One of the ancient castles still found standing in the territory of Great Britain is the Skibo Castle. This ancient mansion is situated in the western part of a town named Dornoch, in the County of Sutherland in Scotland. It stands very close to the coastal region of the Dornoch Firth. The Castle was built by Gilbert de Moravia, who happened to be the Bishop of Caithness and a founder of the Dornoch Cathedral in the year 1186.
Now the question is why such a name is given to the Skibo Castle? Actually in the Scottish or Gaelic language, the term skibo means place of Peace. That is just the reason why the bishop had given such a name. The castle was used as a place of residence for the several bishops that followed after the death of Gilbert. Bishops lived in it till the year 1545. The Church gave the castle for John Gray to live in as a step to reinforce their alliance, as Protestants were becoming more and more threatening at that time.
However, in the year 1745, John Gray decided to leave the Skibo Castle. It was then bought by Andrew Carnegie, who was an industrialist, businessman and philanthropist. He was the person who found the US Steel. Anyway, he took the castle up for a one year lease. However, by then the castle was in a very bad condition and needed immediate repair. Andrew spent a lot of money repairing it to make it suitable for proper dwelling.
Andrew Carnegie made a lot of contributions in increasing the scenic beauty of the Skibo Castle. He made an 18 hole big golf course. Really, he changed the total look of this huge mansion and it is mainly because of his reconstruction work that the castle still stands solidly. In order to provide a feeling of gratitude for this act of safekeeping the castle, the café and the gym that is found in the Carnegie Mellon University has been named as the Skibo Coffeehouse.
The Skibo Castle was later sold to Peter de Savary, who was the member of the Carnegie Club. He kept it as his asset till 2003, after which a businessman named Ellis Short bought it from him. Besides, the castle has also been a home to various celebrity activities of the recent times. It has been the wedding place for people like Madonna, Ashley Judd, Robert Carlyle and Sam Torrence.
Skibo Castle
