Hinba: The Lost Isle of St Columba

The Lost Isle of Saint Columba, an exciting new poetry collection in Ulster-Scots and English, by Donegal poet Alan Millar, will be launched, as part of National Heritage Week, in Central Library, Letterkenny on Thursday August 20, at 6.30pm.

This latest collection, in Ulster-Scots, with English ‘owersettins’, builds on Alan’s inaugural collection, Echas Frae the Big Swilly Swally, published in 2023. The collection documents Alan’s ACNI assisted journey from his native Ulster to the southern Hebridean island of Colonsay, steeped in layers of our shared history.

There, his interest in our Mesolithic hunter gatherers ancestors, was enriched by the powerful legacy of Saint Columba and his 6th Century Columban mission, centred on Iona. For the first time, Alan heard of the monastic settlement on the isle of Hinba, mentioned in Vitae Columba, whose actual location has baffled academics and scholars.

Join Alan, as he recreates his own Hinba of the mind, diffusing ancient with contemporary, in a collection that explores and moves beyond the network of our geographical and cultural boundaries, the boundaries between real and imagined.

Published by Colmcille Press, with assistance from the Donegal County Council Artists Bursary