Historic county of Scotland
Orkney
Arcaibh
Low green islands around sheltered seas, with Hoy rising dramatically in the south-west.
Orkney is an island county lying beyond the Pentland Firth, formed from more than seventy islands and skerries. Mainland provides the principal centre, with Kirkwall on its narrow middle; northwards stretches a scatter of inhabited islands, while the southern group gathers around the deep waters of Scapa Flow.
Most of Orkney is low, open and almost treeless, its farmland meeting rocky coast with little intervening relief. Hoy is the great exception, rising abruptly into mountain and sea cliff. The county’s geography is therefore inseparable from the water between its islands: Orkney is not a collection of isolated fragments so much as an archipelago organised around sea routes.
- Norse earldom from 9th Century
- Scottish crown from 1472
- St Magnus Cathedral
- Area: 376 sq miles
- Population: 21,349
- County Top: Ward Hill, Hoy
County geography
Current Census
Contemporary Census profile
Scotland Census 2022. Detailed contemporary statistics are available in the Geographic County Census Explorer.
- Population density
- 56.1 people per sq mi (21.65 people per km²)
Mainland and the island chains
Mainland contains much of Orkney’s population and forms the natural hub of the county. From it, islands extend northwards through several distinct groups and southwards towards Burray and South Ronaldsay.
Sea passages rather than roads historically provided the principal connections, giving Orkney a county structure fundamentally different from mainland shires.
Scapa Flow and Hoy
The southern islands enclose Scapa Flow, one of the world’s great natural anchorages. Its sheltered water contrasts with the exposed Atlantic and North Sea coasts around it.
To the west, Hoy rises sharply above the generally low Orkney landscape. Its mountains and cliffs make it visually exceptional within the county.
A landscape built in stone
Orkney’s scarcity of timber helped make stone central to settlement across thousands of years. Prehistoric houses, chambered tombs, standing stones, later farms and towns all sit unusually visibly within the landscape.
Few counties possess such a continuous relationship between geology, building material and human occupation.
County questions
Questions about Orkney
Is Orkney one island?
No. Orkney is an archipelago comprising Mainland and dozens of other islands and skerries. Together they form the geographic county.
Is Orkney culturally more Norse or Gaelic?
Orkney has a particularly strong Norse inheritance in its place names, dialect and history, later combined with Scottish influences. Its history differs markedly from the predominantly Gaelic development of much of the western Highlands and islands.
County record
Names and continuity
- Formal name
- County of Orkney
- Local name
- Arcaibh
- Name note
- Historic county formed by the Orkney islands; commonly styled simply Orkney.
- County day
- 16 April
- Foundation
- Sheriffdom 16th Century
Orkney, County of Orkney and the Gaelic Arcaibh are forms associated with the county. Its Norse earldom became part of the Scottish Crown’s territories in the later fifteenth century, while the archipelago itself retained its powerful territorial identity.