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Highland Clearances
The Highland Clearances (Scottish Gaelic: Fuadach nan GÃ idheal, the "expulsion of the Gael") was the forced displacement of a significant number of people in the Scottish Highlands during the 18th and 19th centuries, as a result of an agricultural revolution, that resulted in enclosures, largely carried out by hereditary aristocratic landowners. The changes were seen to be supported by the government, which gave financial aid for roads and bridges to assist the new sheep-based agriculture and trade.
There was mass forced emigration to the sea coast, the Scottish Lowlands and the North American colonies. The clearances were particularly notorious as a result of the late timing, the lack of legal protection for year-by-year tenants under Scots law, the abruptness of the change from the traditional clan system, and the brutality of many evictions.
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