the seventh century. Numerous monasteries and churches were established throughout the Hebrides in this period under the leadership of Iona. Seven existed in the Western Isles, including three in Lewis, one on Bernera, one at Kilcholmkill on North Uist, one at Kilcholambkille on Benbecula, and one at Howmore on South Uist. Norsemen began raiding the Hebrides in the 790s, with the most famous being the sacking of Iona Abbey and the murder of 68 monks there in 806. Due to repeated attacks, the great abbey was abandoned by 825 and all the Hebrides gradually fell under the control of pagan Vikings. For roughly two centuries Celtic Christians were forced to live under pagan rule. It seems that the Church throughout the Hebrides turned again to Ireland as Viking control had cut the region off from the rest of Scotland. The Norse converted, at least nominally, to Christianity in the eleventh century and the southernmost of the Western Isles were placed under the newly created Diocese of Sodor and Man (later simply the Diocese of the Isles). The thirteenth century saw both the Church and the state in the Outer Hebrides begin shifting from Norse to Scottish rule. The first bishops from outside the Kingdom of the Isles sat in the bishop's chair of the Diocese of the Isles in the mid-13th century. Following the Treaty of Perth in 1266, all the Western Isles came under the formal rule of the King of Scotland, although real authority was exercised by the chief of the MacDonalds as Lord of the Isles. The Church in the Hebrides remained part of the Diocese of the Isles until the Reformation. A 16th century description says this diocese was "the most scattered, and also one of the poorest, in the pre-Reformation Church [in] Scotland". Few priests were present to serve the Church here, and those who did serve in the region secured their positions by clan ties rather than by piety, and were more interested in church income than in spreading the faith. On the eve of the Reformation, the Bishop of the Isles sent his relative Fr. Donald Munro to make an inventory of all the prominent parishes of the diocese. This document, Description of the Western Isles of Scotland, was written in 1549, and is the oldest known description of the Outer Hebrides. At the time there was one parish church on Barra and