The earliest records of religious activity at Anwoth date back to the 12th century, when the parish was granted to Holyrood Abbey.

[2] Rutherford remained at the parish until 1636, when his disagreements with the church authorities led to his prohibition from practising as a minister and exile to Aberdeen.

[8] The churchyard was used as a location for a number of scenes in the 1973 horror film The Wicker Man,[9] in which a Christian policeman, played by Edward Woodward, investigates the disappearance of a missing girl in a remote pagan community led by Christopher Lee.

[10] Its walls are 1.1 metres (3.6 ft) thick, and there are round-arched doors in the east and west gable ends, each beneath a rectangular window, all of which have chamfered stonework surrounds.

Above a plinth is a tomb chest, which is decorated with an array of geometric patterns, scrollwork, finials, skeletons, crossbones, and the arms of the Gordons.

[1][11] Also in the churchyard is a monument to John Bell, a covenanter who was shot in 1685, and an early 19th-century mausoleum, which was rebuilt in 1878 by Sir William Maxwell of Cardoness.