Who owns Scotland?

When guiding last month I caused some interest by quoting the statistic that 1/4 of rural land in Scotland is owned by just 66 landowners. Today I finally got around to checking that I had got this right. Happily so. Further details from Who Owns Scotland

Scotland's European landowners

Yesterday I wrote that 19th century European aristocracts would visit the Highlands and wear the kilt. Today I read in the paper that Vladimir Lisin, Russia's second richest man, has bought Aberuchill castle in Perthshire and the associated 3,300-acre estate. Until his recent sad death, Paul Van Vlissingen a Dutchman an ardent environmentalist, was Scotland's richest landowner. Then there is the Swedish millionairess Sigrid van Rausing, also an environmentalist who owns Coignafern estate. It seems that the new European (industrial) aristocrats are even more committed to the Highlands, and perhaps to the environment here, than were the tsars and princes who visited Queen Victoria at Balmoral and got appropriately togged up for the occasion.