Baleshare
Template:Short description Template:Use dmy dates Template:Infobox Scottish island
Baleshare (Template:Langx) is a flat tidal island in the Outer Hebrides of Scotland. Baleshare lies to the south-west of North Uist. Its economics and community were boosted by the building of a causeway in 1962. The Template:Convert causeway was built by William Tawse Ltd.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> The island is extremely flat by Hebridean standards, rising to only Template:Convert above sea level and known for its long sandy beach. The two main settlements on the island are Samhla in the east and Teananachar to the west.<ref name=OS/>
Place names and locations
The name means "east farm" or "east town". The "west town" may have been on land that was said to exist to the west of Baleshare, washed away in the sixteenth century, over which it was possible to walk to the Monach Islands at low tide.<ref name=Smith/> The Monachs are some Template:Convert to the west. Another story suggests there was once a land bridge to Kirkibost, Template:Convert to the north.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> The basis for this seems to be a reference in the Exchequer Rolls for 1542 that the valued rental had been decreased due to encroachment by the sea at some unspecified (presumably recent) date.
Archaeology
Two prehistoric settlements have been uncovered, which contain the remains of a circular stone house and pieces of pottery, bone and metal. In common with other sites in the area, they are threatened by coastal erosion.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Barber, John (2003) Bronze Age Farms and Iron Age Farm Mounds of the Outer Hebrides. Scottish Archaeological Report 3. Template:Webarchive Retrieved 18 August 2007.</ref>
Baelshare was chosen as one of the pilot projects for the Shorewatch programme, which aimed to training community groups to search for new archaeological sites and record information on them to be passed on to local and national archives. In the first year of the pilot project, 2005, the island was severely affected by storms. In some cases, up to 50 metres of the coast were lost in a single night. Between August and December 2005, up to four metres of archaeological remains were lost to erosion.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Notable people from Baleshare
- John Fergusson, Nova Scotia politician.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>