Tarbert is a town in the west of Scotland, in the Argyll and Bute council area. It is built around East Loch Tarbert, an inlet of Loch Fyne, and also crosses the isthmus which links the peninsula of Kintyre to Knapdale and West Loch Tarbert. Tarbert had actually a recorded population of 1,338 in the 2001 Census. Tarbert has a lengthy background both as a harbour and as a calculated point player accessibility to Kintyre and also the Inner Hebrides. The name Tarbert is the anglicised form of the Gaelic word tairbeart, which essentially equates as "carrying throughout" and describes the narrowest strip of land between two bodies of water over which products or entire boats can be lugged (portage). In hobbies freights were discharged from vessels berthed in one loch, hauled over the isthmus to the various other loch, packed onto vessels berthed there and also delivered forward, enabling seafarers to prevent the sail around the Mull of Kintyre. Tarbert was anciently part of the Gaelic overkingdom of Dál Riata and secured by three castles-- in the town centre, ahead of the West Loch, and also on the south side of the East Loch. The spoil of the last of these castles, Tarbert Castle, still exists as well as dominates Tarbert's skyline. Around the year 1098 Magnus Barefoot, King of Norway, had his longship brought across the isthmus at Tarbert to indicate his ownership of the Western Isles. In spite of its difference as a tactical garrison throughout the Middle Ages, Tarbert's socioeconomic prosperity came throughout the Very early Modern period, as the port turned into an angling community. At its elevation, the Loch Fyne herring fishery drew in hundreds of vessels to Tarbert.
