Fillan - Relics

Relics

The Mayne was an arm bone, now lost, enclosed in a silver reliquary or casket. Legend has it that King Robert the Bruce requested the bone be brought to the Bannockburn battle site. The deoir, or hereditary keeper of the relic, and the Abbot of Inchaffray Abbey left the bone behind and brought only the reliquary because they didn't want the relic to fall into English possession. Deoir became Anglecized to the name Dewar, the phonetic pronunciation of the Gaidhlig. On the eve of the Bannockburn battle, as the deoir, the abbot and Robert knelt in prayer, a noise came from the reliquary. They looked at the reliquary as the door opened and the bone fell to the floor. The Bruce won the battle the next day and he established a monastery to thank St. Fillan for the victory.

The Quigrich, or saint's staff, crosier, also known as the Coygerach. The crosier was long in the possession of a family of the name of Jore and/or Dewar, who were its hereditary guardians in the Middle Ages. The Dewars, or deoiradh, certainly had it in their custody during 1428, and their right was formally recognized by King James III in 1487. The head of the crosier, which is of silver-gilt with a smaller one of bronze enclosed within it, is in the Museum of Scotland.

The Bernane, a cast bronze bell, is also preserved in the museum and was placed over a sufferer's head during healing rituals in order to heal such afflictions as migraine headaches and more. During the Middle Ages the bell was kept in the care of deoiradh at several Glen Dochart farms. Legend has it that the bell would come to St. Fillan when called. One day a visitor who was unused to seeing bells flying through the air was startled and shot it with an arrow, causing a crack. The Bernane was used in the coronation of King James IV at Scone on 24 June 1488. Another story came about only in the early 19th century, concerned an English tourist stole the bell. The bell was recovered by Bishop Forbes of the Episcopalian Diocese of Brechin 70 years later, in 1869, and had it placed in the Scottish National Museum in Edinburgh for safe keeping.

Still kept at the woolen mill in Killin, are a set of river stones which were believed to have been given healing powers by St. Fillan and a particular sequence of movements of an appropriate stone around the afflicted area was believed to result in a cure. Each stone cured a specific part of the body.