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Outer Hebrides

The Outer Hebrides or Western Isles (na h-Eileanan Siar, na h-Eileanan an Iar  or na h-Innse Gall; Waster Isles), sometimes known as the Long Isle or Long Island (an t-Eilean Fada), is an island chain off the west coast of mainland Scotland. The islands are geographically coextensive with Comhairle nan Eilean Siar, one of the 32 unitary council areas of Scotland. They form part of the archipelago of the Hebrides, separated from the Scottish mainland and from the Inner Hebrides by the waters of the Minch, the Little Minch, and the Sea of the Hebrides.

Most of the islands have a bedrock formed from ancient metamorphic rocks, and the climate is mild and oceanic. The 15 inhabited islands have a total population of and there are more than 50 substantial uninhabited islands. The distance from Barra Head to the Butt of Lewis is roughly 210 km.

There are various important prehistoric structures, many of which pre-date the first written references to the islands by Roman and Greek authors. The Western Isles became part of the Norse kingdom of the Suðreyjar, which lasted for over 400 years, until sovereignty over the Outer Hebrides was transferred to Scotland by the Treaty of Perth in 1266. Control of the islands was then held by clan chiefs, principal amongst whom were the MacLeods, MacDonalds, Mackenzies and MacNeils. The Highland Clearances of the 19th century had a devastating effect on many communities, and it is only in recent years that population levels have ceased to decline. Much of the land is now under local control, and commercial activity is based on tourism, crofting, fishing, and weaving.

Sea transport is crucial for those who live and work in the Outer Hebrides, and a variety of ferry services operate between the islands and to mainland Scotland. Modern navigation systems now minimise the dangers, but in the past the stormy seas in the region have claimed many ships. Religion, music and sport are important aspects of local culture, and there are numerous designated conservation areas to protect the natural environment.

Etymology
The earliest surviving written references relating to the islands were made by Pliny the Elder in his Natural History, in which he states that there are 30 Hebudes, and makes a separate reference to Dumna, which Watson (1926) concludes is unequivocally the Outer Hebrides. Writing about 80 years later, in 140–150 AD, Ptolemy, drawing on the earlier naval expeditions of Agricola, also distinguished between the Ebudes, of which he writes there were only five (and thus possibly meaning the Inner Hebrides) and Dumna. Dumna is cognate with the Early Celtic dumnos and means the "deep-sea isle". Pliny probably took his information from Pytheas of Massilia who visited Britain sometime between 322 and 285 BC. It is possible that Ptolemy did as well, as Agricola's information about the west coast of Scotland was of poor quality. Breeze also suggests that Dumna might be Lewis and Harris, the largest island of the Outer Hebrides although he conflates this single island with the name "Long Island". Watson (1926) states that the meaning of Ptolemy's Eboudai is unknown and that the root may be pre-Celtic. Murray (1966) claims that Ptolemy's Ebudae was originally derived from the Old Norse Havbredey, meaning "isles on the edge of the sea". This idea is often repeated but no firm evidence of this derivation has emerged.

Other early written references include the flight of the Nemed people from Ireland to Domon, which is mentioned in the 12th-century Lebor Gabála Érenn and a 13th-century poem concerning Raghnall mac Gofraidh, then the heir to the throne of Mann and the Isles, who is said to have "broken the gate of Magh Domhna". Magh Domhna means "the plain of Domhna (or Domon)", but the precise meaning of the text is not clear.

In Irish mythology the islands were the home of the Fomorians, described as "huge and ugly" and "ship men of the sea". They were pirates, extracting tribute from the coasts of Ireland and one of their kings was Indech mac Dé Domnand (i.e. Indech, son of the goddess Domnu, who ruled over the deep seas).

Geography

The islands form an archipelago whose major islands are Lewis and Harris, North Uist, Benbecula, South Uist, and Barra. Lewis and Harris has an area of 2178.98 sqkm and is the largest island in Scotland and the third-largest in the British Isles, after Great Britain and Ireland. It incorporates Lewis in the north and Harris in the south, both of which are frequently referred to as individual islands, although they are connected by land. The island does not have a single name in either English or Gaelic, and is referred to as "Lewis and Harris", "Lewis with Harris", "Harris with Lewis" etc.

The largest islands are deeply indented by arms of the sea such as Loch Ròg, Loch Seaforth and Loch nam Madadh. There are also more than 7,500 freshwater lochs in the Outer Hebrides, about 24% of the total for the whole of Scotland. North and South Uist and Lewis, in particular, have landscapes with a high percentage of fresh water and a maze and complexity of loch shapes. Harris has fewer large bodies of water but has innumerable small lochans. Loch Langavat on Lewis is 11 km long, and has several large islands in its midst, including Eilean Mòr. Although Loch Suaineabhal has only 25% of Loch Langavat's surface area, it has a mean depth of 33 m and is the most voluminous on the island. Of Loch Sgadabhagh on North Uist it has been said that "there is probably no other loch in Britain which approaches Loch Scadavay in irregularity and complexity of outline." Loch Bì is South Uist's largest loch and at 8 km long it all but cuts the island in two.

Much of the western coastline of the islands is machair, a fertile low-lying dune pastureland. Lewis is comparatively flat, and largely consists of treeless moors of blanket peat. The highest eminence is Mealisval at 574 m in the south west. Most of Harris is mountainous, with large areas of exposed rock and Clisham, the archipelago's only Corbett, reaches 799 m in height. North and South Uist and Benbecula (sometimes collectively referred to as The Uists) have sandy beaches and wide cultivated areas of machair to the west and virtually uninhabited mountainous areas to the east. The highest peak here is Beinn Mhòr at 620 m. The Uists and their immediate outliers have a combined area of 745.4 sqkm. This includes the Uists themselves and the islands linked to them by causeways and bridges. Barra is 58.75 sqkm in extent and has a rugged interior, surrounded by machair and extensive beaches.

The scenic qualities of the islands are reflected in the fact that three of Scotland's forty national scenic areas (NSAs) are located here. The national scenic areas are defined so as to identify areas of exceptional scenery and to ensure its protection from inappropriate development, and are considered to represent the type of scenic beauty "popularly associated with Scotland and for which it is renowned". The three NSA within the Outer Hebrides are:

 * South Lewis, Harris and North Uist National Scenic Area covers the mountainous south west of Lewis, all of Harris, the Sound of Harris and the northern part of North Uist.
 * An area of the south west coast of South Uist is designated as the South Uist Machair National Scenic Area.
 * The archipelago of St Kilda is also listed as an NSA, alongside many other conservation designations.

Flora and fauna
Much of the archipelago is a protected habitat, including both the islands and the surrounding waters. There are 53 Sites of Special Scientific Interest of which the largest are Loch an Duin, North Uist (151 sqkm) and North Harris (127 sqkm). South Uist is considered the best place in the UK for the aquatic plant Slender Naiad, which is a European Protected Species.

There has been considerable controversy over hedgehogs on the Uists. Hedgehogs are not native to the islands but were introduced in the 1970s to reduce garden pests. Their spread posed a threat to the eggs of ground-nesting wading birds. In 2003 Scottish Natural Heritage undertook culls of hedgehogs in the area, but these were halted in 2007; trapped animals are now relocated to the mainland.

Nationally important populations of breeding waders are present in the Outer Hebrides, including common redshank, dunlin, lapwing and ringed plover. The islands also provide a habitat for other important species such as corncrake, hen harrier, golden eagle and otter. Offshore, basking shark and various species of whale and dolphin can often be seen, and the remoter islands' seabird populations are of international significance. St Kilda has 60,000 northern gannets, amounting to 24% of the world population; 49,000 breeding pairs of Leach's petrel, up to 90% of the European population; and 136,000 pairs of puffin and 67,000 northern fulmar pairs, about 30% and 13% of the respective UK totals. Mingulay is an important breeding ground for razorbills, with 9,514 pairs, 6.3% of the European population.

The bumblebee Bombus jonellus var. hebridensis is endemic to the Hebrides and there are local variants of the dark green fritillary and green-veined white butterflies. The St Kilda wren is a subspecies of wren whose range is confined to the islands whose name it bears.

Population

The islands' total population was 26,502 at the 2001 census, and the 2011 figure was 27,684. During the same period Scottish island populations as a whole grew by 4% to 103,702. The largest settlement in the Outer Hebrides is Stornoway on Lewis, which has a population of about 8,100.

The population estimate for 2019 was 26,720 according to a Comhairle nan Eilean Siar report which added that "the population of the Outer Hebrides is ageing" and that "young adults [...] leave the islands for further education or employment purposes". Of the total population, 6,953 people reside in the "Stornoway settlement Laxdale (Lacasdal), Sandwick (Sanndabhaig) and Newmarket" with the balance distributed over 280 townships.

In addition to the major North Ford (Oitir Mhòr) and South Ford causeways that connect North Uist to Benbecula via the northern of the Grimsays, and another causeway from Benbecula to South Uist, several other islands are linked by smaller causeways or bridges. Great Bernera and Scalpay have bridge connections to Lewis and Harris respectively, with causeways linking Baleshare and Berneray to North Uist; Eriskay to South Uist; Flodaigh, Fraoch-Eilean and the southern Grimsay to Benbecula; and the Vatersay Causeway linking Vatersay to Barra. This means that all the inhabited islands are now connected to at least one other island by a land transport route.

Uninhabited islands

There are more than fifty uninhabited islands greater in size than 40 ha in the Outer Hebrides, including the Barra Isles, Flannan Isles, Monach Islands, the Shiant Islands and the islands of Loch Ròg. In common with the other main island chains of Scotland, many of the more remote islands were abandoned during the 19th and 20th centuries, in some cases after continuous habitation since the prehistoric period. More than 35 such islands have been identified in the Outer Hebrides alone. On Barra Head, for example, Historic Scotland have identified eighty-three archaeological sites on the island, the majority being of a pre-medieval date. In the 18th century, the population was over fifty, but the last native islanders had left by 1931. The island became completely uninhabited by 1980 with the automation of the lighthouse.

Some of the smaller islands continue to contribute to modern culture. The "Mingulay Boat Song", although evocative of island life, was written after the abandonment of the island in 1938 and Taransay hosted the BBC television series Castaway 2000. Others have played a part in Scottish history. On 4 May 1746, the "Young Pretender" Charles Edward Stuart hid on Eilean Liubhaird with some of his men for four days whilst Royal Navy vessels patrolled the Minch.

Smaller isles and skerries and other island groups pepper the North Atlantic surrounding the main islands. Some are not geologically part of the Outer Hebrides, but are administratively and in most cases culturally, part of Comhairle nan Eilean Siar. 73 km to the west of Lewis lies St Kilda, now uninhabited except for a small military base. A similar distance to the north of Lewis are North Rona and Sula Sgeir, two small and remote islands. While Rona used to support a small population who grew grain and raised cattle, Sula Sgeir is an inhospitable rock. Thousands of northern gannets nest here, and by special arrangement some of their young, known as gugas, are harvested annually by the men of Ness. The status of Rockall, which is 367 km to the west of North Uist and which the Island of Rockall Act 1972 decreed to be a part of the Western Isles, remains a matter of international dispute.

Settlements
A 2018 development plan divides the Outer Hebrides settlements into four types: Stornoway Core, Main Settlements, Rural Settlements and Outwith Settlements. The Main Settlements are Tarbert, Lochmaddy, Balivanich, Lochboisdale/Daliburgh, Greater Castlebay and Greater Stornoway (excluding Stornoway core).

Combining with data from the National Records of Scotland, the principal settlements are:

The dispersed settlements consisting of Rural Settlements and Outwith Settlements account for ca. two thirds of the population of the council area, since the total population of the table is about 9,000.

Geology

Most of the islands have a bedrock formed from Lewisian gneiss. These are amongst the oldest rocks in Europe, having been formed in the Precambrian period up to three billion years ago. In addition to the Outer Hebrides, they form basement deposits on the Scottish mainland west of the Moine Thrust and on the islands of Coll and Tiree. These rocks are largely igneous in origin, mixed with metamorphosed marble, quartzite and mica schist and intruded by later basaltic dykes and granite magma. The gneiss's delicate pink colours are exposed throughout the islands and it is sometimes referred to by geologists as "The Old Boy".

Granite intrusions are found in the parish of Barvas in west Lewis, and another forms the summit plateau of the mountain Roineabhal in Harris. The granite here is anorthosite, and is similar in composition to rocks found in the mountains of the Moon. There are relatively small outcrops of Triassic sandstone at Broad Bay near Stornoway. The Shiant Islands and St Kilda are formed from much later tertiary basalt and basalt and gabbros respectively. The sandstone at Broad Bay was once thought to be Torridonian or Old Red Sandstone.

Climate
The Outer Hebrides have a cool temperate climate that is remarkably mild and steady for such a northerly latitude, due to the influence of the North Atlantic Current. The average temperature for the year is 6 °C (44 °F) in January and 14 °C (57 °F) in summer. The average annual rainfall in Lewis is 1100 mm and sunshine hours range from 1,100 to 1,200 per year. The summer days are relatively long and May to August is the driest period. Winds are a key feature of the climate and even in summer there are almost constant breezes. According to the writer W. H. Murray if a visitor asks an islander for a weather forecast "he will not, like a mainlander answer dry, wet or sunny, but quote you a figure from the Beaufort Scale." There are gales one day in six at the Butt of Lewis and small fish are blown onto the grass on top of 190 metre (620 ft) high cliffs at Barra Head during winter storms.

Prehistory

The Hebrides were originally settled in the Mesolithic era and have a diversity of important prehistoric sites. Eilean Dòmhnuill in Loch Olabhat on North Uist was constructed around 3200–2800 BC and may be Scotland's earliest crannog (a type of artificial island). The Callanish Stones, dating from about 2900 BC, are the finest example of a stone circle in Scotland, the 13 primary monoliths of between one and five metres high creating a circle about 13 m in diameter. Cladh Hallan on South Uist, the only site in the UK where prehistoric mummies have been found, and the impressive ruins of Dun Carloway broch on Lewis both date from the Iron Age.

History
In Scotland, the Celtic Iron Age way of life, often troubled but never extinguished by Rome, re-asserted itself when the legions abandoned any permanent occupation in 211 AD. Hanson (2003) writes: "For many years it has been almost axiomatic in studies of the period that the Roman conquest must have had some major medium or long-term impact on Scotland. On present evidence that cannot be substantiated either in terms of environment, economy, or, indeed, society. The impact appears to have been very limited. The general picture remains one of broad continuity, not of disruption ... The Roman presence in Scotland was little more than a series of brief interludes within a longer continuum of indigenous development." The Romans' direct impact on the Highlands and Islands was scant and there is no evidence that they ever actually landed in the Outer Hebrides.

The later Iron Age inhabitants of the northern and western Hebrides were probably Pictish, although the historical record is sparse. Hunter (2000) states that in relation to King Bridei I of the Picts in the sixth century AD: "As for Shetland, Orkney, Skye and the Western Isles, their inhabitants, most of whom appear to have been Pictish in culture and speech at this time, are likely to have regarded Bridei as a fairly distant presence." The island of Pabbay is the site of the Pabbay Stone, the only extant Pictish symbol stone in the Outer Hebrides. This 6th century stele shows a flower, V-rod and lunar crescent to which has been added a later and somewhat crude cross.

Norse control

Viking raids began on Scottish shores towards the end of the 8th century AD and the Hebrides came under Norse control and settlement during the ensuing decades, especially following the success of Harald Fairhair at the Battle of Hafrsfjord in 872. In the Western Isles Ketill Flatnose was the dominant figure of the mid 9th century, by which time he had amassed a substantial island realm and made a variety of alliances with other Norse leaders. These princelings nominally owed allegiance to the Norwegian crown, although in practice the latter's control was fairly limited. Norse control of the Hebrides was formalised in 1098 when Edgar, King of Scotland formally signed the islands over to Magnus III of Norway. The Scottish acceptance of Magnus III as King of the Isles came after the Norwegian king had conquered Orkney, the Hebrides and the Isle of Man in a swift campaign earlier the same year, directed against the local Norwegian leaders of the various islands‘ petty kingdoms. By capturing the islands Magnus imposed a more direct royal control, although at a price. His skald Bjorn Cripplehand recorded that in Lewis "fire played high in the heaven" as "flame spouted from the houses" and that in the Uists "the king dyed his sword red in blood". Thompson (1968) provides a more literal translation: "Fire played in the fig-trees of Liodhus; it mounted up to heaven. Far and wide the people were driven to flight. The fire gushed out of the houses".

The Hebrides were now part of Kingdom of the Isles, whose rulers were themselves vassals of the Kings of Norway. The Kingdom had two parts: the Suðr-eyjar or South Isles encompassing the Hebrides and the Isle of Man; and the Norðr-eyjar or North Isles of Orkney and Shetland. This situation lasted until the partitioning of the Western Isles in 1156, at which time the Outer Hebrides remained under Norwegian control while the Inner Hebrides broke out under Somerled, the Norse-Celtic kinsman of the Manx royal house.

Following the ill-fated 1263 expedition of Haakon IV of Norway, the Outer Hebrides along with the Isle of Man, were yielded to the Kingdom of Scotland a result of the 1266 Treaty of Perth. Although their contribution to the islands can still be found in personal and placenames, the archaeological record of the Norse period is very limited. The best known find from this time is the Lewis chessmen, which date from the mid 12th century.

Scots rule

As the Norse era drew to a close the Norse-speaking princes were gradually replaced by Gaelic-speaking clan chiefs including the MacLeods of Lewis and Harris, the MacDonalds of the Uists and MacNeil of Barra. This transition did little to relieve the islands of internecine strife although by the early 14th century the MacDonald Lords of the Isles, based on Islay, were in theory these chiefs' feudal superiors and managed to exert some control.

The growing threat that Clan Donald posed to the Scottish crown led to the forcible dissolution of the Lordship of the Isles by James IV in 1493, but although the king had the power to subdue the organised military might of the Hebrides, he and his immediate successors lacked the will or ability to provide an alternative form of governance. The House of Stuart's attempts to control the Outer Hebrides were then at first desultory and little more than punitive expeditions. In 1506 the Earl of Huntly besieged and captured Stornoway Castle using cannon. In 1540 James V himself conducted a royal tour, forcing the clan chiefs to accompany him. There followed a period of peace, but all too soon the clans were at loggerheads again.

In 1598 King James VI authorised some "Gentleman Adventurers" from Fife to civilise the "most barbarous Isle of Lewis". Initially successful, the colonists were driven out by local forces commanded by Murdoch and Neil MacLeod, who based their forces on Bearasaigh in Loch Ròg. The colonists tried again in 1605 with the same result but a third attempt in 1607 was more successful, and in due course Stornoway became a Burgh of Barony. By this time Lewis was held by the Mackenzies of Kintail, (later the Earls of Seaforth), who pursued a more enlightened approach, investing in fishing in particular. The historian W. C. MacKenzie was moved to write:

"At the end of the 17th century, the picture we have of Lewis that of a people pursuing their avocation in peace, but not in plenty. The Seaforths ..., besides establishing orderly Government in the island.. had done a great deal to rescue the people from the slough of ignorance and incivility in which they found themselves immersed. But in the sphere of economics their policy apparently was of little service to the community."

The Seaforth's royalist inclinations led to Lewis becoming garrisoned during the Wars of the Three Kingdoms by Cromwell's troops, who destroyed the old castle in Stornoway and in 1645 Lewismen fought on the royalist side at the Battle of Auldearn. A new era of Hebridean involvement in the affairs of the wider world was about to commence.

British era

With the implementation of the Treaty of Union in 1707 the Hebrides became part of the new Kingdom of Great Britain, but the clans' loyalties to a distant monarch were not strong. A considerable number of islandmen "came out" in support of the Jacobite Earl of Mar in the "15" although the response to the 1745 rising was muted. Nonetheless the aftermath of the decisive Battle of Culloden, which effectively ended Jacobite hopes of a Stuart restoration, was widely felt. The British government's strategy was to estrange the clan chiefs from their kinsmen and turn their descendants into English-speaking landlords whose main concern was the revenues their estates brought rather than the welfare of those who lived on them. This may have brought peace to the islands, but in the following century it came at a terrible price.

The Highland Clearances of the 19th century destroyed communities throughout the Highlands and Islands as the human populations were evicted and replaced with sheep farms. For example, Colonel Gordon of Cluny, owner of Barra, South Uist and Benbecula, evicted thousands of islanders using trickery and cruelty, and even offered to sell Barra to the government as a penal colony. Islands such as Fuaigh Mòr were completely cleared of their populations and even today the subject is recalled with bitterness and resentment in some areas. The position was exacerbated by the failure of the islands' kelp industry, which thrived from the 18th century until the end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1815 and large scale emigration became endemic. For example, hundreds left North Uist for Cape Breton, Nova Scotia. The pre-clearance population of the island had been almost 5,000, although by 1841 it had fallen to 3,870 and was only 2,349 by 1931.

The Highland potato famine (Gaiseadh a’ bhuntàta, in Scottish Gaelic), caused by a blight, started in 1846 and had a serious impact, because many islanders were crofters; potatoes were a staple of their diet. Violent riots became common. Charities, encouraged by George Pole and others in the Commissariat (a military agency) encouraged charities to come to the rescue. The Free Church was particularly helpful, "delivering oatmeal to famine-affected families all across the West Highlands and Islands", according to one report. Another report states that the Church "was prompt in organising an efficient system of private charity across the Hebrides and on the Western seaboard. It cooperated with the Edinburgh and Glasgow Relief Committees".

An interdenominational charity was in place by early 1847 and took the most significant role in famine relief. Some landowners also provided a great deal of assistance, according to one history of the region: "MacLeod of Dunvegan bought in food for his people, some eight thousand of them" ... MacLean of Ardgour provided food, and introduced new crops into the area - peas, cabbages and carrots ... Sir James Matheson on Lewis spent £329,000 (Equivalent to £37,000,000 in 2024 ) on improving his lands, hoping to provide a more secure future for his people". The government of Britain provided some assistance, thanks to Sir Charles Trevelyan, who arranged for food distribution at Portree and Tobermory. The British Association for the Relief of Distress in Ireland and the Highlands and Islands of Scotland also helped as did donations received from North America.  The blight struck again over the next two years, requiring an extra tax on landowners to help feed the population. The British government began encouraging mass emigration.

For those who remained new economic opportunities emerged through the export of cattle, commercial fishing and tourism. During the summer season in the 1860s and 1870s five thousand inhabitants of Lewis could be found in Wick on the mainland of Scotland, employed on the fishing boats and at the quaysides. Nonetheless emigration and military service became the choice of many and the archipelago's populations continued to dwindle throughout the late 19th and 20th centuries. By 2001 the population of North Uist was only 1,271.

The work of the Napier Commission and the Congested Districts Board, and the passing of the Crofting Act of 1886 helped, but social unrest continued. In July 1906 grazing land on Vatersay was raided by landless men from Barra and its isles. Lady Gordon Cathcart took legal action against the "raiders" but the visiting judge took the view that she had neglected her duties as a landowner and that "long indifference to the necessities of the cottars had gone far to drive them to exasperation". Millennia of continuous occupation notwithstanding, many of the remoter islands were abandoned — Mingulay in 1912, Hirta in 1930, and Ceann Iar in 1942 among them. This process involved a transition from these places being perceived as relatively self-sufficient agricultural economies to a view becoming held by both island residents and outsiders alike that they lacked the essential services of a modern industrial economy.

There were gradual economic improvements, among the most visible of which was the replacement of the traditional thatched blackhouse with accommodation of a more modern design. The creation of the Highlands and Islands Development Board and the discovery of substantial deposits of North Sea oil in 1965, the establishment of a unitary local authority for the islands in 1975 and more recently the renewables sector have all contributed to a degree of economic stability in recent decades. The Arnish yard has had a chequered history but has been a significant employer in both the oil and renewables industries. Comhairle nan Eilean Siar, the local authority, employs 2,000 people, making it the largest employer in the Outer Hebrides. See also the "Innse Gall area plan 2010" and the Comhairle's "Factfile – Economy".

Economy

Modern commercial activities centre on tourism, crofting, fishing, and weaving including the manufacture of Harris tweed. Crofting remains popular especially on Lewis and Harris (population 21,000) with over 920 active crofters according to a 2020 report: "with crofts ranging in size from as small as a single hectare to having access to thousands of hectares through the medium of community grazing". Crofters can apply for subsidy grants; some of these are intended to help them find other avenues to supplement their incomes. Some of the funding schemes available to crofters in the Hebrides include the "Basic Payment Scheme, the suckler beef support scheme, the upland sheep support scheme and the Less Favoured Area support scheme and the Crofting Agricultural Grant Scheme (CAGS), as of March 2020.

According to the Scottish Government, "tourism is by far and away the mainstay industry" of the Outer Hebrides, "generating £65m in economic value for the islands, sustaining around 1000 jobs" The report adds that the "islands receive 219,000 visitors per year".

Some of the larger islands have development trusts that support the local economy and, in striking contrast to the 19th and 20th century domination by absentee landlords, more than two thirds of the Western Isles population now lives on community-owned estates. However the economic position of the islands remains relatively precarious. The Western Isles, including Stornoway, are defined by Highlands and Islands Enterprise as an economically "Fragile Area" and they have an estimated trade deficit of some £163.4 million. Overall, the area is relatively reliant on primary industries and the public sector, and fishing and fish farming in particular are vulnerable to environmental impacts, changing market pressures, and European legislation.

There is some optimism about the possibility of future developments in, for example, renewable energy generation, tourism, and education, and after declines in the 20th century the population has stabilised since 2003, although it is ageing. A 2019 report, using key assumptions, (mortality, fertility and migration) was less optimistic. It predicted that the population is "projected to fall to 22,709 by 2043"; that translates to a 16% decline, or 4,021 people, between 2018 and 2043.

The UK’s largest community-owned wind farm, the 9MW Beinn Ghrideag, a "3 turbine, 9MW scheme" is located outside Stornoway and is operated by Point and Sandwick Trust (PST).

The Isle of Lewis web site states that Stornoway's sheltered harbour has been important for centuries; it was named Steering Bay by Vikings who often visited. A December 2020 report stated that a new deep water terminal was to be developed, the Stornoway Deep Water Terminal, using a £49 million investment. The plan included berths for cruise ships as long as 360 meters, berths for large cargo vessels, and a freight ferry berth.

Politics and local government

From the passing of the Local Government (Scotland) Act 1889 to 1975 Lewis formed part of the county of Ross and Cromarty and the rest of the archipelago, including Harris, was part of Inverness-shire.

The Outer Hebrides became a unitary council area in 1975, although in most of the rest of Scotland similar unitary councils were not established until 1996. Since then, the islands have formed one of the 32 unitary council areas that now cover the whole country, with the council officially known by its Gaelic name, Comhairle nan Eilean Siar under the terms of the Local Government (Gaelic Names) (Scotland) Act 1997. The council has its base in Stornoway on Lewis and is often known locally simply as "the Comhairle" or a' Chomhairle. The Comhairle is one of only three Councils in Scotland with a majority of elected members who are independents. The other independent-run councils are Shetland and Orkney. Moray is run by a Conservative/Independent coalition.

The name for the British Parliament constituency covering this area is Na h-Eileanan an Iar, the seat being held by Angus MacNeil MP since 2005, while the Scottish Parliament constituency for the area is Na h-Eileanan an Iar, the incumbent being Alasdair Allan MSP.

During the 2014 Scottish independence referendum the area voted against independence by a margin of 53.42% (10,544) to 46.58% (9,195) in favour on a turnout of 86.2%

In 2022, as part of the Levelling Up White Paper, an "Island Forum" was proposed, which would allow local policymakers and residents in the Outer Hebrides to work alongside their counterparts in Shetland, Orkney, Anglesey and the Isle of Wight on common issues, such as broadband connectivity, and provide a platform for them to communicate directly with the government on the challenges island communities face in terms of levelling up.

Scottish Gaelic language
The Outer Hebrides have historically been a very strong Scottish Gaelic (Gàidhlig) speaking area. Both the 1901 and 1921 census reported that all parishes were over 75% Gaelic speaking, including areas of high population density such as Stornoway. However, the Education (Scotland) Act 1872 mandated English-only education, and is now recognised as having dealt a major blow to the language. People still living can recall being beaten for speaking Gaelic in school. By 1971 most areas were still more than 75% Gaelic speaking – with the exception of Stornoway, Benbecula and South Uist at 50–74%.

In the 2001 census, each island overall was over 50% Gaelic speaking – South Uist (71%), Harris (69%), Barra (68%), North Uist (67%), Lewis (56%) and Benbecula (56%). With 59.3% of Gaelic speakers or a total of 15,723 speakers, this made the Outer Hebrides the most strongly coherent Gaelic speaking area in Scotland.

Most areas were between 60-74% Gaelic speaking and the areas with the highest density of over 80% are Scalpay near Harris, Newtonferry and Kildonan, whilst Daliburgh, Linshader, Eriskay, Brue, Boisdale, West Harris, Ardveenish, Soval, Ness, and Bragar all have more than 75%. The areas with the lowest density of speakers are Stornoway (44%), Braigh (41%), Melbost (41%), and Balivanich (37%).

The Gaelic Language (Scotland) Act was enacted by the Scottish Parliament in 2005 to provide continuing support for the language. However, by 2011 the overall percentage of Gaelic speakers in the Outer Hebrides had fallen to 52%.

In modern Gaelic the islands are sometimes referred to collectively as An t-Eilean Fada (the Long Island) or Na h-Eileanan a-Muigh (the Outer Isles). Innse Gall (islands of the foreigners or strangers) is also heard occasionally, a name that was originally used by mainland Highlanders when the islands were ruled by the Norse.

The individual island and place names in the Outer Hebrides have mixed Gaelic and Norse origins. Various Gaelic terms are used repeatedly:

There are also several islands called Orasaigh from the Norse Örfirirsey meaning "tidal" or "ebb island".

Transport

Scheduled ferry services between the Outer Hebrides and the Scottish mainland and Inner Hebrides operate on the following routes:

 * Oban to Castlebay on Barra
 * Oban to Lochboisdale on South Uist (winter only)
 * Mallaig to Lochboisdale on South Uist
 * Uig on Skye to Tarbert on Harris
 * Uig on Skye to Lochmaddy on North Uist
 * Ullapool to Stornoway on Lewis
 * Tiree to Castlebay, Barra (summer only)

Other ferries operate between some of the islands.

National Rail services are available for onward journeys, from stations at Oban and Mallaig, which has direct services to Glasgow. However, parliamentary approval notwithstanding, plans in the 1890s to lay a railway connection to Ullapool were unable to obtain sufficient funding.

There are scheduled flights from Stornoway, Benbecula and Barra airports both inter-island and to the mainland. Barra's airport is claimed to be the only one in the world to have scheduled flights landing on a beach. At high water the runways are under the sea so flight times vary with the tide.

Bus na Comhairle
Bus na Comhairle (meaning "Bus of the Council") is the council-owned local bus company of the Western Isles. The company serves the Broadbay area of Lewis with 7 buses: 6 Optare Solos and 1 ADL Enviro 200.

Shipwrecks

The archipelago is exposed to wind and tide, and lighthouses are sited as an aid to navigation at locations from Barra Head in the south to the Butt of Lewis in the north. There are numerous sites of wrecked ships, and the Flannan Isles are the location of an enduring mystery that occurred in December 1900, when all three lighthouse keepers vanished without trace.

Annie Jane, a three-masted immigrant ship out of Liverpool bound for Montreal, Canada, struck rocks off the West Beach of Vatersay during a storm on Tuesday 28 September 1853. Within ten minutes the ship began to founder and break up, casting 450 people into the sea. In spite of the conditions, islanders tried to rescue the passengers and crew. The remains of 350 men, women and children were buried in the dunes behind the beach and a small cairn and monument marks the site.

The tiny Beasts of Holm off the east coast of Lewis were the site of the sinking of HMS Iolaire during the first few hours of 1919, one of the worst maritime disasters in United Kingdom waters during the 20th century. Calvay in the Sound of Barra provided the inspiration for Compton Mackenzie's novel Whisky Galore after the SS Politician ran aground there with a cargo of single malt whisky in 1941.

Culture
Christianity has deep roots in the Western Isles, but owing mainly to the different allegiances of the clans in the past, the people in the northern islands (Lewis, Harris, North Uist) have historically been predominantly Presbyterian, and those of the southern islands (Benbecula, South Uist, Barra) predominantly Roman Catholic.

At the time of the 2001 Census, 42% of the population identified themselves as being affiliated with the Church of Scotland, with 13% Roman Catholic and 28% with other Christian churches. Many of this last group belong to the Free Church of Scotland, known for its strict observance of the Sabbath. 11% stated that they had no religion. This made the Western Isles the Scottish council area with the smallest percentage of non-religious in the population. There are also small Episcopalian congregations in Lewis and Harris, and the Outer Hebrides are part of the Diocese of Argyll and The Isles in both the Episcopalian and Catholic traditions.

Gaelic music is popular in the islands and the Lewis and Harris Traditional Music Society plays an active role in promoting the genre. Fèis Bharraigh began in 1981 with the aim of developing the practice and study of the Gaelic language, literature, music, drama and culture on the islands of Barra and Vatersay. This two-week festival has inspired 43 other feisean throughout Scotland. The Lewis Pipe Band was founded in 1904 and the Lewis and Harris Piping Society in 1977.

Outdoor activities including rugby, football, golf, shinty, fishing, riding, canoeing, athletics, and multi-sports are popular in the Western Isles. The Hebridean Challenge is an adventure race, run in five daily stages, which takes place along the length of the islands and includes hill and road running, road and mountain biking, short sea swims and demanding sea kayaking sections. There are four main sports centres: Ionad Spors Leodhais in Stornoway, which has a 25 m swimming pool; Harris Sports Centre; Lionacleit Sports Centre on Benbecula; and Castlebay Sports Centre on Barra. The Western Isles is a member of the International Island Games Association.

South Uist is home to the Askernish Golf Course. The oldest links in the Outer Hebrides, it was designed by Old Tom Morris. Although it was in use until the 1930s, its existence was largely forgotten until 2005 and it is now being restored to Morris's original design.

title: Outer Hebrides


text:
Mnemonic

A mnemonic device or memory device is any learning technique that aids information retention or retrieval in the human memory, often by associating the information with something that is easier to remember.

It makes use of elaborative encoding, retrieval cues and imagery as specific tools to encode information in a way that allows for efficient storage and retrieval. It aids original information in becoming associated with something more accessible or meaningful—which in turn provides better retention of the information.

Commonly encountered mnemonics are often used for lists and in auditory form such as short poems, acronyms, initialisms or memorable phrases. They can also be used for other types of information and in visual or kinesthetic forms. Their use is based on the observation that the human mind more easily remembers spatial, personal, surprising, physical, sexual, humorous and otherwise "relatable" information rather than more abstract or impersonal forms of information.

Ancient Greeks and Romans distinguished between two types of memory: the "natural" memory and the "artificial" memory. The former is inborn and is the one that everyone uses instinctively. The latter in contrast has to be trained and developed through the learning and practice of a variety of mnemonic techniques.

Mnemonic systems are techniques or strategies consciously used to improve memory. They help use information already stored in long-term memory to make memorization an easier task.

Etymology
Mnemonic is derived from the Ancient Greek word μνημονικός (mnēmonikos) which means of memory or relating to memory. It is related to Mnemosyne, the name of the goddess of memory in Greek mythology. Both of these words are derived from μνήμη (mnēmē), remembrance, memory. Mnemonics in antiquity were most often considered in the context of what is today known as the art of memory.

History
The general name of mnemonics, or memoria technica, was the name applied to devices for aiding the memory, to enable the mind to reproduce a relatively unfamiliar idea, and especially a series of dissociated ideas, by connecting it, or them, in some artificial whole, the parts of which are mutually suggestive. Mnemonic devices were much cultivated by Greek sophists and philosophers and are frequently referred to by Plato and Aristotle.

Philosopher Charmadas was famous for his outstanding memory and for his ability to memorize whole books and then recite them.

In later times, the poet Simonides was credited for development of these techniques, perhaps for no reason other than that the power of his memory was famous. Cicero, who attaches considerable importance to the art, but more to the principle of order as the best help to memory, speaks of Carneades (perhaps Charmades) of Athens and Metrodorus of Scepsis as distinguished examples of people who used well-ordered images to aid the memory. The Romans valued such helps in order to support facility in public speaking.

The Greek and the Roman system of mnemonics was founded on the use of mental places and signs or pictures, known as "topical" mnemonics. The most usual method was to choose a large house, of which the apartments, walls, windows, statues, furniture, etc., were each associated with certain names, phrases, events or ideas, by means of symbolic pictures. To recall these, an individual had only to search over the apartments of the house until discovering the places where images had been placed by the imagination.

In accordance with this system, if it were desired to fix a historic date in memory, it was localised in an imaginary town divided into a certain number of districts, each with ten houses, each house with ten rooms, and each room with a hundred quadrates or memory-places, partly on the floor, partly on the four walls, partly on the ceiling. Therefore, if it were desired to fix in the memory the date of the invention of printing (1436), an imaginary book, or some other symbol of printing, would be placed in the thirty-sixth quadrate or memory-place of the fourth room of the first house of the historic district of the town. Except that the rules of mnemonics are referred to by Martianus Capella, nothing further is known regarding the practice until the 13th century.

Among the voluminous writings of Roger Bacon is a tractate De arte memorativa. Ramon Llull devoted special attention to mnemonics in connection with his ars generalis. The first important modification of the method of the Romans was that invented by the German poet Conrad Celtes, who, in his Epitoma in utramque Ciceronis rhetoricam cum arte memorativa nova (1492), used letters of the alphabet for associations, rather than places. About the end of the 15th century, Peter of Ravenna (b. 1448) provoked such astonishment in Italy by his mnemonic feats that he was believed by many to be a necromancer. His Phoenix artis memoriae (Venice, 1491, 4 vols.) went through as many as nine editions, the seventh being published at Cologne in 1608.

About the end of the 16th century, Lambert Schenkel (Gazophylacium, 1610), who taught mnemonics in France, Italy and Germany, similarly surprised people with his memory. He was denounced as a sorcerer by the University of Louvain, but in 1593 he published his tractate De memoria at Douai with the sanction of that celebrated theological faculty. The most complete account of his system is given in two works by his pupil Martin Sommer, published in Venice in 1619. In 1618 John Willis (d. 1628?) published Mnemonica; sive ars reminiscendi, containing a clear statement of the principles of topical or local mnemonics. Giordano Bruno included a memoria technica in his treatise De umbris idearum, as part of his study of the ars generalis of Llull. Other writers of this period are the Florentine Publicius (1482); Johannes Romberch (1533); Hieronimo Morafiot, Ars memoriae (1602);and B. Porta, Ars reminiscendi (1602).

In 1648 Stanislaus Mink von Wennsshein revealed what he called the "most fertile secret" in mnemonics—using consonants for figures, thus expressing numbers by words (vowels being added as required), in order to create associations more readily remembered. The philosopher Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz adopted an alphabet very similar to that of Wennsshein for his scheme of a form of writing common to all languages.

Wennsshein's method was adopted with slight changes afterward by the majority of subsequent "original" systems. It was modified and supplemented by Richard Grey (1694–1771), a priest who published a Memoria technica in 1730. The principal part of Grey's method is briefly this: "To remember anything in history, chronology, geography, etc., a word is formed, the beginning whereof, being the first syllable or syllables of the thing sought, does, by frequent repetition, of course draw after it the latter part, which is so contrived as to give the answer. Thus, in history, the Deluge happened in the year before Christ two thousand three hundred forty-eight; this is signified by the word Del-etok, Del standing for Deluge and etok for 2348."Wennsshein's method is comparable to a Hebrew system by which letters also stand for numerals, and therefore words for dates.

To assist in retaining the mnemonical words in the memory, they were formed into memorial lines. Such strange words in difficult hexameter scansion, are by no means easy to memorise. The vowel or consonant, which Grey connected with a particular figure, was chosen arbitrarily.

A later modification was made in 1806 Gregor von Feinaigle, a German monk from Salem near Constance. While living and working in Paris, he expounded a system of mnemonics in which (as in Wennsshein) the numerical figures are represented by letters chosen due to some similarity to the figure or an accidental connection with it. This alphabet was supplemented by a complicated system of localities and signs. Feinaigle, who apparently did not publish any written documentation of this method, travelled to England in 1811. The following year one of his pupils published The New Art of Memory (1812), giving Feinaigle's system. In addition, it contains valuable historical material about previous systems.

Other mnemonists later published simplified forms, as the more complicated mnemonics were generally abandoned. Methods founded chiefly on the so-called laws of association (cf. Mental association) were taught with some success in Germany.

Types
Ohm_law_mnemonic_principle.svg image mnemonic - when the terms of Ohm's law are arranged in this configuration, covering the unknown gives the formula in terms of the remaining parameters.

It can be adapted to similar equations e.g. F = ma, v = fλ, E = mcΔT, V = $\pi$r2h and τ = rF sinθ/ - for more examples, see this SVG cheat sheet on Wikimedia Commons. When a variable with an exponent or in a function is covered, the corresponding inverse is applied to the remainder, i.e. r = √ $V⁄\pih$ and θ = arcsin$τ⁄rF$.]]
 * 1. Music mnemonics
 * Songs and jingles can be used as a mnemonic. A common example is how children remember the alphabet by singing the ABCs.

 * 2. Name mnemonics (acronym)
 * The first letter of each word is combined into a new word. For example: VIBGYOR (or ROY G BIV) for the colours of the rainbow or HOMES (Lake Huron, Lake Ontario, Lake Michigan, Lake Erie, Lake Superior) the Great Lakes.

 * 3. Acrostic mnemonics
 * The first letter of each word is combined to form a phrase or sentence – e.g. "Richard of York gave battle in vain" for the colours of the rainbow.

 * 4. Model mnemonics
 * A model is used to help recall information. Applications of this method involve the use of diagrams, cycles, graphs, and flowcharts to help understand or memorize an idea. e.g. Freytag's Pyramid to show the different parts of a five-act dramatic structure.

 * 5. Ode mnemonics
 * The information is placed into a poem or doggerel, – e.g. "Note socer, gener, liberi, and Liber god of revelry, like puer these retain the 'e (most Latin nouns of the second declension ending in -er drop the -e in all of the oblique cases except the vocative, these are the exceptions).

 * 6. Note organization mnemonics
 * The method of note organization can be used as a memorization technique. Applications of this method involve the use of flash cards and lists. Flash cards are used by putting a question or word on one side of a paper and the answer or definition on the other side of the paper. Lists involve the organization of data from broad to detailed. e.g. Earth → Continent → Country.

 * 7. Image mnemonics
 * The information is constructed into a picture – e.g. the German weak declension can be remembered as five '-e's', looking rather like the state of Oklahoma in America, in a sea of '-en's'.

 * 8. Connection mnemonics
 * New knowledge is connected to knowledge already known.

 * 9. Visualization mnemonics
 * Techniques such as the method of loci allow the user to create unique associations in an imagined space.

Applications and examples
A wide range of mnemonics are used for several purposes. The most commonly used mnemonics are those for lists, numerical sequences, foreign-language acquisition, and medical treatment for patients with memory deficits.

For lists
A common mnemonic technique for remembering a list is to create an easily remembered acronym. Another is to create a memorable phrase with words which share the same first letter(s) (i.e.: the same initialism) as the list members. Mnemonic techniques can be applied to most memorization of novel materials.

Some common examples for first-letter mnemonics:
 * Mnemonics for spelling mnemonic include "memory needs every method of nurturing its capacity" and "maybe not every mnemonic oozes nuisance intensely concentrated".
 * To memorize the metric prefixes after giga, think of the candy, and this mnemonic. "Tangiest Pez? Yellow!" TPEZY: tera, peta, exa, zetta, yotta.
 * The order of sharps in key signature notation is F, C, G, D, A, E and B, giving the mnemonic "Father Charles goes down and ends battle". The order of flats is the reverse: B♭, E♭, A♭, D♭, G♭, C♭ and F♭ ("Battle ends and down goes Charles's father").
 * The colours of the rainbow in "Richard of York gave battle in vain", "Run over your granny because it's violent" or the fictional name "Roy G. Biv" (red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet).
 * The acronym HOMES for the North American Great Lakes: Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie, and Superior
 * Electronic colour codes are remembered with a wide range of mnemonic phrases, owing to multiple colours beginning with b and g and shifts from sexist phrases once common in traditionally male-dominated professions.
 * For effects of an inductor or capacitor in alternating current circuits, the phrase "Eli the iceman" or "Eli on ice" has been used by electrical engineers. With an inductor present (the symbol L indicating inductance), the peak value of voltage (E) precedes the peak value of the current (I), so E precedes I in "Eli". With a capacitor present (the symbol C indicating capacitance), the peak current leads the peak voltage, with I leading E when C is present in "ice". Another common mnemonic is "civil": in a capacitor (C) current (I) leads voltage (V), while voltage leads current in a inductor (L).
 * For redox chemical reactions, where oxidation and reduction can be confused, the phrase "Leo says ger" (lose electron oxidation, gain electron reduction) or acronym "oil rig" (oxidation is losing, reduction is gaining) can be used.
 * Planetary mnemonics include: "My very educated mother just served us nachos" or "my very easy method just speeds up naming planets" (Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, [Pluto]).
 * The sequence of stellar classification: "Oh, be a fine girl [or guy], kiss me!" – where O, B, A, F, G, K, M are categories of stars.
 * For the layers of the OSI Model: "Please do not teach students pointless acronyms" (physical, data link, network, transport, session, presentation, application).
 * Taxonomy mnemonics include "Do kings play chess on funny glass stairs?" and "Do kindly please come over for green soup." (domain, kingdom, phylum, class, order, family, genus, species)
 * For diatomic elements: BrINClHOF (pronounced 'brinkelhoff') or "have no fear of ice cold beer".
 * For adjective order in English grammar: OPSHACOM (opinion, shape, age, colour, origin, material).
 * For the British English spelling of diarrhoea: "Dash in a real rush! Hurry, or else accident!"
 * For the parts of the brain associated with memory: "herds of animals cause panic" (hippocampus, amygdala, cerebellum, prefrontal cortex)
 * For types of memory encoding: SAVE (semantic, acoustic, and visual encoding)
 * For parts of the digestive system: "mother eats squirrel guts because she is living in rural Arkansas" (mouth, esophagus, stomach, gall bladder, small intestine, large intestine, rectum, anus)

For numerical sequences and mathematical operations
Mnemonic phrases or poems can be used to encode numeric sequences by various methods, one common one is to create a new phrase in which the number of letters in each word represents the according digit of pi. For example, the first 15 digits of the mathematical constant pi (3.14159265358979) can be encoded as "Now I need a drink, alcoholic of course, after the heavy lectures involving quantum mechanics"; "Now", having 3 letters, represents the first number, 3. Piphilology is the practice dedicated to creating mnemonics for pi.

Another is used for "calculating" the multiples of 9 up to 9 × 10 using one's fingers. Begin by holding out both hands with all fingers stretched out. Now count left to right the number of fingers that indicates the multiple. For example, to figure 9 × 4, count four fingers from the left, ending at your left-hand index finger. Bend this finger down and count the remaining fingers. Fingers to the left of the bent finger represent tens, fingers to the right are ones. There are three fingers to the left and six to the right, which indicates 9 × 4 = 36. This works for 9 × 1 up through 9 × 10.

For remembering the rules in adding and multiplying two signed numbers, Balbuena and Buayan (2015) made the letter strategies LAUS (like signs, add; unlike signs, subtract) and LPUN (like signs, positive; unlike signs, negative), respectively.

PUIMURI ('thresher') is a Finnish mnemonic regarding electricity: the first and last three letters can be arranged into the equations $$P = U \times I$$ and $$U = R \times I$$. (The letter M is ignored, which can be explained with another, politically incorrect mnemonic.)

For foreign-language acquisition
Mnemonics may be helpful in learning foreign languages, for example by transposing difficult foreign words with words in a language the learner knows already, also called "cognates" which are very common in Romance languages and other Germanic languages. A useful such technique is to find linkwords, words that have the same pronunciation in a known language as the target word, and associate them visually or auditorially with the target word.

For example, in trying to assist the learner to remember, the Hebrew word for tent, the linguist Ghil'ad Zuckermann proposes the memorable sentence "Oh hell, there's a raccoon in my tent". The memorable sentence "There's a fork in Ma's leg" helps the learner remember that the Hebrew word for fork is . Similarly, to remember the Hebrew word , meaning house, one can use the sentence "that's a lovely house, I'd like to buy it." The linguist Michel Thomas taught students to remember that estar is the Spanish word for to be by using the phrase "to be a star".

Another Spanish example is by using the mnemonic "Vin Diesel Has Ten Weapons" to teach irregular command verbs in the you (tú) form. Spanish verb forms and tenses are regularly seen as the hardest part of learning the language. With a high number of verb tenses, and many verb forms that are not found in English, Spanish verbs can be hard to remember and then conjugate. The use of mnemonics has been proven to help students better learn foreign languages, and this holds true for Spanish verbs. A particularly hard verb tense to remember is command verbs. Command verbs in Spanish are conjugated differently depending on who the command is being given to. The phrase, when pronounced with a Spanish accent, is used to remember "Ven Di Sal Haz Ten Ve Pon Sé", all of the irregular Spanish command verbs in the you (tú) form. This mnemonic helps students attempting to memorize different verb tenses. Another technique is for learners of gendered languages to associate their mental images of words with a colour that matches the gender in the target language. An example here is to remember the Spanish word for "foot", pie, [pee-eh] with the image of a foot stepping on a pie, which then spills blue filling (blue representing the male gender of the noun in this example).

For French verbs which use être as an auxiliary verb for compound tenses: DR and MRS VANDERTRAMPP: descendre, rester, monter, revenir, sortir, venir, arriver, naître, devenir, entrer, rentrer, tomber, retourner, aller, mourir, partir, passer.

Masculine countries in French (le): "Neither can a breeze make a sane Japanese chilly in the USA." (les) Netherlands (Pays-Bas), Canada, Brazil (Brésil), Mexico (Mexique), Senegal, Japan (Japon), Chile (Chili), & (les) USA (États-Unis d'Amérique).

For patients with memory deficits
Mnemonics can be used in aiding patients with memory deficits that could be caused by head injuries, strokes, epilepsy, multiple sclerosis and other neurological conditions.

In a study conducted by Doornhein and De Haan, the patients were treated with six different memory strategies including the mnemonics technique. The results concluded that there were significant improvements on the immediate and delayed subtest of the RBMT, delayed recall on the Appointments test, and relatives rating on the MAC from the patients that received mnemonics treatment. However, in the case of stroke patients, the results did not reach statistical significance.

Effectiveness
Academic study of the use of mnemonics has shown their effectiveness. In one such experiment, subjects of different ages who applied mnemonic techniques to learn novel vocabulary outperformed control groups that applied contextual learning and free-learning styles.

Mnemonics were seen to be more effective for groups of people who struggled with or had weak long-term memory, like the elderly. Five years after a mnemonic training study, a research team followed-up 112 community-dwelling older adults, 60 years of age and over. Delayed recall of a word list was assessed prior to, and immediately following mnemonic training, and at the 5-year follow-up. Overall, there was no significant difference between word recall prior to training and that exhibited at follow-up. However, pre-training performance gains scores in performance immediately post-training and use of the mnemonic predicted performance at follow-up. Individuals who self-reported using the mnemonic exhibited the highest performance overall, with scores significantly higher than at pre-training. The findings suggest that mnemonic training has long-term benefits for some older adults, particularly those who continue to employ the mnemonic.

This contrasts with a study from surveys of medical students that approximately only 20% frequently used mnemonic acronyms.

In humans, the process of aging particularly affects the medial temporal lobe and hippocampus, in which the episodic memory is synthesized. The episodic memory stores information about items, objects, or features with spatiotemporal contexts. Since mnemonics aid better in remembering spatial or physical information rather than more abstract forms, its effect may vary according to a subject's age and how well the subject's medial temporal lobe and hippocampus function.

This could be further explained by one recent study which indicates a general deficit in the memory for spatial locations in aged adults (mean age 69.7 with standard deviation of 7.4 years) compared to young adults (mean age 21.7 with standard deviation of 4.2 years). At first, the difference in target recognition was not significant.

The researchers then divided the aged adults into two groups, aged unimpaired and aged impaired, according to a neuropsychological testing. With the aged groups split, there was an apparent deficit in target recognition in aged impaired adults compared to both young adults and aged unimpaired adults. This further supports the varying effectiveness of mnemonics in different age groups.

Moreover, different research was done previously with the same notion, which presented with similar results to that of Reagh et al. in a verbal mnemonics discrimination task.

Studies (notably "The Magical Number Seven, Plus or Minus Two") have suggested that the short-term memory of adult humans can hold only a limited number of items; grouping items into larger chunks such as in a mnemonic might be part of what permits the retention of a larger total amount of information in short-term memory, which in turn can aid in the creation of long-term memories.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Mnemonic


text:
License

A license (US) or licence (Commonwealth) is an official permission or permit to do, use, or own something (as well as the document of that permission or permit).

A license is granted by a party (licensor) to another party (licensee) as an element of an agreement between those parties. In the case of a license issued by a government, the license is obtained by applying for it. In the case of a private party, it is by a specific agreement, usually in writing (such as a lease or other contract). The simplest definition is "A license is a promise not to sue", because a license usually either permits the licensed party to engage in an illegal activity, and subject to prosecution, without the license (e.g. fishing, driving an automobile, or operating a broadcast radio or television station), or it permits the licensed party to do something that would violate the rights of the licensing party (e.g. make copies of a copyrighted work), which, without the license, the licensed party could be sued, civilly, criminally, or both.

In particular, a license may be issued by authorities, to allow an activity that would otherwise be forbidden. It may require paying a fee or proving a capability (or both). The requirement may also serve to keep the authorities informed on a type of activity, and to allow them to set conditions and limitations.

A licensor may grant a license under intellectual property laws to authorize a use (such as copying software or using a patented invention) to a licensee, sparing the licensee from a claim of infringement brought by the licensor. A license under intellectual property commonly has several components beyond the grant itself, including a term, territory, renewal provisions, and other limitations deemed vital to the licensor.

Term: many licenses are valid for a particular length of time. This protects the licensor should the value of the license increase, or market conditions change. It also preserves enforceability by ensuring that no license extends beyond the term of the agreement.

Territory: a license may stipulate what territory the rights pertain to. For example, a license with a territory limited to "North America" (Mexico/United States/Canada) would not permit a licensee any protection from actions for use in Japan.

Again, a shorthand definition of a license is "a promise by the licensor not to sue the licensee". That means without a license any use or exploitation of intellectual property by a third party would amount to copying or infringement. Such copying would be improper and could, by using the legal system, be stopped if the intellectual property owner wanted to do so.

Intellectual property licensing plays a major role in business, academia and broadcasting. Business practices such as franchising, technology transfer, publication and character merchandising entirely depend on the licensing of intellectual property. Land licensing (proprietary licensing) and IP licensing.

Real property licenses
A license provides one party with the authority to act on another's land, when such action would typically amount to trespass absent that license. A key distinction between licenses and leases is that a license grants the licensee a revocable non-assignable privilege to act upon the land of the licensor, without granting any possessory interest in the land. Once a license is agreed upon, the licensee may occupy the land only so far as is necessary to complete the act. Another key distinction between a license and a lease is that leases are generally required to be in writing, where the statute of frauds requires it, while licenses can be made orally.

Creation
A license is generally created by an express or implied agreement. The licensor must agree to the license which can be shown in writing or the licensors acquiescence in its exercise. Furthermore, unlike many other contractual agreements, a license does not require consideration, a license can be created with or without it. Moreover, whether an agreement is held to be a "license" and not a lease will depend on three essential characteristics of a license: (1) a clause allowing the licensor to revoke "at will"; (2) the retention by the licensor of absolute control over the premises; and (3) the licensor's supplying to the licensee all of the essential services required for the licensee's permitted use of the premises.

Termination
Under a pure licensing agreement, the licensor, under its terms and by common-law, can cancel the agreement at will and without cause, unless it is coupled with an interest or made irrevocable by contract. A license that has been coupled with an interest is not revocable by the licensor without exposure to liability and potential damages. In the event a license is coupled with an interest, the licensor must provide reasonable time for the licensee to remove that interest from the property prior to termination. Additionally, because a license does not confer any possessory interest in the licensee, in the event of a sale of the property, the license is terminated and cannot be enforced against the new owners of that property. Moreover, the death of either the licensee or licensor will terminate the agreement.

Remedies
If a license is revocable at will by the licensor, courts will be unable to grant specific performance in favor of the licensee. A licensee would be unsuccessful in bringing forcible entry claims or a detainer proceeding because the licensee was never granted any possessory interest. The Licensee would also not be able to recover damages for money spent unless they are able to show detrimental reliance on the license. In certain cases, however, licenses can be made irrevocable, and specific performance may be granted. Where a license is made with a set term period and valid consideration is transferred, revocation of the license prior to the terms expiration may raise breach of contract claims that could provide damages against the licensor. Furthermore, once the licensor terminates or revokes the license, notice is statutorily required prior to the commencement of any special proceeding to recover possession of the property (e.g., in NY that requirement is 10 days).

Mass licensing of software
Mass distributed software is used by individuals on personal computers under license from the developer of that software. Such license is typically included in a more extensive end-user license agreement (EULA) entered into upon the installation of that software on a computer. Typically, a license is associated with a unique code, that when approved grants the end user access to the software in question.

Under a typical end-user license agreement, the user may install the software on a limited number of computers.

The enforceability of end-user license agreements is sometimes questioned.

As of 2020, there are various ways to license software with different kinds of licensing models, which allow software vendors to profit from their product offerings in flexible ways.

Patent licensing
Like other intellectual property, patent owners may grant permission to others to engage in conduct that would otherwise be within the scope of a patent. For example, a patent owner may authorize a licensee to make, use, sell, offer for sale, or import a patented product. Such agreements are typically referred to as a patent license agreement or a covenant not to sue. These agreements can last for a specific period of time (such as five years) or for the entire life of the patent (i.e., until the patent expires). Patent license agreements may also be exclusive (i.e., the licensee is the only person or entity that is allowed to sell, make, use, offer to sell, or import the patented invention) or non-exclusive (i.e., the licensee is simply one of several entities who has rights under the patent). Finally, any rights given under the agreement may be limited to a particular "field of use" (e.g., a licensee may be able to practice an invention in the field of consumer electronics, but not in the field of industrial electronics).

Often, patent owners will require a licensee to pay money in exchange for granting a patent license. Such payments are referred to as royalty payments and come primarily in two forms: lump sum or running royalty. A lump sum royalty involves an upfront, one-time payment, while a running royalty typically involves periodic payments (e.g., quarterly or annual) based on the number of patented products sold or imported.

Trademark and brand licensing
A licensor may grant permission to a licensee to distribute products under a trademark. With such a license, the licensee may use the trademark without fear of a claim of trademark infringement by the licensor. The assignment of a license often depends on specific contractual terms. The most common terms are, that a license is only applicable for a particular geographic region, just for a certain period of time or merely for a stage in the value chain. Moreover, there are different types of fees within the trademark and brand licensing. The first form demands a fee independent of sales and profits, the second type of license fee is dependent on the productivity of the licensee.

For example, McDonald's licenses their trademark such as the "Golden Arches" or the "Big Mac", but the licenses gives McDonald's a right to impose strict quality standards to their franchisees as they can take back the right to the trademark if they do not meet McDonald's standards.

When a licensor grants permission to a licensee to not only distribute, but manufacture a patented product, it is known as licensed production.

Artwork and character licensing
A licensor may grant a permission to a licensee to copy and distribute copyrighted works such as "art" (e.g., Thomas Kinkade's painting Dawn in Los Gato) and characters (e.g., Mickey Mouse). With such license, a licensee need not fear a claim of copyright infringement brought by the copyright owner.

Artistic license is, however, not related to the aforementioned license. It is a euphemism that denotes freedom of expression, the ability to make the subject appear more engaging or attractive, by fictionalizing part of the subject.

Academia

 * National examples of the licentiate are listed at licentiate (degree)

A licentiate is an academic degree that traditionally conferred the license to teach at a university or to practice a particular profession. The term survived despite the fact that nowadays a doctorate is typically needed in order to teach at a university. The term is also used for a person who holds a licentiate. In English, the degree has never been called a license. In France, the licence is the first degree awarded in Universities.

In Sweden, Finland, and in some other European university systems, a 'licentiate' is a postgraduate degree between the master's degree and the doctorate. The licentiate is a popular choice in those countries where a full doctoral degree would take five or more years to achieve.

Vehicle licensing
A license to driving certain vehicles has been applied to many countries around the world. Being allowed to drive a certain vehicle requires a specific driving license, the type of license depending on the type of vehicle.

Criminal law
In the United Kingdom prisoners serving a determinate sentence (a fixed time in prison) will be released prior to the completion of their full sentence "on licence". The licence is the prisoner's agreement to maintain certain conditions, such as periodic reporting in to a probation officer and only living at an approved address, in exchange for their early release. If they break the conditions of the licence, they can be "recalled" (returned to prison).

Offenders serving determinate sentences are released automatically at a set point in their sentence, whereas prisoners serving indeterminate sentences (e.g. life imprisonment) can only be released by the parole board.

Economic theory
Patent licensing has been studied in formal economic models in the field of industrial organization. In particular, Katz and Shapiro (1986) have explored the optimal licensing strategy of a research lab selling to firms who are competitors on the product market. It turns out that (compared to the welfare-maximizing solution) the licensor's incentives to develop innovations may be excessive, while the licensor's incentives to disseminate the innovation are typically too low. Subsequently, the seminal work of Katz and Shapiro (1986) has been extended in several directions. For example, Bhattacharya, Glazer, and Sappington (1992) have taken into account that the firms acquiring licenses must make further investments in order to develop marketable products. Schmitz (2002, 2007) has shown that asymmetric information due to adverse selection or moral hazard may lead the research lab to sell more licenses than it would do under complete information. Antelo and Sampayo (2017) have studied the optimal number of licenses in a signalling model.

Criticism
The provision of licenses and the agencies that mandate them are often criticised by American libertarians like Milton Friedman for creating an anticompetitive environment for occupations, which creates a barrier to entry for more qualified and skilled individuals who may not have the resources to obtain the necessary licences. According to Friedman, licenses and permits have become so burdensome due to legislation that favors the current establishment of wealthy occupants that they decrease the supply of such occupations, which raises prices for the average consumer. Libertarians and the anti-authoritarian left (anarcho-communists) view competing guilds and other voluntary communes as being more beneficial for disseminating the skills and education required to perform a specified career.

title: License


text:
Perfectae Caritatis

Perfectae Caritatis, the Decree on the Adaptation and Renewal of Religious Life, is the document issued by the Second Vatican Council which deals specifically with institutes of consecrated life in the Roman Catholic Church. One of the shorter documents of the Council, the decree was approved by a vote of 2,321 to 4 of the assembled bishops, and promulgated by Pope Paul VI on 28 October 1965. As is customary for Church documents, the title is taken from the first words (incipit) of the decree: "of Perfect Charity" in Latin.

Content
The Second Vatican Council had already given an exposition of the nature of religious life in chapter 6 of the Constitution Lumen gentium and Perfectae Caritatis reflected the principles of religious life as established therein. This chapter described the essential form of religious life as a life "consecrated by the profession of the evangelical counsels" (n. 44). The Decree Perfectae Caritatis was published in order to, "treat of the life and discipline of those institutes whose members make profession of chastity, poverty and obedience and to provide for their needs in our time" (Perfectae Caritatis n. 1). Containing 25 numbered paragraphs, the Decree established five general principles to guide the renewal of these institutes. Because of the broad variety of religious communities with their different histories, characteristics, customs, and missions, the Vatican Council did not give specific indications, and left to each individual community the authority to determine what needed to be changed in accord with the spirit of their founders, the needs of modern life, and the situations where they lived and worked.

Aftermath
On August 6, 1966 Pope Paul VI issued Ecclesiae Sanctae, an apostolic letter on the implementation of certain conciliar documents, including Perfectae Caritatis.

The period that followed the promulgation of Perfectae Caritatis was marked by a huge amount of experimentation in religious life. Many institutes replaced their traditional habits with more modern attire, experimented with different forms of prayer and community life, and adapted obedience to a superior to a form of consultation and discussion. A great number of religious left religious life entirely, and in subsequent decades there was a large drop the number of religious vocations in the Western World. It is not clear how much of this change was due to the documents of the Second Vatican Council. Historians note that western society as a whole was going through social turmoil caused by the sexual revolution.

title: Perfectae Caritatis


text:
Optatam Totius

Optatam totius, the Decree on Priestly Training, is a document which was produced by the Second Vatican Council. Approved by a vote of 2,318 to 3 of the bishops assembled at the council, the decree was promulgated by Pope Paul VI on 28 October 1965. The Latin title means "desired renewal of the whole [church]".

title: Optatam Totius


text:
Jean Baptiste Point du Sable

Jean Baptiste Point du Sable (also spelled Point de Sable, Point au Sable, Point Sable, Pointe DuSable, or Pointe du Sable; before 1750 – August 28, 1818) is regarded as the first permanent non-Native settler of what would later become Chicago, Illinois, and is recognized as the city's founder. The site where he settled near the mouth of the Chicago River around the 1780s is memorialized as a National Historic Landmark, now located in Pioneer Court.

Point du Sable was of African descent, but little else is known of his early life prior to the 1770s. During his career, the areas where he settled and traded around the Great Lakes and in the Illinois Country changed hands several times between France, Britain, Spain and the United States. Described as handsome and well educated, Point duSable married a Potawatomi Native American woman, Kitihawa, and they had two children. In 1779, during the American Revolutionary War, he was arrested by the British on suspicion of being an American Patriot sympathizer. In the early 1780s he worked for the British lieutenant-governor of Michilimackinac on an estate at what is now St. Clair, Michigan.

Point du Sable is first recorded as living at the mouth of the Chicago River in a trader's journal of early 1790. By then he had established an extensive and prosperous trading settlement in what later became the City of Chicago. He sold his Chicago River property in 1800 and moved to the port of St. Charles, where he was licensed to run a ferry across the Missouri River. Point duSable's successful role in developing the Chicago River settlement was little recognized until the mid-20th century.

In Chicago, a school, museum, harbor, park, bridge, and road have been named in du Sable's honor.

Biography

There are no records of Point du Sable's life prior to the 1770s. Though it is known from sources during his life that he was of African descent, his birth date, place of birth, and parents are unknown. Juliette Kinzie, another early pioneer of Chicago, never met Point duSable but said in her 1856 memoir that he was "a native of St.Domingo" (the island of Hispaniola). This became generally accepted as his place of birth. Historian Milo Milton Quaife regarded Kinzie's account of Point duSable as "largely fictitious and wholly unauthenticated", later putting forward a theory that he was of African and French-Canadian origin. A historical novel published in 1953 helped to popularize the claim that Point du Sable was born in 1745 in Saint-Marc in Saint-Domingue (later known as Haiti). If he was born outside continental North America, there are competing accounts as to whether he entered as a trader or from the north through French Canada, or from the south through French Louisiana.

Point du Sable married a Potawatomi woman named Kitihawa (Christianized to Catherine) on 27October 1788, in a Catholic ceremony in Cahokia in the Illinois Country, a longtime French colonial settlement on the east side of the Mississippi River. It is likely that this couple was married earlier in the 1770s in a Native American tradition. They had a son named Jean and a daughter named Susanne. Point duSable supported his family as a frontier trader (voyageur or coureur des bois) and settler during a period of great upheaval for the former southern dependencies of French Canada and in the Illinois Country, where the regions changed hands several times over the course of half a century.

In a footnote to a poem titled Speech to the Western Indians, Arent DePeyster, British commandant from 1774 to 1779 at Fort Michilimackinac (a former French fort in what was then the British province of Quebec), noted that "Baptist Point deSaible" was "a handsome negro", "well educated", and "settled in Eschecagou". When he published this poem in 1813, DePeyster presented it as a speech that he had made at the village of Arbrecroche (now Harbor Springs, Michigan) on 4July 1779. This footnote has led many scholars to assume that Point duSable had settled in Chicago by 1779. But letters written by other traders in the late 1770s suggest that Point duSable was at this time settled at the mouth of Trail Creek (Rivière duChemin) at what is now Michigan City, Indiana.

In August 1779, during the American Revolutionary War, Point duSable was arrested as a suspected Patriot at Trail Creek by British troops and imprisoned briefly at Fort Michilimackinac. An officer's report following his arrest noted that Point du Sable had many friends who vouched for his good character. The following year, Point du Sable was ordered transported to the Pinery on the St. Clair River north of Detroit. From the summer of 1780 until May 1784, Point duSable managed the Pinery, a tract of woodlands owned by British officer Lt.Patrick Sinclair, on the St. Clair River in eastern Michigan. This may have been a choice given by him from the British, offering him release from his imprisonment to manage the Pinery. Point duSable with his family lived in a cabin at the mouth of the Pine River in what is now the city of St. Clair.

At some time in the 1780s, after the US achieved independence, Point du Sable settled on the north bank of the Chicago River close to its mouth. The earliest known record of Point duSable living in Chicago is an entry that Hugh Heward made in his journal on 10May 1790, during a journey from Detroit across Michigan and through Illinois. Heward's party stopped at Point duSable's house enroute to the Chicago portage; they swapped their canoe for a pirogue that belonged to Point duSable, and they bought bread, flour, and pork from him. Perrish Grignon, who visited Chicago in about 1794, described Point duSable as a large man and wealthy trader. Point du Sable's granddaughter, Eulalie Pelletier, was born at his Chicago River settlement in 1796.

In 1800 Point duSable sold his farm to John Kinzie's frontman, Jean La Lime, for 6,000 livres. The bill of sale, which was rediscovered in 1913 in an archive in Detroit, detailed all of the property Point duSable owned, as well as many of his personal effects. This included a house, two barns, a horse-drawn mill, a bakehouse, a poultry house, a dairy, and a smokehouse. The house was a 22 x log cabin filled with fine furniture and paintings.

After Point du Sable sold his property in Chicago, he moved to St. Charles, west of St. Louis, which at that time was still part of Spanish Louisiana. He was commissioned by the colonial governor to operate a ferry across the Missouri River. In St.Charles, he may have lived for a time with his son, and later with his granddaughter's family. Late in life, he may have sought public or charitable assistance. He died on 28 August 1818 and was buried in an unmarked grave in St.Charles Borromeo Cemetery. His entry in the parish burial register does not mention his origins, parents, or relatives; it simply describes him as nègre (French for negro).

The St.Charles Borromeo Cemetery was moved twice in the 19thcentury. Oral tradition and records of the Archdiocese of St. Louis suggested that Point duSable's remains were also moved. On 12October 1968, the Illinois Sesquicentennial Commission erected a granite marker at the site believed to be Point duSable's grave in the third St.Charles Borromeo Cemetery.

In 2002 an archaeological investigation of the grave site was initiated by the African Scientific Research Institute at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Researchers using a combination of ground-penetrating radar, surveys, and excavation of a 9 x area did not find any evidence of any burials at the supposed grave site, leading the archaeologists to conclude that Point duSable's remains may not have been reinterred from one of the two previous cemeteries.

Early life
Though there is little historical evidence regarding Point duSable's life before the 1770s, there are several theories and legends that give accounts of his early life. Writing in 1933, Quaife identified a French immigrant to Canada, Pierre Dandonneau, who acquired the title "Sieur deSable" and whose descendants were known by both the names Dandonneau and DuSable. Quaife was unable to find a direct link to Point duSable, but he identified descendants of Pierre Dandonneau as living around the Great Lakes region in Detroit, Mackinac, and St.Joseph. He speculated that Point duSable's father may have been a member of this family, while his mother was likely an enslaved woman.

In 1951, Joseph Jeremie, a native of Haiti, published a pamphlet in which he said he was the great-grandson of Point duSable. Based on family recollections and tombstone inscriptions, he claimed that Point duSable was born in Saint-Marc in what was then Saint Domingue, studied in France, and returned to Haiti to deal in coffee before traveling to French Louisiana. Historian and Point duSable biographer John F. Swenson has called these claims "elaborate, undocumented assertions... in a fanciful biography".

Fiction
In 1953, Shirley Graham drew from the work of Quaife and Jeremie in a historical novel about Point duSable. She described it as "not accurate history nor pure fiction", but rather "an imaginative interpretation of all the known facts". This book presented Point duSable as the son of the mate on a pirate ship, the Black Sea Gull, and a freedwoman called Suzanne. Despite lack of evidence and the continued debate about Point duSable's early life, parentage, and birthplace, this popular story has been repeated and widely presented as being definitive.

Peoria
In 1815, a land claim that had been submitted by Nicholas Jarrot to the land commissioners at Kaskaskia, Illinois Territory, was approved. In the claim Jarrot asserted that a "Jean Baptiste Poinstable" had been "head of a family at Peoria in the year 1783, and before and after that year", and that he "had a house built and cultivated land between the Old Fort and the new settlement in the year 1780". This document has been taken by Quaife and other historians as evidence that Point duSable lived at Peoria on the Illinois River prior to going north to settle in Chicago. However, other records demonstrate that Point duSable was living and working under the British at the Pinery in Michigan in the early 1780s. The Kaskaskia land commissioners identified many fraudulent land claims, including two previously submitted in the name of Point duSable. Nicholas Jarrot, the claimant, was involved in many false claims, and Swenson suggests that this one was also fraudulent, made without Point duSable's knowledge. Although perhaps in conflict with some of the above information, other historical records suggest that Point duSable bought land in Peoria from J.B. Maillet on 13March 1773 and sold it to Isaac Darneille in 1783, before he became the first "permanent" resident of Chicago.

Departure from Chicago
Point du Sable left Chicago in 1800. He sold his property to Jean La Lime, a trader from Quebec, and moved to the Missouri River valley, at that time part of Spanish Louisiana. The reason for his departure is unknown. By 1804, John Kinzie, another early Chicago settler, had bought the former du Sable house. Kinzie's daughter-in-law, Juliette Magill Kinzie, suggested in her 1852 memoir that "perhaps he [du Sable] was disgusted at not being elected to a similar dignity [great chief] by the Pottowattamies".

In 1874, Nehemiah Matson elaborated on this story, claiming that Point duSable was a slave from Virginia who had moved with his master to Lexington, Kentucky, in 1790. According to Matson, Point duSable became a zealous Catholic in order to convince a Jesuit missionary to declare him chief of the local Native Americans, but after they refused to accept him as their chief, he left Chicago. Quaife dismisses both of these stories as being fictional.

In her 1953 novel, Graham suggests that Point du Sable left Chicago because he was angered that the US government wanted him to buy the land on which he had lived and called his own for the previous two decades. The 1795 Treaty of Greenville, which ended the Northwest Indian War, and the subsequent westward migration of Native Americans away from the Chicago area might also have influenced his decision.

Founder of Chicago
The French came to the North American mid-continent region in the 17thcentury. Though probably not the first Europeans to visit the area, Louis Jolliet and Jacques Marquette were the first noted in the written record to have crossed the Chicago Portage and traveled along the Chicago River, as part of their 1673 Mississippi Valley expedition. Over the following years, visits by the French continued and occasional intermittent posts were established, including those by René LaSalle, Henri de Tonti, Pierre Liette and the four-year Mission of the Guardian Angel. Point duSable's residence in the 1780s is recognized as the establishment of the first continuous settlement, which ultimately grew to become the city of Chicago. He is therefore widely regarded as the first permanent resident of Chicago and has been given the appellation "Founder of Chicago".

Memorials
By the 1850s, historians of Chicago recognized Point duSable as the city's earliest non-Native permanent resident, but for a long time the city did not honor him in the same manner as other pioneers. Point du Sable was generally forgotten during the 19thcentury; instead, the Scots-Irish trader John Kinzie from Quebec, who had bought his property, was often credited for the settlement. A plaque was erected by the city in 1913 at the corner of Kinzie and Pine Streets to commemorate the Kinzie homestead. In the planning stages of the 1933–1934 Century of Progress International Exposition, several African-American groups campaigned for Point duSable to be honored at the fair. At the time, few Chicagoans had even heard of Point duSable, and the fair's organizers presented the 1803 construction of Fort Dearborn as the city's historical beginning. The campaign was partially successful, however, with a replica of Point duSable's cabin being presented as part of the "background of the history of Chicago".

In 1965, a plaza called Pioneer Court was built on the site of Point duSable's homestead as part of the construction of the Equitable Life Assurance Society of America building. The Jean Baptiste Point Du Sable Homesite was designated as a National Historic Landmark on 11 May 1976 as a site deemed to have "exceptional value to the nation". Pioneer Court is located at what is now 401N.Michigan Avenue in the Michigan–Wacker Historic District. At this site in 2009, the City of Chicago and a private donor, Haitian-born Lesly Benodin, erected a large bronze bust of Point duSable by Chicago-born sculptor Erik Blome.

In October 2010, the Michigan Avenue Bridge was renamed DuSable Bridge. Previously, a small street with the alternative spelling DeSaible Street had been named after him. In 2021, Lake Shore Drive in Chicago was renamed in honor of Point du Sable. Several institutions have been named in his honor. DuSable High School opened in Bronzeville, Chicago, in 1934. The DuSable campus today houses the Daniel Hale Williams Prep School of Medicine and the Bronzeville Scholastic Institute. Margaret Taylor-Burroughs, a prominent African-American artist and writer, taught at the school for twenty-three years. She and her husband co-founded the DuSable Black History Museum and Education Center, located on Chicago's South Side. DuSable Hall, built in 1968, on the campus of Northern Illinois University is also named for him.

DuSable Harbor is located in the heart of downtown Chicago at the foot of Randolph Street. Directly across the Chicago River from the harbor, DuSable Park is a 3.24 acre urban park in Chicago currently awaiting redevelopment. The project was originally announced in 1987 by Mayor Harold Washington; following years of remediation of the site initial development began in early 2024. A park is also named after Point du Sable in St. Charles, his other notable place of residence. The US Postal Service honored Point duSable with the issue of a Black Heritage Series 22-cent postage stamp on 20 February 1987.

title: Jean Baptiste Point du Sable