the MacLeod chief, instead of taking offence, invited the king to feast at his table. The chief led him not to Dunvegan Castle but to the summit of Healabhal Mhor. There he had laid a banquet on the open mountain: roast deer, salmon, bread, wine — and instead of candelabra, hundreds of MacLeod clansmen standing in ranks around the table, each holding a flaming torch. The chief asked the king whether any table in his palaces could equal it. The story is well-attested in Highland tradition and is the origin of the flat tops' English nickname. The folklore overlay is that on midsummer night, the torches can still be seen — moving in lines around the flat summit, then dispersing down the slopes at dawn. Skye fishermen returning before sunrise have reported them. They are visible only from the sea; from inland, the mountains are dark.