St Magnus Cathedral

Put your hand flat against the outer wall. The stone feels slightly rough, almost warm in colour even on a grey day. Look closely and you will see two shades woven together: a deep rust red and a softer, sandy yellow. In the low northern light of Orkney, these blocks seem to glow. Locals have long called this building the Light in the North, and standing here, it is easy to understand why.

You are in Kirkwall, the main town of Orkney, an island group off the northern tip of Scotland. For centuries these islands belonged not to Scotland but to Norway. That fact shapes everything about the cathedral in front of you. It was begun in the twelfth century, in 1137, by a Norse ruler. The style, the saints, and the stories all come from that Viking-age world on the edge of the North Sea.

The story starts with a killing. In the early twelfth century, Orkney was shared between two cousins, Magnus and Haakon, both earls of the islands. Their rivalry grew dangerous. The two men agreed to meet on the small island of Egilsay to make peace. Haakon arrived with far more ships than agreed. Magnus was captured there and put to death with a blow to the head. According to the sagas, he faced his death calmly and prayed for his killers.

After his death, people began to report miracles at his grave. Magnus came to be honoured as a saint. Years later, his nephew Rognvald wanted to claim power in Orkney. He made a promise: if he succeeded, he would build a great stone church in his uncle's name. He did succeed. And so this cathedral began as both an act of faith and a very clever piece of politics.

Now here is the first surprise. In 1919, workers repairing one of the great pillars inside found a hollow space. Inside it was a box of bones. The skull showed damage that matched the saga's account of a blow to the head. Many people believe these are the remains of Saint Magnus himself. Bones thought to be Rognvald's had been found in another pillar decades earlier. The founder and the saint, it seems, rest inside the building's own structure.

When you step inside, the change is immediate. The noise of the street drops away. The nave, the long central hall, feels tall and narrow, lined with heavy round columns and rounded arches. This is the Romanesque style, the solid, round-arched building style of Europe before Gothic architecture. Many visitors notice a strong likeness to Durham Cathedral in northern England, and historians think masons connected with that tradition may have worked here.

The cathedral was not built in one go. Work went on, in stages, for roughly three centuries. You can see this if you look along the building. The older parts carry round arches. The later sections, further east, show pointed arches in the Gothic style. The stone colours also shift and mix. Some red sandstone came from near Kirkwall, while the yellow stone is thought to come from the island of Eday. The building is a patchwork of time.

The second surprise concerns ownership. This cathedral does not belong to a church. It belongs to the people of Kirkwall. Orkney passed from Norway to Scotland in the late fifteenth century. Soon after, in 1486, King James III of Scotland granted the town a charter. That charter gave the cathedral to the town. Today the local council still looks after the building, while the Church of Scotland holds its services here.

As you walk the aisles, look down at the walls near floor level. You will find old gravestones set into the stone. Many date from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. They carry carved skulls, crossed bones, and hourglasses. These symbols are called memento mori, a Latin phrase meaning remember that you will die. To modern eyes they can seem grim. To the people who carved them, they were an honest reminder of a short and uncertain life.

The cathedral also holds memorials to more recent loss. One of the most moving is for HMS Royal Oak, a British battleship. In 1939, at the start of the Second World War, a German submarine slipped into Scapa Flow, the great sheltered harbour of Orkney. It sank the ship, and more than eight hundred men died. The ship's bell now hangs in the cathedral, and the names of the dead are remembered here.

Look too for the memorial to John Rae, a nineteenth-century explorer born in Orkney. He spent years mapping the frozen Arctic of northern Canada. He learned survival skills from the Inuit people and travelled huge distances on foot. His memorial shows him lying asleep, wrapped in his coat, with a book and a gun beside him. For many years Orkney felt he never received full credit for his discoveries. This stone is the islands' answer.

If you have time, step back outside and look across the road. The ruins there are the Bishop's Palace and the Earl's Palace. In 1263, the Norwegian king Haakon the Fourth died at the Bishop's Palace after a failed campaign against Scotland. His body rested for a time in this cathedral before it was carried home to Norway. It was a quiet turning point. Within two centuries, the islands themselves would pass to the Scottish crown.

Before you leave, stand for a moment on the paving and look up at the west front. Watch how the red and yellow stone changes as clouds move over the town. Listen for the gulls, and for the wind coming off the harbour just down the street. This building has stood through Norse earls, Scottish kings, and two world wars. As you walk away, glance back once more. Even from the harbour, that warm red stone is easy to find.