Place names, Highlands & islands of Scotland

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PLACE NAMES

HIGHLANDS AND ISLANDS

OF SCOTLAND

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HIGHLANDS & ISLANDS
OF SCOTLAND

ALEX. MacBAIN, M.A.,LL.D.

WITH NOTE.S AND A FOREWORD
BY

WILLIAM J. WATSON, MA.,LL.D.

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^'--fSSSSS^.-sll^^

ENEAS MACKAY

43 MURRAY PLACE, STIRLING

1922

INTROiJUCTION.

Dr Alexander Macbain's work on Names of
Places deals with the Cehic names of pre-Gaehc
origin which he calls " Pictish " ; with Gaehc
names, ancl with names of Norse origin which
have been transmitted through Gaelic. The area
from which he took his materials was chiefly
Inverness-shire, Sutherland, and Lewis. His
views on the language spoken by the Picts are
given in his paper on " Ptolemy's Geography of
Scotland" (published separately), in his edition
of Skene's "Highlanders of Scotland," and in
several papers contained in this volume, particu-
larly that on the " Place-Names of Inverness-
shire." His position is that the Picts spoke
Early British or a dialect of it, and that the Celtic
language of early Britain was practically homo-
geneous from the English Channel to the very
North. He agrees with Kuno Meyer in holding
that " no Gael ever set his foot on British soil
save from a vessel that had put out from Ire-
larid." Further, assuming that the terms
Cruthen (which is the Gaelic form of Briton) and
Pict are co-extensive and mutually convertible,

VI. INTKODUCTION.

he includes under ' ' Picts ' ' the whole of the
Celtic settlers in Britain prior to the Belgae, thus
ignoring the facts that the Picts are not heard of
till about 300 %^, and that all old authorities
(Gildas, Nennius, Bede, &c.) state that their
original seat in Scotland was in the far
North. To him too, as well as to othei
modern writers, the Cruithne of Ireland are
"Picts." These assumptions do not, how-
ever, alfect the linguistic part of Macbain's
argument, and his views on the language of the
Picts have been generally accepted. No one
nowadays would suggest, as Sir John Ehys did
once, that the Picts spoke a language that was
non-Aryan, and very few^ w ould hold that Pictish
was other than Early British. It must be
admitted at the same time that some of Macbain's
"Pictish" examples are really Gaelic {e.g.
Dores, Loch Oich), or at least capable of being
explained from Gaelic {e.g. Feshie, Mashie,
Geldie).

By his treatment of Norse names, Macbam
laid a firm foundation for further investigators to
build on. He was the first to recognize in
practice that the changes undergone by these
names in the mouths of Gaelic speakers are not
arbitrary, but are capable of classification, and
that no derivation which ignores the current
Gaelic pronunciation, or which goes against it,
can be accepted as certain.

INTRODUCTION. VU.

In dealing with place-names in general, Dr
Macbain's method was first to make sure of the
actual pronunciation in Gaelic, and then to com-
pare the old written forms of the names when
such are available. He also paid attention to
the physical characteristics in cases where there
niight be more than one possible explanation.
In the case of Idrigill, for instance, I remember
how he learned first that there is no " gill
there, and then that there is a knob-like hill at
the extremity next the sea. This is, of course,
the only scientific way of treating the subject.
He was not always right, and in the papers that
follow it will be seen that he changed his views in
particular instances; but he was on the right
lines. Sometimes he was misled by wrong
information : this is most notable in his paper on
ISutherland. The only work on Scottish place-
names comparable to Macbain's, done by a man
of his generation, is the late Professor Donald
Mackinnon's series of eighteen articles in the
Scotsman on the Place-Names and Personal
Names of Argyll, which has not been reprinted.

The present volume contains practically all
that Macbain printed on the subject of Place-
Names. It may be proper to state that before
the work came into my hands, the selection and
sequence of the papers had been already decided,
and pp. 1-64 printed off.

Vlll. INTRODUCTION.

In the notes that loUow, 1 have indicated the
chief points on which, as it seems to me, one
might venture to differ fi'om Dr Macbain's
explanations.

FAOK

I . Cataobh, GaUaobh, being certainly datives,
are correctly spelled Cataibh, Gallaibh.

6. Ptolemy's tribes : In his paper on Ptolemy's
Geography of Scotland, Macbam places
the Caereni " in Western Sutherland up
to near the Naver " ; " the Cornavii occu-
pied Caithness, the horn or corn of
Scotland " ; " neighbours to the Cornavii
southwards were the Lugi, occupying
Easter Sutherland. Around Loch Shin
were the Smertae, and Easter Ross was
' occupied, up to the Varar estuary, by
the Decantae." The name of tiie
Smertae was discovered (by myself) to
survive in Carn Smeart (also, sometimes,
Carn Smeartach), the name of a hill in
the ridge between Strathcarron and Kyle-
side. Smertae is a participial form, fiom
the root siner, smear; compare M. Ir.
smertha.
Travedum, Travedrum : read Tarvedum,
Tarvedunum.

8 . Creed river — A' Ghriota : correctly Abhainn
Ghride.

INTRODUCTION. IX.

Pittentrail : in Gaelic Baile an Traill,
Thrall's Stead, which makes it post-
Norse, for train is a loan from Norse
thraell.

Aberscross : in Gaelic abarscaig ; Norse ; no
connection with aber, a confluence.

10. Eogart : in Gaelic Raghart, i.e. Ro-ghort,

Ea-ghart, Big-field.
xlssynt : assendi will not do, for initial a of
Norse ass, ridge, is long. There is
another Assynt in Ross-shire .

11. Skinaskink : a ghost-name fouud on maps

for the real Sionasgaig.

Clyne : as Mr CM. Robertson has pointed
out, Clin, which is the Gaelic form, is an
oblique case of claon, sloping, a slope.

Dornoch : place of fist-stones, i.e., rounded
pebbles or dornagan: the locative case is
found in Dornaigh, Dornie, in Lochalsh,
and elsewhere— r. Place-Names of Ross
and Cromarty.

Kildonan : Kelduninach c. 1230; in view of
other early spellings and of the modern
Gaelic, Cill Donnain, there is no doubt
that " St Donnan's Kirk " is the original,
and that Kelduninach (presumably inter-
preted by Macbain as Kil-domnach) is
either an error or refers to another place.

Lairg : in Gaelic Luirg, dative-locative of
lorg, shank; compare Lurgyndaspok,

X. INTRODUCTION.

PACK

1390, "the Bishop's Leg" (Ant. of

Aberdeen and Banff); Magh-luirg, Moy-

lurg, in Connacht.
Reay : in Rob Donn Mioghiadh, genitive

Mioghraidh (rhyming with inntinn, cinnt-

each, gniomh sin) ; in Strathy now Meagh-

rath ; cannot therefore be from magh ; the

second part is rath; compare Dii(n)rath,

Dounreay.
Embo : may be Eyvind's Stead; Elvind is

probably a misprint.
Creich : in Gaehc Craoich, possibly locative

of craohhach, tree-place; not from cnoc/i.
li). Ashore: in Rob Donn, and now, Aisir (a

long); anglicised on maps Old-shore.
Hysbackie, in Gaelic Hei(ll)sbacaidh; the

phonetics clearly indicate an original II

(or possibly nn); compare Heisker.
Coldbackie, in Gaelic Callbacaidh.
14. Migdale : in Gaelic Migein, not Norse,

wholly at least, and to be compared with

Migvie, Miggovie, Miggernie, etc.
Keoldale : in Gaelic Cealldail; the palatal c

is decisive against kaldr, cold.
Duible, in Gaelic Daigheabul; the hrst

syllable is sounded like aoi short.
Leirable, in Gaelic Lireabol; not from leir,

loam ; it may be from Norse liri, a tern,

also a man's nickname.

INTRODUCTION. XI.

PAGE

Eldrable, in Gaelic Eilldreabol, which can-
not be from the source suggested in the
text.

Mudale, in uaehc Modhadul.

Halladale, in Gaehc Healadul.

15. Navidale : in Gaehc Nei(mh)eadail, which
may be a hybrid from 7ieimhidh, a sanc-
tuary, holy place, and Norse dah, a dale.

Conamheall : properly Conmheall, either
High Lump or Hound Lump ; con may be
the compositional form of cu, hound, or
it may represent Early Celtic cimos, high.
As Conmheall is the highest part of Ben
More in Assynt, it probably represents
Early Celtic Cunomello- .

iriimisdale, in Gaelic Eumasdal; the u is
almost ao short.

Iti. Meall Rinidh, in Gaelic Meall Eoidhinigh
or Eeidhinigh (possibly Eoithinidh,
Eeithinidh) ; Loch More is in Gaelic Loch
an Eei'inidh; there is also Allt an Eei'-
inidh; the ei is close. My informant
connected these names with reidhneach,
reithneach (in the glossary to Eob Donn,
1829, reidhne), "bo sheasg," a yeld cow.
Reisgill : there is another Eeisgiil in Suther-
land, which is in Gaelic Eidhisgii; I am
not sure of its position.

Xll. INTRODUCTION.

i'A<.r

k>migol, ill Gaelic Smidl)i*;ii ; not from
smiiga; it appears lo represent Norse
" smidbju-gil," Smithy-gill.

Fresgill, in Gaelic Freisgii, perhaps froui
Norse fress, a tom-cat.

Siiisgil, in Ciaelic Sithisgil or Sidhisgil ;
Norse " seydhir," from which Macbain
takes the name, means a lire-pit, cook-
mgfire, roasting fire. The derivation is
somewhat doubtful .

Ben Loyal : in Gaelic Beinn Laghail, Norse
laga-fjaU or larja-rdJlr, Law-fell or Law-
field.

TralagiU : Thrall's Gill, not Troll's Gill.

Baligil : the a is long, therefore Norse
Bale-gulley, Flame-gulley.

Melness, in Gaelic Mealanais; cf. Meala-
bhaig, Bent-grass Bay.

Shinness : more likely Gaelic sean-innis^
old-haugh .
17. Conesaid, in Gaelic Caonasaid; the phon
etics point to a Norse '" kein-" ; compare
" Thorgeir Keingr " (genitive Keings)
of Landnamabok, where "Keingr" is
explained as " uncus," hooked.

Falside, in Gaehc Feallasaid, correctly ex-
plained in text.

Melvich, in Gaelic Mealbhaich, Place of
Seabent; not from Norse vik.

INTRODUCTION. Xlii.

PAGE

Golval, in Gaelic Golbhal, where o, being
short, cannot represent an of Norse,
which would give o long in Gaehc.

Musal, in Gaelic Musal; the explanation is
probably correct.

Marrel, in Gaelic Maraill, Sealield.

Rossal : the grass here causes congestion
and inflammation in cattle, but not m the
case of horses.

1."^. Hielam, in Rob Donn Huilleum; may he
Hound -holm.

Scourie; in Gaelic Sgohhairidh, probably
from Norse skogr, a wood, " Shaw-
shieling."

Bighouse : in Gaelic Biogas, genitive Biog-
ais; an alternative explanation is Norse
hygg, barley : Barley-house.

Olave : in Altas, a fancy name given to a
cottage.

32. "A well called Dobur Artbranani ': read "a
stream," etc.

" Losing himself in a dense wood " : read
" entering a dense wood."

Clar Sgithe : in poetry clar is common in
the sense of " surface, district," e.g.
Clar Chormaic, Clar Conghail, Clar Cobh-
thaigh, etc. (bardic names for Ireland),
Clar Monaidh (North Britain); Clar
Mumhan (Munster); Clar Rois (Ross);
Clar Fionnghall (the Western Isles,

XIV INTRODUCTION.

fAOK

Hebrides), etc., etc. '' Clar Sgith,"
therefore, is in no way influenced by
Norse skidh. The term occurs often in
unpubhshed bardic poetry, regularly in
the form of Cldr Sgith or Sgi.

33. Dun Sgathaich : read Dim Sgathaich; so in
Skye now ; the Dean of Lismore has
genitive ^'caf/ic/?a, rhyming with cjnrdha.
The poem in the Dean's Book has also the
dative Scdthaigh rhyming with d' fhdg-
ais; both forms occur m Early Irish.

35. Swordale : in Gaelic Snardail; Norse Saur-
dalr would become Sordail in Gaelic. It
is " Sward-dale."

Sleat : the derivation from sleitr is sup-
ported by the spelling SUite in an unpub-
lished poem by Cathal MacMhuinch.

Bracadale : in Gaelic Bracadail (Brachda-
dail); therefore not from hrekka, a slope.

36.Eaasay: in Gaelic Ratharsa; MacVurich
Raarsaigh (genitive); v. p. 169.

Trodday : in Gaelic Trondaidh, evidently
connected with Trdiidairnis, but
" Thrond's Isle " ought to be Trondar-
aidh.

Ascrib. Isles : initial a is long, which nega-
tives the explanation.

Wiay : in Gaelic Fuiaidh, which does not
consist with the explanation.

INTRODUCTION, XV.

PAGE

37. Broadford : a translation of an i-Atli
Leathan, the Broad Ford; not Norse.

Oskaig : oss-skiki, Stream-mouth Strip.

Loch Eishort : Gaehc, as got by me, Loch
Ai(ll)seort, does not consist with the ex-
planation.

Scavaig : in Gaelic Sgathabhaig; hardly
from Norse skogr, wood, shaw

Osdail : initial o short negatives the deriva-
tion.

39. Garry : in Gaelic gearraidh, Norse gerdhi,
a fenced field, garth.

46. Kilmallie : the suggested derivation from

Amhalghaidh is impossible; Mailidh is
most probably connected with mdi, a
prince; found also in Con-e Mhaileagain
(Place-Names of Eoss and Cromarty) and
in Dail Mhailidh, Dalmally .
An Linne Sheilich : read ' ' iVn Linne
Sheileach," which is from setle, locally
said to mean here ' ' brackish water ' ' ;
compare seile, saliva.

47. Loch Leven : I have heard it called " Loch

Liobhunn," but the true form appears to
be " Loch Leamhain " or "Leamhna,"
from leamhan, elm. The river Leven m
Lennox is certainly Leamhan; so in the
poem by Muireach Ua Dalaigh, " Saer do
lennan, a Leamhain." Glen Lyon is
Gleann Lio{h}i)unn.

JCVl. TNTRODUCTION.

PAOH

4.S. Glen Loy : in Gaelic Gleann Laoigh; Lao^h,
calf, is the name of the river. A well at
Tara was called Loig-les, " vitulus civi-
tatum," Calf of the Courts.
Callart : in Gaelic CaUaird, Hazel Point.

49. Dun Dearduil : onlv two forts of this name
are known to me, one at Inverfarigaig on
Loch Ness, the other this one, in Glen
Nevis.
Bothuntin : the local pronunciation in Gaelic-
is Both-thionntainyi .

^)''>. Loch-ais' : the lingering, dragging sound
that indicates the loss of // is attached to
the i, not to the a.

•">*'. Ulhava : if Ulfr were a person's name, it
ought to be rather Ulfs-ey; in Gaelic,
Ulbhsa; but the s of the Norse genitive
seems to be dropped sometimes in the
Gaelicized forms.

57. Avernish : afar, bulky, seems to be used

only of qualities and actions, not of

things like nesses.
Loch Calavie : in Gaelic Loch Cailbhidh,

from calbh, a plant-stalk, etc.
Strathasgaig : in Gaelic Srath-asgaig ; Norse

d-skiki, water-strip.

r>". Conchra : more probably "Dog-fold";
compare Ir. con-chro, a wolf -trap; K.
Meyer's Contribb.

INTRODUCTION. XVII.

A.GK

61. Strathie : as it has the singular form of the
article, " abhainn an t-Srathaidh," the
form must be diminutive.
Palascaig : in Gaelic FeaUasgaig, Norse
Fjalla-skiki, Hill-strip. Palasgaig was
formed on the assumption that / was
aspirated p.
Monar : the phonetics are decisive against
the reference to monmhur; the Gaelic is
Monar, from root of mon-adh, hill, moun-
tain.

63. Loch Hourn : the couplet quoted from the
Dean's Book is in Deibhidhe metre, and
should be read —

Leigid deireadh do mhuirne
eadar Seile is Subhairne.

They make an end of jollity between
Sheil and Subhairne.

Tohn MacCodrum has —

0 cheann Loch-Uthairn nam fuar

bheann
Gu bun na stuaighe a Morrair,

which I have printed in Bardachd
Ghaidhlig "Loch Shubhairn," following
the Dean. At the head of the loch there
are Coire Shuhh and Loch Coire Shuhh,
from suhh, small fruit, berry, raspberry,
etc. ; and Subhairn is therefore Suhh-
hhearn, Berry Gap. Similarly A' Mhor-

XVlll. INTRODUCTION.

PAGE

hhairn, Morverii, is from mor, the com-
positional form of muir, sea, and hearn,
" the Sea Gap," with reference probably
to the deep indentation by Loch Sunart.

68. Sainea : the equation with Shuna is impos-

sible phonetically, for Sainea would be-
come Saoine in modern Gaelic, while
Shuna is now Siuna.
Maleos : read Malaios.

69. Colonsay : in Gaelic Colhhasa; in the

Dean's Book, " jholfissay " ; in the
so-called " Eed Book of Clanranald,"
" Colbhannsaigh " ; with Dean Monro,
" Colvansay " ; on record " Coluynsay,'*
etc. — plainly Norse, " Kolbein's Isle."
Adamnan's Colosus is now Coll.

Terra Ethica : there is no reason to doubt
the equation with Tii'ee, but the reference
to Old Irish ith , oenitive etho, corn, is
doubtful, in view of the fact that Tiree
appears in very old Irish poetry as Ti'r
lath, which indicates that e of " Ethica "
is long.
78. Harris: another suggestion is Norse
heradh, a district, but the fact that e of
heradh is long while that of Na h-Earradh
is short is fatal to this idea.

Hirt : i\ p. 177; perhaps the more probable,
if more orosaic, connection with Old Irish
irt, death, is the extremely dangerous

INTRODUCTION. XIX.

PAOE

character of the rock-bound coast of
Hirt. The term recurs in an Duihhirt-
each, " the Black Deadly One," the
name of the sea-rock west of Colonsay on
which a lighthouse now stands.

74. Coilsay : read " Gilsay."

75. Fuidhaidh : /•. note on p. 36 above.
Benbecula : the Gaelic form is pioperly

Beinn na bJiFaoghJa.

Heisker : in Gaelic Hei{U)s(jeir: old spell-
ings have / regularly; the name is Norse
hellu-sher, flat skerry, contracted into
liellsker.

Hasker : in Gaehc Haisgeir, haf-sker, deep-
sea skerry.

76. Trodday : the derivation from trodh, pas-

ture, is impossible, for Norse f//^ would be
in (-aelic here r/h. See note on p. 36
above. The correct explanation of
Trotternish appears on p. 166.
Eaasay : r. p. 169; Hraunsey is not pos-
sible .

77. Kerrera : in Gaelic pronunciation there is

still distinct trace of hit — Cear(bli)ara;
kjarr, copse, is therefore insufficient lo
explain the phonetic facts.

78. Colonsay : see note on p. 68 above.
Hersey : it is difficult to see how this could

have been a Norse attempt at pronouncino-
Arran.

XX. INTRODUCTION'.

PAai

Bute : in modern Gaelic rather Bod ; Baile
Bhoid is Eothesay; there is Old Irish hot,
fire, but the connection is not obvious.
79. Snizort : v. p. 34.

81. Creed : this is all wrong; see p. 8 and note

thereon above.

82. Diebek : this is the same as Diobaig,

" Deep Bay," in Eoss-shire.

83. Leurbost : cannot come from leir, which

would yield laor in Gaelic.
Garbost : cannot come from geir, which
would yield gaoi' in Gaelic.

84. Habost : the derivation proposed by Captain

Thomas' is impossible, for II would not
disappear here.

85. Haugr : becomes Hogh and Togh in Gaelic.

88. Bragar : in Gaelic Bragar.

89. Orfris-ey : read Orfiris-ey.

90. Eodel : in an Adv. Lib. MS. Roghadal

(poem of 1705).

92. Taransay :Taran was a Pictish personal

name; see Index to Skene's Chronicles of
the Picts and Scots.

93. Eesort : in GaeHc Reusort; Capt. Thomas'.^

explanation is impossible phonetically .

95. Coinn-mheall : see note on p. 15 above.

96. Gardhr : throughout this article, read

gerdhi, a fenced field, garth. The Gaehc
is gearraidh.

INTRODUCTION. XXI.

PAGE

Rusigarry : in Gaelic Ruisigearraidh , which
makes a derivation from hris improbable.
97. Tralagill : in Gaelic Tralaigil, Thrall's
Gulley.

Crisigill : the explanation "Cross-gill" is
phonetically unlikely. I do not know the
Gaelic pronunciation.
100. " Joyce is wrong " : Norse muli would not
become rnaol, maoil in Gaelic; Joyce is
right so far as the Mull of Kintyre is con-
cerned, and probably also as to the Muli
of Galloway. The MiiUs of Orkney, etc.,
represent mxili doubtless.

103. Callernish : in Gaelic Calanis; " Caia " is

found at the beginning of several Lewis
names, and probably is the personal
name Kali. Mr Kenneth Mackenzie of
Shader, Barvas, believed the form CaUer-
nish to be wrong ; it is mdicated, however,
by Martin's " Classerniss." In any case,
kjalar-nes does not suit the fact that c of
Calanis is not palatal, as it would be if it
were Norse kj.

104. Barvas : the derivation is certainly wrong

as to the first part, and very doubtful as

to the second part.
107. Linshader : in Gaehc Liseadair, with nasal

i; Flax- stead.
109. Vatisker : the first part has no connection

with vddha; probably for vains-sker,

•XXll. INTRODUCTION.

PAGE

water-skerry, i.e., skerry covered at high
water.
Hasker : Deep-sea Skerry, haf-sker.

112. Clach an Truiseil : derivation unsatisfactoiy

phonetically; a more likely one will ap
pear in Mr Kenneth Mackenzie's forth-
coming book on the Flace-Names of
Lewis.

113. Teangue : rather from Gaehc teanga.
121. Inverness: in the Dean's Book, Inverness

is " v'nvir nissa," i.e. Inbhir Nise (the
metre requires a dissyllable); in 17th
century bardic poetry (poetry by profes-
sional trained bards) it is Inbhir Nis,
without the genitive inflection, as now.
Clachnaharry : Clach na h-Aithrigh(e),
Stone of Repentance, suits the phonetics
exactly; cf. Clach a' Pheanais, in Colon-
say.
Tomnahurich : in literature iuhhrach is used
in the sense of a " barge, goodly vessel" ;
also " a pretty girl."
126. Bona : well known in Gaelic as am Banath,
the White ford, and named so, according
to the local seanchaidhean, from white
stones in it. Similar formations are com-
mon, e.g., an Damhath, Dava, the Ox
Ford; an Garhhath, Garva, the Rough
Ford; am Bannath, Bonar, the Bottom
Ford, etc. Macbain's suspicioi] was

127

INTR0DUCT10>. XXlll.

perhaps due to the fact that there is no
ford at Bona now, but that is due to the
raising of the level of Loch Ness when the
Caledonian Canal was made.

Dores : see note to p. 157.

Moy : The Mackintosh is " Tigliearna na
Moighe."

Nairn : in Gaelic Narunn ( PNarrunn) ; kSiath
Narunn and Srath Naruinn, Strathnairn;
Inbhir Narunn and Inbhir Naruinn, Nau'i],
town. The name belongs to the small
but important class of river names -hat
end in -ami, -unn, e.g., Comhann, Coe;
Liobhunn, Lyon ; Carrann, Carron. Mac-
bain regarded these as representmg the
Early Celtic ending -ona: they may, how-
ever, be names of river divinities in {he
genitive case, from an old nomniaiive
ending in -u; compare Domnu, gen.
Domnann; Manau, gen. Manann.

128. Croy is in Gaelic Crothaigh.

Partick is in Gaelic Pearraig (for Pearth-
aig?).

Blairour : the fact that the confluence of
the Blair-our burn with Spean is Inver-
our indicates that Blair-our represents
Blar-dhobhair, Moor of the Water, i.e.
Stream.

129. Pelier : there are other streams of this

name in addition to those mentioned. In

XXIV. INTRODUCTION.

rAOK

" Inbhir-feo'arain," / is of course really
ph. The final -an (open a) is not in-
flected; i.e., it is not -ain. This lack of
inflection in the case of the final -an (from
-agnos) is common in the early language,
and in some parts of Scotland is still
regular in saints' names, e.g. Ciaran, etc.

147. Don : I have not heard Dian.

151. "A medigeval MS." : the Book of Lemster
(circa 1150 a.d.), 371, b. 37 : " Donnan
Ega — Ega nomen fontis i n-Aldasain i
Cataib i tuasciurt Alban ' ' ; Ega is the
name of a well in Aldasain among the
Cats (i.e. in Sutherland or Caithness) m
the north of Alba. An interlinear gloss
on Aldasain says correctly, " .i. carrac
etir Gall-Gedelu 7 Cend-tiri i n-a camair
immuich " ; "(Aldasain is) a rock be-
tween Galloway and Kintyre facing them
out (in the sea) " ; it is Ailsa Craig in fact.
With " Ega nomen fontis " compare
" enga, aqua super petram, .i. fons,"
' ' enga, water over a rock, that is, a foun-
tain" (Book of Armagh), where " enga "
might be written, in Greek style,

Morvern, which has o short, cannot con-
tain w,6r ; the first S3^11able is the composi-
tional form of miiir, sea ; Morvern means

INTRODUCTION. XXV.

PAGC

" Sea-gap," just as Subhairne means
' ' Berry-gap. ' ' See note on p. 63 above.
Portree : there is another Fort-righ in Km-
tyre, a very old name. The Skye name
may be much older than James V.
152. Morbhearnaibh : see note to p. 63.

157. Duthil : anglicized from Gaelic Daoghal or

Daodhal ; similarly Culduthel, near Inver-
ness, is Cuil-daoghail, -daodhail; this puts
" tuathail " out of the question.

Dores, in Gaelic Duras . there is no phonetic
difficulty m equating this with duhhros,
duhhras, which in fact occurs as Durrus
in Cork (Joyce). Terminal -as here is
dull, whereas the so-called ' ' Pictish ' '
ending -ais has open a. Dorus, locally
darus, a door, is the Gaelic name which
is anglicized Dares, in the parish of Dores.
The local rhyme beginning ' ' Mile o
Dhuras gu Darus," " a mile from Dores
to Dares," is very well known.

Loch Hourn : see note to p. 63 above.

158. Dalarossie, Dulergusy : the ending -ie or -y

represents the old genitive ending of
Fergus, an u-stem with genitive Ferguso,
Fergusa.
164. Loch Hourn : see note to p. 63.

159. Ben Loyal : see note to p. 16 above. Mac-

bain's leidh-fjall would yield laodhcd in
Gaelic.

XXVI. [NTRODUCTION.

PAor

172. (Jreagarry or Oreagorry is Creag Ghoraidh,

Godfrey's rock.
176. Elrick : in the Book of Deer " elerc,

which comes by metathesis from Old

Irish erelc, an ambush.
178. Lochmaddy : in Gaehc Loch nam Madadh,

Loch of the Dogs ; the '' ' dogs ' ' are

three rocks hi the bay, called " na

madaidhean."
Boisdale : in Gaehc Baoghasdail, Baegi's

Dale.
Gieniinnan : in Gaelic Gleann Fhionghiiin,

Fingon's Glen; from Fingon comes Mac-

Fhionghuin, anglicized Mackimion.

180. Loch Arkaig : in Gaelic Loch xiirceig.
Glenquoich : ' ' cuach ' ' may have refer-
ence to pot-holes in the river; the fact
that " cuaich " is singular is no objection,
being quite in keeping with Gaehc usage.

Loch Oich : it is sniiply Loch Obhaich, for-
merly Loch Abhaich, Loch of Abhach,
i.e. stream-place, from ahh, river,
whence Awe. That the stream novv-
known as the Oich river was once Abha
is proved by the fact that a stretch of
ground above it is called Fachdar Abha,
the Overland of Awe.

181. Phoineas in Kiltarlity has no waterfall neai

it; it 1-=^ "fo-innis," suh-meadov, small
meadow or haugh.

rNTEODUC'TTON. XXVll.

PAOJC

Ooylum : from cumg-leam, ' gorge-leap '' ;

cong, a deep narrow gorge in a stream

(or even between rocks m the sea), is with

us cuiyig.

Rothiemoon : " Eat a' Monie ' ' ; we should

have expected " na mona."
Geldie, etc. : it is to be feared that here we
have Old Irish gelda, geldai, bright; e.g.,
" Aedan in grian geldai," in Feillire
Oengusa ; ' ' Aedan the brilliant sun ' ' ; and
elsewhere passim.

188. Scaniport : the stress being on the first part,
the meaning is rather " Cleft-ferry," i.e.
ferry near the cleft.

319. Ach-gourish represents " gobhair-innis,"
Goat-haugh, Goat-mead. Compare Coin-
innis, Hound-mead; Daimh-innis, Ox-
mead.

327. This is a review of the first edition of the
work; the second edition (1903) benefited
by the criticism.

331. abh, O.Ir. ab, means stream, river; it is
feminine; genitiye " na habae, nahaba,"
in Earlv Middle Irish,
"an, water" : so Kuno Meyer in Contnbb.,
with reference to Stokes' ' ' Metrical
Glossaries."

334. " Dal-uar, with the accent on the Dal " :
the stress would be on " uar," the quah-
fying term, not on " Dal," the generic

XXVlll. INTRODUCTION.

PMIT.

term. The fatal objection to connecting
names like Bal-four, Pit-four, with Gaelic
" fuar," cold, is that when these names
are preserved in Gaelic pronunciation, the
sound of " four " is not in the least like
that of "fuar'."

343. " The Gael did not visit the Epidii for at
least forty years later." Macbain means
that Cairbre Eiada's settlement took
place about forty years after the time
when Ptolemy wrote.
But Gael from Ireland may have
visited ' ' Kintyre much earlier ; the
regulus ' ' who visited Agricola in
Scotland about 84 a.d. is not likely to
have been the first to come across.

346. Maol-rubha : the declension of the name
(e.g., mac Maile-Rubha in Cain Adam-
nain) negatives mdl, prince. Mael-rubha
is exactly equivalent to Maei-ruis or
Mael-rois, from ros, cape or wood; in
such names ma el has lost its primitive
meaning of " cropped man, shaveling,"
whence " slave, devotee " ; and is prac-
tically equivalent to gille.
Glen Finnan, see note, p. xxvi.

348. Ardnamurchan : the fact that the name is
stressed on the penultimate syllable puts
" Heishts of the sea of Coll '" out of the

INTRODUCTION. X51X.

PAOK

question; the grammar, too, is impos-
sible.

350. Colonsay : see note, p. xviii.

352. Nant is simply neannta, nettle; Abhainn
Neannta, Nettle river; Coille Neannta,
Nettle M^ood, etc.

354. Glen Brander (Branter) : I have not heard
the name pronounced, but the Pass of
Brander is Cumhang a' Bhrannraidh,
from h7'annradh, an obstruction; Irish
brannradh, a trap or snare; stocks, pil-
lory.
Seil, in Book of Leinster 24b, Soil; more
likely pre-Norse; O.N. seil means a
string, which is not satisfactory as an
island name.

C O N T K N T S.

PAGE

Introduction . . . . . .v.

Sutherland : its Early History and Names . . 2

{Highland Neiv.s, 26th March, 2nd April, 9th
April, 16th April, 1898).

Place Names of Skye ..... 32

(Highland Newt:, 11th December, 1897).

Place Names of Lochaber ..... 42
(Highland News, 12th February, 1898).

Place Names of Lochalsh ..... 53
(Highland News, 2nd February, 1901).

Place Names of the Hebrides .... 67
(Northern Chronicle, 16th, 23rd, and 30th Novem-
ber, and 2nd December, 1892).

Place Names of Inverness and Vicinity . .121

(Northern Chronicle, 12th July, 1893).

Place Names of Inverness-shire . . . .133

(Transactions of the Gaelic Society of Inverness,
Vol. XXV.; read 13th February, 1902. Also
Northern Chronicle. 1899— 15th March, 22nd
March, and 29th March).

Badenoch : its History, Clans, and Place Names . 189
(Transactions of the Gaelic Society of Inverness,
Vol. XVI.; read 5th March, 1890).

Annat 283

(Northern Chronicle, 20th May, 1903).

Gaelic " Airigh," Shieling, in Norse Place Names 289
(Northern Chronicle, 29th Jiily, 1903).

Glenshiel 296

(Northern Chronicle, 2nd September, 1903).

XXXU. CONTENTS.

PAGE

Tonuiaburich 299

(Northern Chronicle, 2nd September, 1903).

Place Names of Ross and Croiririrty (Review) . 303
(Celtic Review, July, 1904).

The Place Names of Elginshire (Review) . . 313

(nighUind News).

Place Names of Scotland (Review) . . . 327

(Inverness Courier, 1st Miixch, 1892).

The Place Names of Argyll (Review) . . . .*^?,9

(Highland News, 28tli April and 5th M:iy, 1906).

Index ........ 361

SUTHERLAND:
ITS EARLY HISTORY

AND NAMES.

SUTHERLAND.— ITS EARLY
HISTORY AND NAMES.

THE name Sutherland was applied by the Norse to the
portion of their Caithness south of the Ord,
stretching to the Oikel river, now the southern
boundary of the modern county. The water-shed
in the middle of the county divided this Sudhr-land
from Assynt, Durness, and Strathnaver ; and the northern
district of Strathnaver and its neighbouring valleys were
known to the Norsemen as the Dales of Caithness. This
restricted meaning of the name remained in historic force
till 1601, when the Earl of Sutherland got the modern
county, all save Assynt, raised mto a separate Sheriffship,
apart from Inverness, in the Sheriffship of which it had
been till then included. The Earl of Sutherland's lands
also were till then mostly confined to the district here
indicated as early Sutherland. Through the fall of the
Roman Church, which practically possessed north-west
Sutherland, and through the turbulence of the native clans
— the Mackays especially — the Earl of Sutherland in 1601
was either actual holder or legal superior of the present

4 SUTHERLAND— ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NAMES.

county, with the exception of Assynt. In 1631 Assynt
was also joined to the rest of Sutherland, and the present
county was constituted, thanks to the efforts of the
indefatigable Sir Robert Gordon.

The Gaelic name for Sutherland is Cataobh, and Brae-
Chat is Sir Robert Gordon's designation for the upper
regions of Lairg — the Barony of Gruids and the other
inland and upland districts on the eastern water-shed, with
Dirie-Chat, or the Desert of Cat, further north. The
Norse called both Sutherland and Caithness by the name
of Caithness or Katanes ; but when greater accuracy was
desired, modern Caithness was called Ness, that is, the
Nose of the province of Cat, while the district south of
the Ord w^as called Sudhr-land. This distinction remained
after the Norse power was overthrown, and w^e hear of
" Catanesia cis et ultra Montem " — Caithness on this and
beyond the Mound — the MONTEM being the Ord of Caith-
ness. In an important epitome of the geography of
Scotland, written in 1165, and inspired by Andrew, the
first Bishop of Caithness, we read : — " Septima enim pars
est Cathanesia citra montem et ultra montem, quod mons
Mound dividit Cathanesia per medium." The division
made by the Ord of Caithness suggested the usual deriva-
tion given for the Gaelic names of Sutherland and Caith-
ness— the names Cataobh and Gallaobh. They were
explained by Shaw, the historian of Moray, as being for
Cat-taobh and Gall-thaobh, the CAT-side and the Gall-
side of the Ord ; Gall he explained as stranger or foreigner,
and this is correct, and Cat he derived from Gaelic CAD,
high, which is a non-existent word, or from St Cattan's
name. As a matter of fact the two names are the dative
or accusative plural of the Gaelic nouns Cat and Gall. The
name of a people was in old Gaelic times used for the
name of their country, in the plural number, and generally
in the dative or accusative plural. The same thing occurred
in Latin and in Anglo-Saxon. The name Wales means

SUTHERLAND — ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NAMES. 5

" Welshmen ;" it is a plural of like force with Gall or
Gallaobh, foreigners, or " Lowlanders " now. Caithness
in Gaelic is Gallaobh, and means " strangers," " among
strangers," "in the land of strangers," that is, AN
Gallaobh.

But what is Cataobh ? Gaelic " cat " means a cat, as
in English. Various interpretations have been offered.
Careless investigators have correlated the name with the
Chatti of Germany, mentioned in the first century of our
era, and they have even asserted that Ptolemy places a
Catti tribe in Sutherland. The tribe meant is the
Decantae, which has been misread into Cantae, which even
then is unlike Catti, and still more unlike the Chatti, or
rather Hatti, now developed into the province of Hesse.
The name Cat, Cait, or Cataobh is old ; it is manifestly
antecedent to the Norse, who made use of the tribal names
they found on the mainland of Scotland — the Picts for
Pettland, as in Pentland Firth ; and so Cat and Cata was
the name adopted for the province, which was divided
into the Ness of Cat and the Souther-land. Katanes or
Caithness latterly usurped the older name of Kata or Katar,
which, as a matter of fact, does not exist in historical Norse
literature ; it is only inferred. The Gaelic records of
mediaeval times make Cat a son of Cruithne, the eponymus
of the Cruithnig or Picts ; he was one of the seven sons of
Cruithne, who divided Scotland between them, and a verse (X-m^rru^f
is recorded which is attributed to St Columba, which says :

Seven children of Cruithne
Divided Alba into seven divisions —
Cait, Ce, Cirig, a warlike clan,
Fib, Fidach, Fotla, Fortrenn.

The four provinces of Cataobh, Fife, Athole (or old Ath-
Fhodhla), and Fortrenn are clearly indicated ; the other
three names are difficult to fix. Mediaeval Irish works

6 SUTHERLAND — ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NAMES.

refer to the northern province of Scotland as Crich Chat
and I CATAIB, " in (the land of) Cats," or m the Province
of Cats. There is every indication that the name ante-
ceded the Norse ; and, further, the word CAT, cat, possessed
by most modern languages, is probably Celtic, meaning
the " wild cat." The name appears in Gaulish as a per-
sonal name — Cattos and Catta ; and there can be little
doubt that the Gaelic name of Sutherland comes from an
old Celtic tribe — the Catti — named so after the " wild cat."
Such animal names were quite common as tribal names,
and it is supposed that the Caereni (Assynt, probably)
mentioned by Ptolemy as possessing western Sutherland
were so named from CAORA, sheep.

Ptolemy, the geographer, who flourished about 120 of
our era, has left half-a-dozen interesting names attachable
to Sutherland and Caithness. The tribal names are the
Caereni, already mentioned ; north of them, in the north-
west corner of the county, occupying Durness, were the
Cornavi, a name which might mean the people of the
CORN or horn, as we have in Cornwall. The Lugi (or
Lougi) inhabited eastern Catanesia ; and south of them
were the Decantae, with the Smertae to the west, possibly
of both. The latter name is from the root SMER, MER,
mind, memory, which also appears elsewhere, especially
in Ro-smerta, the Gaulish Minerva. These five tribes,
with the Carnonacae, in the Loch-carron and adjacent
districts, filled the whole of Scotland north of the Beauly
Firth. Ptolemy mentions the capes, rivers, and estuaries.
Curiously, Cape Wrath is missed; but the river Naver is
given plainly enough in his " Nabarus flumen," the root of
the name being supposed to be NAV, flow, swim, as in our
borrowed English words, NAVAL, NAVY. The Cape of
Travedum or Travedrum may be regarded as one of the
horns of Thurso Bay ; the word means " bull head," from
TARVOS, now TARBH, bull. That this is the locality meant
seems to be proved by the name Thurso, older Thorsa, for

SUTHERLAND — ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NAMES. 7

Thjorsa, bull water, a name which appears also in Iceland.
The name Orkas is also given to this cape, and Orkney is
the Norse garb of the Celtic name Orcades or Whale-isles.
Ptolemy gives also two other cape names further east:
Duncansbay Head is Cape Virvedrum, and Noss Head is
Verubium, which last possibly means " Spit-head." The
Helmsdale river, Gaelic Ilidh, is rendered with fair exact-
ness by Ptolemy's Ila flumen. With this name may be
compared the other Isla of Perthshire, and Dr Stokes has
proposed the root IL, EIL, move rapidly, as the root of the
name. Further south Ptolemy places his Alta Ripa or
High Bank, which is supposed to be the Ord of Caithness
misplaced.

One or two misreadings of Ptolemy, besides supposi-
tious names which the perfervid imaginations of anti-
quarians have conjured up, are responsible for some bad
history and bad etymologising. The case of the name
Chatti or Hatti has already been mentioned ; but a bad
reading of the name Lugi has been adopted, namely, Logi,
which is made to explain the parish name of Loth. The
Lougi may have been so named from the Celtic or Gadelic
sun-god, whose name was Luga, possibly meaning the
" bright and charming one," perhaps allied to the Norse
Loki, the god of tricks and evil deeds. A name Abona
has somehow " growed " in this connection, and it is made
to explain Bonar.

The first Celtic inhabitants of Sutherland were the
Picts ; it was from them that the names recorded by
Ptolemy came. They spoke a language like the Welsh,
where P often answers to Gaelic C. The great test-word
in place-names is PET, whose Gaelic equivalent is CUID.
It signifies a farm or " town," the same as Gaelic BAILE,
which, in fact, replaces it. Half-a-dozen names with the
prefix PIT or PET meet us in Sutherland proper, for there
are none now in the north and west of the county. There

8 SUTHERLAND — ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NAMES.

is, first, Pitfour; this is a common name in Pictland
(occurring twice in Sutherland — in Rogart and near Lairg),
and means, in all probability, " Pasture-town," allied ta
Welsh PAWR, pasture. Pitmean, in the old Barony of
Skelbo, is also common, and possibly means " Mid-town,"
allied to Gaelic MEADHON, middle. It appears as Pait-
mayne in 1525 and Petmayne in 15G2. Pettakarsie and
Pitfour are mentioned together in 15G6. Pitgrudie shows
a terminal part which seems to appear in Gruids and the
Grudie river in Durness. It has been explained as from
the Norse GRJOT, gravel ; and as a river name it is classical
in the Cumberland form of Greta. In Lewis we have it in
the Creed river — A' Ghriota. But it can scarcely be the
same word in Pitgrudy ; such a hybrid is almost impossible
in the circumstances. The Pictish language by the time
of the Norse conquest of Sutherland was practically dead ;
a new combination with PET under Norse auspices is
scarcely to be imagined. The old form of the name, in
1222-45, was Pethgrudi, which is unlike what we should
expect from Norse GRJOT at that time, or indeed later.
A form like GREED or GREOD is demanded by Norse-
Gaehc phonetics. Compare the river name Fleet from
Norse FLJOTR, fleet, flood, and the clan name Macleod,
which comes from Norse LJOTR, ugly. The Welsh GRUT,
of similar meaning, has been suggested, but the history of
the Welsh word itself requires clearing up. Pittentrail (in
1566 Pittentrail) has been explained as Pet-an-traigh —
the town by the shore ; but this does not account for the
ending of the word.

The only other assured Pictish names are Abirscor and
Oykel. In regard to Abirscor, there being Easter and
Wester Abirscor, the word is generally plural — Aberscors,
now Aberscross. The natives pronounce it Aberscaig.
The etymology of the name still awaits elucidating. In
1518 it is spelt Abbirsco, in 1544 Abirscor. That it is
Pictish is proved by the prefix ABER, instead of the Gaelic

SUTHERLAND — ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NAMES. 9

equivalent INVER, meaning " confluence." The Oykel
river is probably so named from its banks : the name in
Pictish means " high," and is the same as appears in the
Ochil Hills and m Ochiltree ("High-town" or Uxello-
trebos). The Norse sagas speak of Ekkjalbakki or the
Oykel bank, and this fact also lends strength to the view
that the river got its name from the high banks some-
where.

The Norsemen commenced their raids shortly before
800. At first they did not think of settling in the land.
About 830 they began to establish a kingdom in Ireland,
and they had evidently meanwhile subdued the Orkneys
and Hebrides and colonised them, intending them as so
many stepping-stones in their raids in Ireland and the west
of England. The conquest of Sutherland and Caithness
is recorded as having taken place about 880 under Thors-
tein the Red and Sigurd of Orkney. The Norse had pos-
session of the province of Cat for over three hundred
years. It was not till 1196 that King William finally estab-
lished the authority of the Scottish Crown north of the
Oikel ; for it was only a nominal suzeranity that existed
previous to that, and Earls like Thorfin (1014-1064) were
quite independent of the King of Scotland ; indeed, the
latter ruled as a rival — a friendly rival— to Macbeth, pos-
sessing all Scotland north of the Beauly Firth, if, indeed,
his power did not extend to Inverness. The name Ding-
wall (" Parliament-place ") shows that they had estab-
ilshed a centre of political authority there. The complete-
ness of the conquest of Sutherland is shown by the great
number of Norse place-names that still exist therein. In
Cosmo Innes' map of Sutherland, attached to his " Origines
Parochiales," where all the " public " names of the county
appear as they were in the 16th and 17th centuries, the
proportion of Norse names in Sutherland proper — Dor-
noch, etc. — is one in every three as against Gaelic, while
in the " Dales " district — Tongue, etc. — the proportion is

10 SUTHERLAND — ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NAMES.

reversed, and Gaelic forms only a third of the names as
against Norse. The conquest and occupation of Suther-
land proper were slower and less complete than what took
place on the northern coast. As we come through Easter
Ross the Norse names fall away rapidly, and end alto-
gether in the Beauly valley with Tarradale and Eskadale.

In northern Sutherland we meet with as many Norse
place-names nearly as in Lewis. The general Gaelic
names STAC, CLEIT, GEODHA and SGEIR, meaning respec-
tively a precipitous hill, sea cliff, bay, and " skerry," are
from the Norse ; and these are common names along the
coast of Sutherland from Assynt to Reay. Beinn Stack
in Eddrachilles is one of the highest mountains in the
county. Of the thirteen or fourteen parish names in
Sutherland three are certainly Norse — Durness, which
means " Deer's Ness or point," spelt about 1230 as Dyrnes ;
Golspie, spelt in 1330 Goldespy, which is a compound of
the Norse BAER or BYR, a village, English BYE, as in
Whitby, and whose first part is possibly GULL, gold, though
usually explained as Gils-by or " Ravine-village ;" and
Tongue, which is from Norse TUNGA, a tongue (of land).
Rogart is possibly Norse ; its earliest spelling (1230) is
Rothe-gorthe, then Rogert in 1542, and Roart in 1562,
which is practically its local name still. It seems to be
for Raudhar-garth or Rauth's garth or farm, the RAUDH
signifying a person as well as " red." It is explained
usually as ROTH-GART, " circle garth " in Welsh, as being
of Pictish origin. If GARTH forms the final part of the
name, it is infallibly Norse ; for DAL and GARTH or GARRY
(from GERDI) final are of Norse origin and use. Assynt
has also been claimed as Norse, explained as A SYNT, " seen
from afar," with reference to its conspicuous mountains.
The earhest spelling is Assend, and for this we might
suggest the derivation ASSENDI, the Norse for "Ridge-
end." Its termination may be compared to that of the
Caithness parish name of Skmnet, the older Scynend, the

SUTHERLAND — ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NAMES. 11

Skinid of Tongue, which may be compared with the
Icelandic Skinnastadr or " Skinstead ;" and to these we
may add the name of Loch Skinashink in Assynt.

The other parish names are Celtic or Gaelic. Clyne is
the Clun of 1230 from G. CLUAIN, a meadow. Creich is
Crech in 1230, and doubtless means the " boundary "
parish— G. Crioch ; Dornoch, which in 1230 is Durnach,
seems of Pictish origin, pointmg to a Celtic Durnacon, the
stem DURNO appearing both in England and on the Con-
tinent in Celtic place-names and meaning " stronghold "
doubtless allied to Gaelic DORN, fist; Eddrachilles means
the place " between the two kyles ;" Farr, a name also
appearing in Strathnairn, is possibly a compound from G.
FOR, over, above, and means " upper land ;" Kildonan was
originally Kil-domnach or " Lord's Kirk," corrupted into
"St Donnan's Kirk ;" Lairg, in 1230 Larg, means a "hillside
or moor," G. LEARG ; Loth is from G. LOTH, mud, now
obsolete ; Reay, which is partly of Caithness and partly
of Sutherland, is in G. Rath or Magh Rath, " Plain of
the Fort " (there is also Ben Rath), reminding us of the
Ulster Maghrath or Moyra, famous in story. The earliest
form of the Gaelic name appears in M'Vurich, who calls
the first Lord Reay "Morbhair Meghrath," Mormaer of
Moyra.

In rapidly reviewing the Norse names of Sutherland,
I will first commence with personal names which enter
into place-names. Persons' names often give names
to farms, especially with the word BOL, farm. Thus
Arnaboll of Durness, which appears in the sixteenth
century as Ardeboll, Arnboll, Ardnaboll, and Arnobill,
means Ami's stead, rather than " eagle or erne stead ;"
Embo, which in the early ITth century is Enbo, and in
1610 Eyndboll, means Elvind's stead, even though the
modern pronunciation is Ereboll, a manifest and easily
explained corruption ; Skibo is the Scitheboll of 1230,

12 SUTHERLAND— ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NAMES.

which suggests the name Skithi, the word SKIDH meaning
otherwise a log, tablet ; Torboll of Dornoch, which appears
as Torroboll in Lairg, appears as Thoreboll or Thureboll
in the 13th century, and is so named from Thori, a fav-
ourite Norse name, derived from the god named Thor.
Another form of this name is Thorir, genitive Thoris,
which appears in Torrisdale of Tongue. Names in pre-
fixed Thor or Tor are very common all over the Norse-
occupied portion of the Highlands and Isles. Unapool of
Assynt receives its name from Uni; it means Uni's BOL.
Allied to BOL is the word BOLSTADR, farm-stead; it
becomes BISTER or BUSTER in Caithness and Orkney, and
BOST in the Isles. Ulbster of Kildonan no doubt was
Ulli's stead, a favourite nnme, which also appears in Ulla-
pool and Ulladale elsewhere ; while Scrabster (in Tongue),
which in the Orkney Saga appears as Ska-ra-bolstadr,
means Skari's stead rather than " sea-mew stead," which
it may also mean. With DALR, a dale, personal names are
rare ; yet we have Helmsdale in the Sagas as Hjalmundal,
which means Hjalmund's dale. Ospisdale, in Creich, is
from Ospis, which must be the genitive, degraded consi-
derably, of Ospak or Uspak, another favourite Scoto-
Norse name. Ullipsdale, in Kildonan, is doubtless
" Wolf's dale," after Gaelic phonetics had hardened the F
of Ulfs (genitive of Ulfr) into a P before the S. Trantle,
in Farr, which appears in 1527 as Trountal and in 1626 as
Trontaill, stands no doubt for a Norse Throndar-dalr, or
" Thrond's dale ;" and doubtless the same name accounts
for the Dronside or Thrond's SETR (seat) of Tongue.
Dal-Harald, in Farr, is a Gaelic compound, and, as conjec-
tured, commemorates the defeat in 1196 of Earl Harold,
son of Maddad (Gaelic MADADH — Hound) of Athole, by
King William, when the King was helped by the famous
Manx King Reginald, son of Godred, who undertook the
government of Cataobh for a season. Lochan Hacoin, in
Tongue, is named after some unknown or unrecognised

SUTHERLAND — ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NAMES. l3

Haco or other, just as Kyleakin of Skye celebrates Haco
of Largs (1263). The name Grimr has left many place-
names in the Isles ; two places in Sutherland get named
after some hero of this designation — Ben Griam, Sir R.
Gordon's Bingrime, and, below the ben, Griamacharry,
or " Grim's Garth " — that is, Griama-ghardhaidh in
the best old Gaehc phonetics. Not far away is Ben
Armin, the ben of the ARMANN, w^hich in Norse means
steward or controller, and in Gaelic, which has borrowed
it, " a hero." Cyderhall is a fancy form for Sidera, which
in 1230 appears as Sywardhoch, in 12T5 as Sytheraw ; it is
no doubt justly regarded as standing for Sigurd's HAUGR
or "howe," where the first Sigurd of Orkney may have
been buried after his fight with and death by Malbrigd
Bucktooth, whose venomous tooth had killed him. Ashore
or Oldshores in Assynt was formerly Astlair (1559) and
Aslar (1551), and the late Captain Thomas regarded this
as a corruption of Asleifar-vik, Asleif's Bay, which is
mentioned in 1263 as one of Hacon's ports of call.

The most of the Norse names will now be classified
under their commonest, significant parts, such as bakki,
bol, dalr, and vik.

Bakki, a bank. We have Backies above Golspie, "the
Banks ;" Coldbackie in Tongue, which is either Cold Bank
or Charcoal Bank, probably the former; Hysbackie, also
in Tongue, for Hus-bakki, "House-bank;" and the Saga
Ekkjals-bakki or Oikel Bank, where Oikel itself seems to
be the Pictish UCHEL, high, possibly applied to the river
banks.

BOL, a farm. Arnaboll, Embo, Skibo, Torboll, Torro-
bol, and Unabol have been explained above. In Dornoch
parish we have Skelbo, the older Skelbol and Skelbotil,
which means "shell town (bol or botl) ;" in Durness, Erri-
bol, "Beach-town," from EYRR, beach, and Loch Crossphuil
from Krossa-bol ,"cross-town," a name well known in the

14 SUTHERLAND — ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NA.MES.

Isles ; in Kildonan, Duible, "Mud town/' from DY, mud, and
Leirable from LEIR, loam, meaning much the same as
Duible — old forms of both are Doypull (1527), Duiboll
(IGIO), Lyriboll, Lereboll (1563-156G), to which compare
Lerwick, "mud bay ;" Borrobale is Borg or Burgh-bol,
"fort-town," Borryboll (1563); Eldrable, older Eltriboll
(1610) and Altreboll (1566), which cannot be from ELDR,
gen. ELDS, beacon, as usually explained, must be equated
with the Caithness Alterwall, the Alterwell of 1455, which
points to a Norse Altara-voUr or "Altar-field ;" hence we
may infer Eldrable to be for "Altar-ton." Gailval in
1566 Galezboll, is possibly Galli's town: in Lairg we have
Colaboll, which may mean " Coal (charcoal) town," or
" Cold town," or even " Kol's town," the person Kol : in
Tongue we have Kirkiboll, Icelandic Kirkjubol, " Church-
town," and Ribigill, which in 1530 appears as Regeboll,
and may thus mean " Lady's town " (RYGR, lady).

Dalr, a dale. In Creich there is Swordale, the
Swerdel and Swerisdale of 1275, meaning " Swarddale ;"
Spinningdale, in 1464 Spanigidill, and in 1553 Spanzedell,
possibly " spangle-dale," from Norse SPONG, G. SPANGAR ;
Migdale, the Miggeweth of 1275, seems from MYKI, dung.
In Dornoch there is Astle, which has undergone many
transformations. Askesdale and Haskesdale (1222-75),
Assastel (1360), Askadaile (1472), Assiedale (1610), which
is the Icelandic Eskidalr or " Ash-dale." In Durness
there is Keoldale, in 1559 Kauldale, the Icelandic Kaldi-
dalr, " Cold-dale ;" Strath-undale, Strathwradell of 1530,
the dale of the URUS or auroch. In Farr are many dales
— Armadale, Armidill (1499), " Arm or bay dale ;" Mudale,
Mowdaill (1570), Mowadale (1601), possibly from MODA
MODR, muddy river or snow-banks, which seemingly is
the root idea of Moydart also — "Mudfjord;" Halladale,
Helgadall in 1222, means " Hallow or Holy dale," though
the name may be a personal one, Helgi ; Langdale is
exactly " Longdale." In Kildonan we found Helmsdale

SUTHERLAND — ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NAMES. 15

and Ullipsdale, already discussed ; there are also Navidale
(Navadaill, 1566) and Rimisdale (Rimbisdell, 1630), the
former being explained as from NAEFR, birch (compare
Icelandic Naefrholt, " Birch-holt," and the latter from
RYMR, roaring, " Dale of the roaring stream." In Lairg
we have Sletdale, " Evendale," and Osdale (Feith Osdale),
" East-dale."

Ey, island. Oldney off Assynt is possibly from
ALDIN, fruit ; the Channel Island Alderney has been com-
pared in name. Soyea is Saudhar-ey or " Sheep-isle," a
common name in the Hebrides ; Chrona is possibly
T-hraun-ey, the same as Rona, " Rocky-isle." Off
Eddrachilles are Calva or " Calf -isle," a common name
also, and Handa, " Sand-isle." Boursa, near Strathy
Point, is apparently BURS-EY, " Bower-isle." In 1386
Ferchard Leche, or the Physician, gets from Robert III.
the islands from " Rowestorenastynghe to Rowearmedale "
(Rudha-Stor-an-Assaint to Rudha-Armadail), which are
named Jura (" Deer isle,' possibly Oldaney), Calva (" Calf-
isle,") Sanda (Handa, " Sand-isle,") Elangawne, Elanwill-
ighe, Elanerone, Elanehoga, Elanequothra, Elangelye,
and Elaneneyfe. In 1570 some of these are Handa,
Choarie (Quothra in 1551), Gyld (Rabbit Isles?), Rone
(" Seal Isles ") and Colme, while Howga, now Hoan, also
appears (Haga and Houga in 1601, 1613). The latter
means the " howe " or " burial " isle ; and itself and Isle-
Colm or Neave, " Holy-isle," were ancient burial-places
" to keep the bodies safe from the mainland wolves !"

FjORDR FJARDAR, a ford or sea-loch. Laxford
(G. Luiseard) and INCHARD are both on the coast of
Eddrachilles ; the former means '" Salmon-loch " and the
latter probably " Meadowf jord," from ENGI, a mead.

FjALL, hill, fell. This suffix seems to have been
replaced in Sutherland by BEINN and MEALL of the Gaelic.
Suilven, from SULA, pillar; Conamheall, from Konna-

IG SUTHERLAND— ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NAMES.

fjall "Lady's fell;" and Far-mheall, from FAER, sheep.
Ben Arkle must be from Arkfell, from its summit being
" ark-like ;" Aleall Horn is simply the Norse HORN, which
is common for hills and capes ; Meall Rinidh may be for
Hreinn-fjall, " Reindeer fell," for the Norse found rein-
deer, it is said, in Sutherland. Beinn Loyal has the ter-
minal FJALL, but the prefix is obscure; compare the
Icelandic Laufafell or " Leafy-hill." In South Uist is the
similarly named Ben Layaval.

Gil, a ravnie. In Assynt we have Tralagill, usually
explained as Troll's gill, but Thrall's gill is also an Ice-
landic word, and suits here as well ; Urigill, ravine of the
URUS or auroch ; Gisgill, the " gushing gill," allied to
GEYSIR, hot spring. The Reisgill of Eddrachilles is pos-
sibly from HRIS, brushwood. Farr has Apigill, " Ape-gill,"
which recalls the Icelandic Apavatn, where API may have
been a person's nick-name; Baligill, gill of the grassy-
slope (BALI) ; Smigel, gill of the narrow cleft (SMUGA) ; and
Redigill, possibly Retta-gil, the " gill of the sheep pen or
adjusting pen." Fresgill, in Durness, is explained as the
" noisy gill " (FRAES, noise). Suisgil, in Kildonan, is in
1527 Seyisgill and Suisgill in 1545, which may be com-
pared to the Icelandic Seythisfjordr, " Seethe-fjord." Mr
Mackay refers it to SUS, roaring.

GjA, a rift, geo, G. GEODHA, borrowed. The Gaelic
form of this word is very common on the northern shores

of Sutherland ; its Norse use is found in Sango-more and
Sango-beg, " Sand-bay," in Durness, and Lamigo or
^' Lamb's bay," in Tongue.

Nes, a ness, cape. Melness, in Tongue, means
" Bent-grass-ness " (MELR) ; Unes, in Golspie, " Yew-ness,"
from YR, yew, the Owenes of 1275 ; and Shinness, which
in 1630 is Chinenes, " Ness of Shin or Loch Shin," called
in Gaelic Ard-na-sinnis.

SUTHERLAND — ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NAMES. 17

Setr, a seat, farm, sheiling. It often appears as
SIDE in Sutherland : in Tongue, Conesaid, Konnasetr,
" Lady's-ton," the older Kinsett (1570) and Kenny side
(1601) ; Falside, "Hill or fjall seat;" in Creich, Linside,
Linsett in 1541 and Leynside in 1552, possibly " flax-
seat " (lin) ; in Golspie, Clayside, possibly " Cliff-seat "
(KLEIF) ; Bosset and Bowsett (Creich and Farr), " Dwell-
ing-seat " (BUSETR), while in Reay Sandside, the older
Sandset, means " Sand-seat."

ViK, bay. In Assynt are Melvich (" Bent-grass ") and
Kirkaig (^Kirkjavik, " Kirk-bay ") ; m Farr, Melvich ; in
Durness, Cearbhaig, or Kerwick, Karfavi, " Galley bay."
Port Chahgaig, in Eddrachilles, is Cellach or Kjallak's
wick.

Vollr, g. VALLR, a field. Carrol, in Clyne, Carrell
in 1610, is Kjarr-vollr or Copse-field. Rossal, in Rosehall,
is Hross-vollr, " Horse-field," Rosswell in 1553 ; Langwell
and Dal-Langal are both from Langi-vollr or " Longr
field ;" Sletell, in Tongue, is " Even-field ;" Golvall, in Farr,
the older Gauldwell (1559), may be Galh's field or Gaular-
vollr, " field of the sounding stream," Norse Gaular-dale.
Musal, in Durness, is Moswell in 1560, that is " Mossfield ;"
.while Majrel, in Kildonan, is explained as " Sea-field."

Other names that do not often recur and do not
come under " heads " are these : — Stoer m Assynt,
which is the very common Norse prefix STOR, big,
Stor-ass, " Big-ridge," Stor-isandr, " Stour-sand," etc. ;
Brora (Bruray 1601, Brora sixteenth century), which
is the Icelandic Bruara, " Bridgewater " exactly ; Uppat,
Uphald in 1528, is from UPP, up; Kyle-strome and
Ben-Strome, admissable hybrids of Gaelic and Norse,
come from STRAUMR, stream, ocean current; Smoo, Cave
of Smoo, in Durness, from SMUGA, a rift or narrow cleft
to creep through, SMJUGA, to creep; Rispond, from HRIS,

18 SUTHERLAND — ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NAMES.

copse ; Cape Wrath or Am Parph is from the Norse name
HVARF, turning point; Hope, ben and loch, from HOP, a
bay, as in Oban, Ob, etc. ; Hielam is a compound of
HOLMR, a holm or island, but the old forms are puzzling —
Unlem (1542), Handlemet (1551), Hunleam (IGOl) ;
Sandwood in Eddrachilles is for Sandvatn, " Sand-water "
— it is Sandwat in 1559; Scourie, place of sheds or
shiels ( ?), from SKURR, a shed ; Borgie in Farr is from
BURG, a fort, the Borve or Borr of the Isles ; Port Skerra
and Skerray are from SKER, a sharp rock, whence "skerry"
and Gaehc SGEIR ; Forsinard, etc., the " twa Fursyis "
(1527\ Forseyis (1626), are from FORS, a waterfall;
Swordly is probably " Sward-lea ;" Skullomie may be
Skolla hvamur, " fox's slope ;" and the following may be
Norse : — Gearnsary, Grodsary, Modsory, Pronsy, Maikle,
Sciberscross, Olave, Shigra, Skericha, Syre, Kirtomy, Big-
house and Garty. Grumbeg and Grumbmore (also Grubeg
and Grubmor) have been etymologised by Rev. A. Gunn
as from Druim-beg and Druim-mor, a phonetic impossi-
bility. The old forms explain their origin : in 1570 we
have Grubmor and Grubeg, but in 1551 it is Gnowb
" Mekle and litil," which is the common Icelandic place-
name word GNUPR, a peak, " a knob." Bighouse is pro-
bably Bygd HUS, " Dwelling-house."

EARLY CLAN AND FAMILY NAMES.

Before passing on to the Clan and Family Names of
Sutherland, I have, firstly, to acknowledge my deep
indebtedness, in my study of the Norse names of Suther-
land, to Mr John Mackay of Hereford, whose excellent

SUTHERLAND — ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NAMES. 19

series of papers in the Inverness Gaelic Society's Trans-
actions on " Sutherland Place-Names " made my task com-
paratively easy — in fact, made it a matter of judicial, if
not judicious, selection.

HURRAYS, SUTHERLANDS, AND GORDONS.

The oldest family name in Sutherland is that of
Moray or Murray. The noble family of Sutherland hailed
originally from Moray ; Freskin, the ancestor of the Earls
of Sutherland and the great families of Morays of Both-
well and Tullibardine, whence the Duke of Athole and
the Earl of Dunmore, held the lands of Duffus, in Moray,
about 1150. His son, called Hugh Freskin, got Suther-
land— that is, Sutherland proper — from King William, no
doubt at the time of his conquest of Catanesia in 1196 ;
and William, his son, was created Earl of Sutherland about
1235, much about the same time as Magnus, son of Gille-
bride, Earl of Angus, was made Earl of Caithness proper,
Freskin's son William was ancestor of the De Moravia
family — the Morays — famed in the 13th and 14th cen-
turies, the best known of them being Sir Andrew Moray
of Bothwell, the Scottish patriot.

It cannot be proved that Hugo Freskin was called
" of Moray," nor was his son so called, for he calls himself
" Dominus de Suthyrlandia, filius Hugonis Freskyn ;" but
his friends were Moravians. Gilbert, Bishop of Caithness,
1222-1245, was " de Moravia," acquiring the lands of
Skelbo from Hugh Freskin, and latterly granting them to
his brother, Richard de Moravia of Culbyn, in whose
family they remained for two centuries. Next to Suther-
land the name Moray is the commonest met with in old
documents dealing with Dornoch and the adjacent
parishes. The Province of Moray is called in early Gaelic

20 SUTHERLAND — ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NAMES.

Mureb, and in Norse Morhaefi, which points to a Pictish
Mcrapia, roots MOR (sea) and AP (water), meaning " coast-
land."

As a name Sutherland is naturally very common in
Sutherland proper. Its origin is simple : it arises from the
title " de Sutherland," or " of Sutherland." In its older
form it appears as " Nicholas of Sutherland of Duffus," for
example. Scions of the noble house only had the name,
just as " de Isles " or " Isles " did duty for the surname
of the early IMacdonald Chiefs — Alexander Isles of Glen-
garry and Marion de Ilys, sister of Alexander, Earl of
Ross (1439). The name Sutherland is, therefore, on a
different footing from any other county-named surnames,
such as Nairne and Fyfe. The tenants of Cupar-Abbey
lands were sometimes from the neighbouring " kingdom,'^
and such are called, for lack of other surnames, Henry of
Fife and James of Fife, as the case may be, that is, James,
from Fife, " James the Fifer," which latterly settles into
James Fife.

The Gordons became Earls of Sutherland in the 16th
century on the failure of the Moray family in the male
line, Adam Gordon, second son of the Earl of Huntly,
marrying the heiress Elizabeth, and their son Alexander
being infeft in the Earldom in 152T. The Gordons there-
after became fairly numerous in the county. The name
is derived from the lands of Gordon, in Berwick, " de
Gordon " being its original form as a designation. One
of the most noted Sutherland men of this name was Sir
Robert Gordon of Gordonston, tutor of Sutherland from
1615 to 1630, being uncle to the young Earl. He wrote
that valuable work, "The Genealogy of the Earls of Suth-
erland," which is our most important guide for the early
history of the northern Highlands.

SUTHERLAND — ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NAMES. 21

GUNNS, MACPHAILS, POLSONS.

Sir Robert Gordon gives as the principal surnames
in Sutherland proper (leaving out Strathnaver, Durness,
Eddrachilles, and Assynt, which last was joined to the
county by Sir Robert's efforts m 1631) in his day the
following: — Gordon, Sutherland, Moray, Gray, Clan-Guin
(the Gunns), Seil-Thomas, Seil-Wohan, and Seil-Phaill. I
have already discussed the first three clan names. The
Grays had their chiet holding at Skibo, which was pos-
sessed by them in the 16th and 17th centuries. The first
of them came North from Forfarshire about 1456, being
the son of Lord Gray of Fowlis, who had to fly for killing
the constable of Dundee.

The Clan Gunn were of Caithness origin. The name
is Norse, the common one of Gunni, from GUNNR, war
(allied to Eng. GUN). Their ancestor was Gun, crowner
of Caithness, about the middle of the 15th centur}' (1450).
He was a man of great power in his day, and a descent
from the King of Denmark was claimed for him — a son
of that King called Gunni having settled, ages before
Sir Robert Gordon wrote the story, in Caithness. The
Crowner's daughter was mother of Donald Gallach of
Sleat, slain in 1506, ancestor of Lord Macdonald. The
Crowner was treacherously slain by the Keiths, along with
many of his clan. His son James escaped to Sutherland,
and the chief centre of the clan in Sutherland came to
be Killernan in Strath-ully. William Mac James Mac
Crowner Gunn distinguished himself against the Mackays
in 1517, at the battle of Torran-dow. During the 16th
century the history of Clan Gunn was a very chequered
one ; the clan had branches in Caithness, Strathnaver and
Sutherland proper, and they could not please the rival
heads of the houses of Sutherland, Sinclair and Mackay.

o«»

SUTHERLAND — ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NAMES.

They generally sided with the Earl of Sutherland. In
1585 the earls agreed to destroy the Gunns, and for three
years the plucky clan was harassed by the earls, until
another disagreement intervened to save the Gunns. John
Gunn Robson was leader of the Caithness Gunns in
IGIC), and no doubt the northern Robsons may be traced
to this branch of the clan. Colonel Sir Wilham Gunn,
his son, rendered himself famous in the Continental wars,
becoming by 1G48 a Baron of the Roman Empire.

The Seil-Thomas and Seil-Phaill, mentioned by Sir
Robert Gordon, were cadets of the Mackay clan. There
is some doubt as to the Seil-Thomas, for Sir Robert, in
his attempt to wean them from the Mackay alliance, de-
clared them to be from Ardmeanagh, in Ross. But the
Seil-Phaill or McPhails were really Mackays, descendants
of Paul, son of Neil Mac Neil Mackay, the latter Neil
being a brother of Angus Dubh, the great Mackay Chief
of 1411. This Neil Mac Neil was the first Mackay to get
land from the Crown under charter; King James, in
1430, gave him lands in Creich and Gairloch. The Pol-
sons, or Paulsons, are supposed to be the same as the
McPhails, sons of Paul Mackay, but this is not the case.
The real Poisons go back as such to the 15th century, and
were settled before 1430 m Creichmore in Creich, where
John Poilsone is mentioned in 1545, and Thomas Poilsone
in 15GT. They are regarded by Cosmo Innes as des-
cended from Paul MacTire, who got these lands in 1365.
Paul MacTire, or " Paul the Wolf," was a famous man in
his day. One or two ecclesiastics appear with the name
of Poison in the 16th century. The name Paul was a
favourite one among the Norse, and hence its popularity
in Cathanesia.

SUTHERLAND — ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NAMES. 23

MATHESONS: DORNOCH NAMES.

Seil-Wohan, or Seil-Wogan, as Sir Robert Gordon
has the name, were Siol-Mhathain, or the Sept of Mathe-
sons. The name Mathan simply means " bear," and was
extremely common in Ireland, especially in Norse times,
when Thor's Wolf and Thor's Bear formed the model for
warlike names. The Mathesons or Mac Mahons were
located on the north side of Loch Shin, their Chief being
tacksman of Shiness. They are traditionally regarded as
descended from the Lochalsh Mathesons, one of whom,
Donald, son of Alexander, fled for his country's good to
Caithness or Cataobh. It was his grandson, "John Mac-
ean-Mac-Konald-wain " whom Sir Robert Gordon in 1616
induced to assume the chiefship of the sept and to
separate his name and kin from the Seil-Thomas, who
were on the side of their kinsmen, the Mackays, and who
were bringing the Mathesons over to the Mackay side.
In this way Sir Robert, as he says, weakened the power
of Seil-Thomas. The first mentioned in the county is
William Matheson in 1512, who acted among other pro-
minent citizens and tacksmen at Dornoch as juryman in a
succession case. Sir John Matheson was Chancellor of
the Bishopric from 1544 to 1554, and Robert Matheson,
saddler and burgess of Dornoch (1566 to 1603), was a
man of property, a fact to which we owe a list of the chief
burgesses of Dornoch Burgh in 1603, who held an
" inquest " over his estate. Colonel George Matheson of
Shiness made his name on the Continent with Lord Reay ;
and from him are descended the Mathesons of the Lewis
— the late Sir James Matheson and Donald Matheson, the
present proprietor of that island.

The list of Burgesses of Dornoch referred to above
must be given to show the character of the better class of

2 4 SUTHERLAND — ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NAMES.

the population, at least from the standpoint of names.
They are these in 1603: —

Richard Murray,

Alexander Murray,

William Murray M'Kane M'Kwatt,

John Murray M'Kane M'Kwatt,

Thomas Murray Angus-sone,

Donald Mackphaill,

Alexander M'Kraith,

William Clunes,

Alexander Clark,

Thomas Veir,

Thomas Ratter,

George Dicksone,

Thomas Fiddes,

to whom add Robert Mathiescne, saddler, deceased.
Earlier Dornoch names are : — Morays in plenty ; in 1512
David Mudy (Moody), a family name introduced by Bishop
William Mudy about 1450; in 1529, Ysaac Leslie and
John Talyour; 1542, Walter Leslie, Ferquhard
M'Gillespy, Alexander Rater and Alexander M'Culloch;
1544, David Dyksoun ; in 1551 and 1552, in addition to
these Leslies, Morays, M'Cullochs, and Dicksons, are
Thomas Chesholme and John Gillepatrick Tailyeour; in
1583 Angus Poison is a citizen, and the name Suther-
land also appears, though rarely. The McRaes are also
common as burgesses and once as bailie ; Robert
McRaithe, bailie, 1570, with Angus McCraithe, holding
Achloch in 1584, and Alexander McKraith, burgess in
1603. Sir Robert McCraith was vicar of Kilmalie or
Golspie in 1545. Other names connected with Dornoch
City are Donald McGillemor (1512), Alexander Gar
(G. GEARR, short) in 1545, John Awloche (Atholeman?)
in 1524 and 1545, Thomas Mowate, Robert Duf or

SUTHERLAND — ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NAMES. 25

McDonald McDavid, 1562, John McDonald McMurquhe,
1568, etc. The name Mowatt, so common in Caithness
early and late, is in the oldest documents given in its
original form of " de Monte Alto " — High Mount, whence
the modern name is contracted and degraded.

THE MACKAYS.

The clans outside Sutherland proper — those of Strath-
naver, Durness, Eddrachilles and Assynt — did not in olden
times comprise any great variety of names. This region is
the cradle of one great clan — the Mackays of Strathnaver
and Reay. The Mackenzies, with their dependants
the Mclvers, and the Macleods, with the Morrisons
and other Lewis septs, are outsiders, comparatively
speaking. Like all the other northern clans — the Mac-
leods, Mackenzies, Mackintoshes, Camerons, etc. — the
Mackay Clan begins its history really at the end of
the fourteenth century — at 1400. True, historians do
tell us that Alexander Mackay, hailing from Galloway,
the seat of the similarly named septs of Mackie and
McGhie, or from Aberdeenshire and the lands of the
Forbeses there, settled in Strathnaver in 1196, he having,
of course, helped King WilHam to expel the Norsemen.
Of course his son (or himself) married the Bishop of
Cathanesia's daughter (as did the ancestor of the Morri-
sons of Durness, etc.), and got from him Church lands in
Strathnaver. Equally, of course, Magnus, the 4th from
Alexander, fought for Bruce at Bannockburn, as did 18
other Highland chiefs, inclusive of The Macpherson. The
first assured chief is Angus Dubh Mackay, who in 1411
barred Donald of Harlaw's path at Dingwall, and got well
" thrashed " for the same. From him the descent can be
followed easily to the present Lord Reay. The Mackay
chiefs got their first charters only in 1499.

2(j SUTHERLAND — ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NAMES.

Sir Robert Gordon calls them Clan Worgan — that is,
Clan of Morgan — and though this title has been refused
by the clan historian, under the impression that it was an
invention of the enemy, it is the usual Gaelic name in
literature for the Mackays of Sutherland, distinguishing
them from the Mackays of Kintyre and " Mac Aoidh na
Ranna," in Islay. In the famous " arming " piece in the
Red Book of Clanranald they are called Clanna meram-
oenmnacha, masgalacha, morbhrontach Morguinn agus
Catuigh " — the merry-hearted, courteous, great-bestowing
Clans Morgan and Cattach. This was written before Sir
Robert's time, possibly. Niall McVurich says that Donald
Duval Mackay O'Manus was " Morbhair Meghrath na
chenn ar Mhorgannachuibh " — the Mormaor of Moyra
(Lord Reay) was the chief of the Morgans.

The name Morgan has puzzled and annoyed the his-
torians ; it is Welsh, they thought. Now, the name is a
good Pictish one, common in Aberdeenshire now, and
especially in olden times, appearing in the roll of Earls of
Mar and other dignities. It is also in the Book of Deer
(circ 1100). It is the old Celtic name Moricantos, " Sea-
bright." Its preservation in Aberdeenshire and Strath-
naver is interesting ; and the fact shows that there is more
in the Forbes myth than some wise historians think. The
name Mackay is, in Gaelic, Mac Aoidh, son of Aodh, and
this in old Gaelic was Aed, the Celtic Aidus, which was the
word, declension and all, for " fire." That it was once a
longer name — such as Aed-gal, Aed-gin, Aed-lug, etc. — is
possible ; but in historic times it has been Aed, and means
" fire," neither more nor less. Caesar's Aedui, whose
name is directly from Celtic AEDUS or AIDUS, were the
first Mackays!

SUTHERLAND — ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NAMES. 27

ANTIQUITIES.

I have no intention of dealing with the purely
physical antiquities of Sutherland, such as the cairns and
stone circles of the Stone Age, or the brochs (of which
there are 60) and earth-houses of the Bronze and Iron
Ages. I will deal only with the literary monument left
by early Christianity at Golspie in the shape of an Ogam-
inscribed monolith usually known as the " Golspie Stone,"
now in the Dunrobin Museum. The inscription on this
stone has received much attention in late years from Mr
Nicholson, of the Bodleian Library, and from Professor
Rhys. Both have written largely on the so-called
" Pictish Inscriptions " in the Ogam character. The Ogam
letters are an Irish invention — a sort of proto-telegraphic
system where the letters of the alphabet are denoted by
so many strokes — from one to five — above, through, or
under a stem line respectively. The letters are easy to
inscribe, but often difficult properly to read.

Professor Rhys has spent many years in deciphering
these Ogam monuments, but Mr Nicholson " came, saw
and conquered " all at once. As he says himself, it was
on a visit to Golspie in 1893 he came " by chance " to
study the Pictish inscriptions of Scotland, and two years
later he gave his " chance " lucubrations to an astonished
Celtic world in the pages of the " Academy." Since then
he has put the articles together in book form under the
title of the " Vernacular Inscriptions of the Ancient
Kingdom of Alban." Celtic scholars have not thought it
worth while to confute Mr Nicholson's views ; his philology
belongs to the good old days of Charles Mackay and
Lachlan Maclean (" Lachunn nam Mogan.") The Picts,
according to Mr Nicholson, were Gaelic-speaking Celts.
Now, no Celtic scholar holds such a view ; even Professor
Rhys maintains that they were not Gaelic-speaking. In

28 SUTHERLAND— ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NAMES.

his extraordinary paper in the Society of Antiquaries'
Transactions (1892), and lately in the report of the Welsh
Land Commission, the Professor strenuously holds that
the inscriptions are written in a lost language, which
was neither Gaelic nor Welsh, nor allied to them at all.
Dr Whitley Stokes and Professor Windish consider the
Picts to have been of Brittonic race and language, and
the place-names of Pictland alone ought to be enough to
bring any unprejudiced mind to this view. It is, however,
probable that the inscriptions are in Gaelic, for they were
no doubt the work of the Gaelic-speaking missionaries
from Ireland who Christianised Pictland. The Ogam
writing is, as already said, a purely Irish invention. The
Ogams are, therefore, not " Pictish ;" they are the " Ogams
of Pictland," and " Pictish inscriptions " is a misleading
term. Mr Nicholson's greatest sin is his disregard of
what Professor Rhys calls " perspective in language." He
explains Tth century Gaelic as if it were 19th century
Gaehc. He forgets or overlooks the fact that " b " and
"m," for instance, w^ere not aspirated for hundreds of years
after the Ogams were inscribed on the Golspie stone.
The readings of these Ogams are unsatisfactory in the
highest degree. Professor Rhys pins his faith to an atro-
city like this at Lunasting — xttocuhetts : ahehhtmnnn :
hccwevv: nehhtonn. He challenges the believers in the
Brittonic origin of Pictish to explain it, and says — " Let
them explain it as Welsh and I shall have to confess that
I have never understood a single word of my mother
tongue." ! ! ! As it stands printed above, it belongs to
a language that " was never heard on land or sea." It
looks like the language of Luna, the moon — " Lunacy," it
may be named.

Mr Nicholson's reading of the Golspie stone is equally
as satisfactory as Professor Rhys's champion inscription
given above. It runs thus — Allhhallorr edd m'qq Nu
uvvarrecch. This he puts in Gaelic thus — Alhallr, ait Mic

SUTHERLAND — ITS EARLY HISTORY AND NAMES. 29

Nu Uabhraich, " Alhallr, the place of McNu the Bold."
He takes Alhallr to be Norse, meaning " All-sloping."
The stone — indeed, all the inscribed stones — he regards
as boundary stones, not gravestones. McNu is compared
to the name of Columba's maternal grandfather Mac Naue,
a perfectly legitimate comparison, and to the Pictish
McNu Sir Herbert Maxwell correlates the Galwegian and
Dumfries names of McNoe or McNoah. Professor Rhys
reads the stone thus — Allhhallorr edd Maqq Nuuwa
rreirng. It is at present useless to speculate on the mean-
ing of such a conglomeration of letters ; the stone is evi-
dently mis-read, and so are most of them.

A name about which much nonsense has been written
is Dunrobin ; and the latest nonsense is in Mr Nicholson's
book on " Golspie." If the name had been Dun-Robert,
he says, it would be easily seen that it was named after
some Robert or other; but Robin he regards as a name
unlikely among a Gaelic population. This is a fallacy.
Diminutives like Robin in -in and -on were common in
early times with English names borrowed by the Gaels,
and in the Highlands we meet with many — Gibbon
(whence McGibbon), Robin (whence the present-day
McRobin), Paton (whence AlcFadyen;, Wilkin (whence
McCuilcein), Rankin (whence McRankin, now obsolete),
Cubbin (from Cuthbert, whence McCubin, a Kirkcudbright
name), Michin (from Michael), whence McMichin or
McMeeking). In Ireland such forms were also common
— Tomin, Wattin, Philbin, Rickm, Robin. Dunrobin,
then, means the DUN or " fort " of Robin. The form
Drum-robin also occurs: " Robin's-ridge." Dunrobin
appears first in 1401 in Earl Robert's charters; it is no
doubt named after him.

PLACE NAMES

OF

SKYE.

PLACE NAMES OF SKYE.

THE Island of Skye is first mentioned by Ptolemy,
the classical geographer of the second century.
He calls it Skitis or Sketis, and misplaces it, putting
it where the Orkneys should be. The island is
next mentioned by Adamnan (700 A.D.), who calls
it Scia Insula, the Island Scia, no doubt from Scith. St
Columba, he tells us, was there once baptising a pagan
chief called Artbrananus at a well called after him,
Dobur Artbranani, at another time losing himself in a
dense wood, for the island, we know, was once well
wooded, as, indeed, were all the Hebrides till the advent
of the Norse. The Irish annals tell us that in 668 the
sons of Gartnait, with the people of Scith (or Sceth, gen.
case), migrated to Ireland, but returned two years later.
In TOO A.D, a battle of some consequence took place in
Scii (dat. case), followed by the destruction of Dunolly
Castle by King Selbach. Skye is mentioned several
times in the Norse sagas, especially as being devastated
in 1098 by Magnus of Norway : the Norse called it Skith,
which in their language meant " tablet, log ;" and, evi-
dently from a remembrance of the Norse possession of
the island and its Norse name, our poets have called the

PLACE NAMES OF SKYE. 33

isle by the name of Clar Sgithe. The Dean of Lismore
(1512) speaks of

" McWllam oo Clar Skeith,"

the Dunvegan chief of the time. Rory M'Vurich's elegy
on M'Leod (pubhshed 1776) has it—

" Dh' fhalbh mo lathaichean eibhinn
C' 'n threig sibh Clar Sgithe."

The early charter forms of the name are Skey (1292),
Sky (1336, the 14th century form), Skye (1498) ; in the
Chronicle of Man the name is Ski. The present Gaelic
name is adjectival: An t-Eilean Sgiathanach, and Sgith-
eanach, explained as the " Winged Isle." The older forms
of the name, Sci or Scith, point to a shorter form of the
same sort, as in Gaelic SGIATH, Norse SKITH, namely SKI,
divide. The name may really be Pictish and mean the
" Indented Isle," still having the same general force as
" Wmged."

It is usual to connect with Skye the early history
of Cuchulinn, who received his martial education in the
isle and DUN of Scathach, the Amazon Championess. The
oldest tales make her live in an isle eastward of Alba or
Scotland ; the Scottish tradition has it that Dun-Scathaich
in Skye is meant (Dunskahay in 1505 — Dun-Scathaigh',
the Dean of Lismore's Zown Skayth, and Skay for dative
of Scathach), and this, after all, is likely.

Skye was one of the immediate causes of Hacon's
invasion in 1263 : with the rest of the Isles it owned
Norway as its suzerain, but it formed part of the Kingdom
of Man and the Isles till 1266, when the cession of the Isles
took place. The Earl of Ross attacked it fiercely in 1262,
with the consequence that complaint Vv-as made to Norway.
Hacon in 1263 passed between Skye and the mainland

34 PLACE NAMES OF SKYE.

with his fleet, and there is httle doubt that Kyleakin —
" Hacon's Sound," as it undoubtedly means — got its name
from the passing through of Hacon and his fleet. Simi-
larly King James IV.'s punitive visit to Skye and the Isles
in 1540 is no doubt remembered in Portree, the King's
Port. The Earl of Ross received Skye as his portion of
the spoils of Largs and the events of 1262, and in 1292
the Sheriffdom of Skey was constituted from the Earl of
Ross's lands on the West Coast and northern Hebrides
(Skye and Lewis especially), for which Hugh of Ross has
in 1309 a charter from Robert Bruce. In 1335 King
Edward Balliol forfeited the next Earl and gave the Isles
of Skye and Lewis to John of Isles, the head of the Clan
Donald ; but David Bruce, on his return, restored Skye to
the Earldom of Ross. It passed, with the Earldom of
Ross, into the hands of the Wolf of Badenoch, the LesHes,
and finally Donald of the Isles took it with the rest of the
Earldom of Ross. The forfeiture of the Lord of the Isles
towards the end of the 15th century brought the local
clans into direct relations with the Crown, and hencefor-
ward we have Macleods, Macdonalds, and Mackinnons as
leading chiefs and landlords in Skye.

The completeness of the Norse conquest and posses-
sion of Skye is proved by the place-names. The seven
natural provinces of the island have all Norse names —
Trotternish, Waternish, Duirinish, Bracadale, Minginish,
Strathordil, and Sleat ; and the important townships and
" setters " also were occupied and named by the Norse-
men. The Valuation Roll is the best proof of this. Some
250 different names occur in Skye in the present Roll, but
nearly a score of these are purely English. The rest are
Gaelic and Norse, and the proportion is exactly 60 per
cent. Norse names and 40 per cent. Gaelic. Naturally the
percentage is heaviest on the west and north, while Sleat
and Portree have the fewest Norse names. Black's tourist
map of 4 miles to the inch has 58 per cent. Norse names

PLACE NAMES OF SKYE. 35

for Kilmuir and 33 for Sleat; the latest map — 2 miles to
the inch — gives 55 per cent. Norse names for Kilmuir, and
Sleat 30 per cent. It practically contains all the names in
the ordnance one inch to the mile map. As Duirinish and
Snizort show a higher percentage on the Valuation Roll
respectively than Kilmuir (viz., 68, 70, 61 per cent.), we
may roughly state that about 50 per cent, of the names on
the 1 inch map are Norse as against the Gaehc names.
Of course, as the maps increase in minutiae and detail, the
Gaelic names correspondingly increase : the smaller fea-
tures— fields, hillocks, and burns — are apt to be Gaelic,
having possibly been re-named since the Norse occupa-
tion.

Of the present parish names three are Gaelic —
Strath, Portree, and Kilmuir (St Mary's kil or church),
but the first is properly half Norse, being for Strath-
Swordale or Strathordil, where Swordale or Suordale is a
common Norse name, appearing otherwise in Skye (at
Dunvegan), in Lewis, in Ross-shire, and in Sutherland,
explained by Captain Thomas as " Sward-dale," which it
likely is, though Saur-dalr, " Swampy or Mud dale," may
suit the phonetics in this case. The other four parishes
have Norse names : Duirinish, Hke Durness, in Sutherland,
means " Deer's ness," NESS being the Norse NES, a cape,
nose; Snizort, Snesfurd 1501, Sneisport 1526, Snisport
1561, seems to be for Snaes-fjord, "Snow-firth," the sug-
gested " Sneis firth," from the name Sneis (skewer) being
unsatisfactory. Bracadale (Bracadoll 1498, Braikodell
1541) stands for Brekka-dalr, " Slope-dale ;" and Sleat is
the Norse sletta, a level or plain, it being, in fact, the most
even or level portion of Skye. Here we may add the dis-
tricts of Trotternish, Waternish, and Mmgmish. The first
is spelt by Dean Munro (1549) as Trouternesse or Tron-
ternesse, and a writer at the end of the 17th century also
spells the name with N, not U, before the middle T.
M'Vurich gives the Gaelic for it in the Red Book of Clan-

36 PLACE NAMES OF SKYE

ranald as Trontarnis ; the modern Gaelic is practically the
same — Tr6(n)dar-nis, with nasalised 6. It stands for
Throndar-nes, " Thrond's ness," Thrond being a favourite
personal name, giving rise also to many place-names, in-
clusive of the Icelandic Throndarnes quoted above, and
the modern Drontheim or Trondhjem, in Norway.
Waternish finds its counterpart in two Icelandic nesses
called Vatnsnes, " Water-ness ;" while Minginish
(Myngnes, 1498, Mygnes 1511, Myngynnes 1549, I\Ien-
zenise 1549) may stand for Megin-nes' " JMain ness."

We may next deal with the islands belonging to Skye.
Pabay is for Pap-ey, " Pope or Priest Isle," a common isle
name, showing the Norse found the Gaelic hermits or
Culdees there. Scalpa, which also appears in Harris, is
found also in Orkney, but there stands for Skalp-eith,
" Ship isthmus," whereas in the Hebrides it means " Ship
isle." Raasay (Rasay 1501, Rairsay 1526, Raarsay 1549)
seems to stand for Rar-ass-ey, " Isle of Roe-ridge." Its
neighbour, Rona, is easily derived, for we have the Norse
name for it — Rauney, that is Hraun-ey, " Isle of the rough,
rocky surface " (HRAUN, lava-field especially), a deriva-
tion supported by Martin's description of it — " This little
isle is the most unequal rocky piece of ground to be seen
anywhere." Staffm Isle is so named from its basaltic
rocks, Norse STAFR, staff, etc. ; it gives its name to the
adjoining bay and mainland. Altavaig, on the contrary,
must take its name from Alpta-vik, " swan-bay." Trodday,
to the north of Trotternish, may be Thrond's Isle, though
" Pasture (Trodh) Isle " has also been suggested. Holm
Isle, off Duntulm, gives its name to the latter place, " Fort
of Holm ;" the Norse is HOLMR, a holm or islet in a bay.
The Ascrib Isles, called by Monro Askerin, seem to con-
tain a reference to ASKR, ash, spear, ship. Isay is " Ice-
isle ;" Mingay, " Lesser-isle ;" Wiay, a common isle name
in the Hebrides, seems for Ve-ey, " Temple-isle." Oronsa,

PLACE NAMES OF SKYE. 37

off Bracadale and off Sleat (the latter Eilean Dhiarmaid ;
ITth century Island Diermand), is for Orfiris-ey, " Ebb-
tide-isle," joined to the mainland at low water. There are
three or more other such. Soay, also a common island
name, " Sheep-isle," as Lampay, at Dunvegan, means
" Lamb-ey," and Eilean Heast, or " Horse-isle," no doubt
gives its name to the mainland township of Heast, though
in Iceland a place gets its name Hestr on account of a
horse-shaped crag.

The sea-lochs or fjords have mostly Norse names end-
ing in ORD or ORT, derived from fjord. Broadford, like
the Arran Brodick, has replaced a Norse Breidha-fjord.
Lochs Ainort and Eynort may be for Einar's fjord ; Loch
Snizort has been already explained ; Loch Harport is pos-
sibly Hafra-fjord, " He-goat " fjord ; and Loch Eishort
may be for Eiths-fjord, or Isthmus fjord. The termina-
tion AIG stands for VIK, bay, and there are many such. In
Sleat we have Ostaig, " Eastwick ;" Saasaig, Cask
bay (sas-vik) ;" Morsaig, "Ant-bay (Maurs-vik") ; Aula-
vaig, " Olave's bay ;" Tarskavaig, "Cod-bay (thorskr,
Gaelic trosg ") ; in Strath, Malag "Measure or Speech bay
(Mala-vik ") ; Boreraig, " Burg bay " (Borgar-vik ") ; in
Bracadale, Scavaig river, ITth century Scah-vag, " Shaw-
bay ;" Fiskavaig, " Fish-bay ;" Totaig, " Toft or Clearing
Bay ;" in Duirinish, Varkasaig, " Castle-bay " (ViRKi) ;
Branderscaig, Ramasaig, " Raven's bay ;" Boreraig and
Totaig as before, Camalaig ; in Snizort, Pen-soraig, from
Saur-vik, " Mud bay ;" Liuravaig, like Lerwick, " Mud-
bay ;" Bearraraig, Bjorn's bay ; in Kilmuir, Bornaskitaig
(Martin's Bornswittag), from Skipta-vik, " Division-bay ;"
Volovig, " Field bay ;" Loch Langaig, " Long-bay ;" Bro-
gaig, " Breeches' bay ;" Torvaig, " Thori's bay ;" Cracaig,
" Crook-bay ;" Tianavaig (Martin's Camstinvag), Tmdar-
vik or " Peak-bay ;" Oskaig (long o), m 1630 Oistage,
" Osk's bay or the Desire bay." A river mouth is OSS
or AR-OSS, and hence come Ose, Glen-ose, Osdal, Oisgill

38 PLACE NAMES OF SKYE.

(Oyce-burn), Aros Bay, Inveraros or Inverarish in Raasay.
The capes or nesses arc numerous : Ard Thurinish,
" Thwart or cross (Thver) point ;" Ardnish, a hybrid, as
also Kraiknish, UlHnish, " UlH's point ;" Crossnish, " Cross
point ;" Uignish, " Wick ness ;" Unish, " Yew ( ?) ness ;
Greshornish, " Grice or Pig's ness ;" Skirinish (Martin's
Skerines), " Skerry ness ;" Meanish, Mjo-nes or " Narrow
ness ;" Hunish, " Bear's (hunn) ness ;" Arnish " Erne or
Eagle ness;" Manish (Maenes, 1630), "Sea-mew ness."
The two south capes of Suisnish — Raasay and Strath —
come from SNOS, projecting rock, head, in fact for " Sow's
head." Eyrr, a pebbly beach, appears in Eyre of Snizort,
Ken-sal-eyre, and Ayre Point, south of Raasay,

Hill and rock names are mostly Norse, showing VALL
for FJALL, fell; CLEIT or KLETTR, a rock; STACK or
STAKKV, a stack of a hill ; SGEIR, skerry ; SCORE and
SGUVR, edge or chff ; HAMARR, rock (as in Hamara, " Rock
water ") ; SGATH or SKAGI, a jutting hill or promontory
(Beinn a' Sgath) ; and Sco, a shaw or woody rising
(Birkisco, " Birk-shaw.") The Hoe and Cop-na-Hoe
mean HAUGR, tumulus or burial hillock. Ben Cleit, Loch
Cleit and such names are common. Stockval is " Stock-
fell ;" Arnaval, " Erne-fell ;" Roineval, " Hraun-fell," as in
Rona; Scoval, "Shaw-fell;" Horneval, "Horn-hill;"
Helavall, " Hella or Flagstone fell;" Maehall, "Narrow-
hill ;" Reiveal, " Smooth-hill." Ben Storr is from STOR,
big. To these must be added one or two names in BRECK
or BREKK, a slope ; Cross-breck and Scorry-breck.

All names with -DAL as an ending are Norse, and
they are very numerous (Armadale, Meadale, etc.) There
are many GILS or burns (Vidi-gill, Vikisgill, etc.); but
Idrigill, which occurs twice, is a promontory, and must
stand for Ytri-kollr or " Further (Outer) hill." There are
three names from FORS, a waterfall — Forse and Forsan.

PLACE NAMES OF SKYE. 39

The township names show many -SHADERS ter-
minally ; this is the Norse SETR, a station or sheiling
(Marishader, " mare-seat," Shuhshader, " Pillar-seat," etc.)
The suffix BOST means township — Husabost, " House-
stead ;" Breabost, " Broad-town," etc. Terminal STA is
for STADR, a stead, holding — Shuhsta, as in Shulisshader,
Lusta, Conista (Lady's-town), etc. Suffix GARRY is for
GARTH — Bigeary, "Bigging-garth," etc. BuRG or Borve
is very common — Skudiburg, Raisaburg, etc. ; so is TOT or
TOBHTA, a toft or clearing.

PLACE NAMES

OF

LOCHABER.

PLACE NAMES OF
LOCHABER.

THE earliest mention of Lochaber occurs in the pages
of Adamnan, who died in 704. St Columba, he
tells us, gave a miraculous stake, which attracted
and killed wild animals coming near it, to a poor
man from " the district which borders on the shores
of the Apcric Lake ;" and the poor man further catches
by means of the stake a monster salmon from the river
there — a river " which may be called in Latin Nigra
Dea," or Dark Goddess. Dr Skene has ingeniously con-
nected this river with another name given by Adamnan
for a lake in the Drumalban Range, viz., Loch-dae, which
means in old Gaelic " Dark Goddess," from obsolete
LOCH, dark. Hence the Nigra Dea is the Lochy, either
in Perth or Lochaber ; and it is an interesting reminder of
the fact that the ancient Celts v/ere great river wor-
shippers, which they often called " Mothers " (Matrona
or Marne), or " Goddesses " (Deva or Dee, Divona or Don).
Adamnan's Aporic comes from the old Gaelic APOR, a
marsh), and the meaning of Lochaber is the Lake of the

PLACE NAMES OF LOCHABER. 43

Marsh. Fortunately, tradition supports this view, for,
according to it, the original Lochaber was a lakelet in the
Moine Mhor — the Large Moss — near the mouth of the
river Lochy. Tradition and philology thus go hand in
hand in the etymology of the name Lochaber : no scep-
ticism need apply. The old Gaelic APOR and Irish ABAR
(marsh) are not the same as the Pictish prefix ABER or
OBAIR (confluence, river-mouth), so common in place-
names in Pictland, such as Aberdeen, Aberchalder, and
the like. Indeed, only one characteristically Pictish name
can be fomnd in Lochaber, and that is the old Pitmaglassy
(1500), or Pittenglass (1669), which is mentioned along
with Achadrom and Culross, on the borders of Lochaber
and Glengarry, but such names as Spean or Pean may be
inferred to be Pictish names belonging to the main fea-
tures of the country. It is clear that in Columba's time
the inhabitants of Lochaber spoke Gaelic, not Pictish:
they, in fact, belonged to the old Scottic invaders of Pict-
land that settled in Oirir-Ghaidheal (" coastland of the
Gael," Argyll from Kintyre to Lochbroom) long ere the
Sons of Ere founded the Kingdom of Dalriada. Hence
the people of Lochaber speak the Northern Dialect of
Gaelic, and good Gaelic it once was, and still is.

Romance makes Banquo of the Macbeth drama Thane
of Lochaber, and respectable tradition connects the Cum-
mings with Lochaber in the thirteenth century ; and, of
course, as elsewhere, there is a Cummings-tower at Inver-
lochy Castle. When we come to assured history, we find
that the " lands of Louchabre " formed part of the Earl-
dom of Moray, granted to Randolph between 1307 and
1314, though seemingly it soon left his hands, for in the
" Index to Lost Charters " it is entered that Angus of the
Isles got the lands of " Lochabre " from Bruce in 1309.
Anyway, Lochaber was not long attached to the Province
of Moray. The " good John of Isla " got the ward of it
in 1335 in the minority of the Earl of Atholl, who pro-

44 PLACE NAMES OF LOCHABER.

bably got it through his grandmother, the heiress of the
Cummings. The Island Lord got it altogether in 1343.
Alaster Carrach, third son of the good John of He, is in
possession of the Lordship of Louchabre at the end of
the century, though the superiority still remained in the
hands of the eldest son, the Lord of the Isles. Alaster
Carrach was the ancestor of the Keppoch Macdonalds, and
it was from him, as eldest direct descendants, that their
claims of Brae Lochaber arose. The last two Lords of the
Isles seem to have ignored Alaster Carrach's descendants ;
at anyrate, in 1444, Mackintosh got from the Lord of the
Isles the lands of Glenluy and Locharkaig, west of Loch
Lochy, and the Brae Lochaber lands, at first as far down
as Loch Lochy, the chief demesne being Keppoch. Mac-
kintosh's claims to these lands and his attempted posses-
sion of them as against the native Camerons of Glenluy
and Locharkaig and the Macdonalds of Keppoch, kept
the country in a state of turmoil for two hundred years.
Finally, in 1666, Lochiel unwillingly bought Glenluy and
Locharkaig, Argyle being guarantor ; but the Keppochs
kept forcible possession longer, which practically ended in
the last clan fight in Scotland, on Mulroy, above Keppoch,
in 1688. Though then defeated. Mackintosh made good
his right, and still holds the property.

The Camerons also incurred the displeasure of the
Lords of the Isles for deserting them in 1429 in their
quarrel with the King. Their brave and energetic chief,
Donald Dubh, fought against Donald Balloch at Inver-
lochy in 1431, when the latter defeated the Royal forces.
Donald Dubh and his clan suffered severely over this, and
became somewhat Ishmaelite for a century or two there-
after. Maclean, first, of Coll, then, of Lochbuy, received
the barony of Lochiel, there being a charter to the latter
in 1461 of these lands. The Lord of the Isles' cousin,
Celestine of Lochalsh, who appears to have received the
lordship of Lochaber from the Earl, favoured Cameron as

PLACE NAMES OF LOCHABER. 45

against the Macleans, and granted him Lochiel in 1472 —
a grant renewed in 1492 by Celestine's son. The final for-
feiture of the Lord of the Isles in 1493 brought the lord-
ship of Lochaber into the King's hands. In 1494 Mac-
lean again got Lochiel, but next year Cameron received
it from the Crown. The Macleans kept up their claims
or sold them, and the frequent forfeitures of Cameron gave
his enemies plenty of opportunity to get charter rights to
his property. After passing through the hands of Mac-
leans, Campbells of Cawdor and Argyll, and Huntly, it is
gratifying to record that the Chief of Clan Cameron still
holds the barony of Lochiel — the land north of the loch
and west of Loch Lochy.

The portion of Lochaber between Glen Nevis and Loch
Leven, east of Loch Linnhe, had the general title of Maw-
more, the "Great Mam," MAM meaning a "large round hill."
The name is still preserved in Mamore Forest. Maw-
more was still in the King's lands after the forfeiture of the
Lord of the Isles in 1502, but then it was granted to
Stewart of Appin, and in 1504 to Huntly, who as Lord of
the Lordship of Lochaber sold it in 1522 to Argyll.
Mamore came thereafter into the hands of the Gordons,
but on their decline the western half of it came into the
hands of Lochiel, and the eastern half, inclusive of Glen-
Nevis, belongs to Mrs Cameron-Campbell of Monzie repre-
sentative of the Camerons of Fassifern. Glen Nevis of
old belonged to the Camerons. The district about Fort-
William and Inverlochy, now the Abinger estate, was
acquired by Maclean of Duart in 1496, who sold to Stewart
of Appin and to Huntly parts of the estate, and in 1531
Lochiel got Appin's lands, including Inverlochy. But the
Duart family again recovered the land (1540), and in the
ITth century it finally came into Huntly's hands, who held
it in the 17th and 18th centuries. The Gordons parted
with the estate some fifty years ago, and it is now Lord
Abinger's. The leading proprietors of Lochaber are

46 PLACE NAMES OF LOCHABER.

therefore Cameron of Lochiel, Mackintosh of Mackintosh,
and Mrs Campbell of Monzie — three good Gaelic family
names as against one "Scarlett" Sassenach, who holds a
big fourth of the country !

Lochaber now comprises the two parishes of Kilmallie
and Kilmonivaig; but formerly Mamore formed part of
the old parish of Elan-munne, the other part belonging to
Argyll. The name Elan-munne, or St Munn's Isle, is
still known, corrupted in English to Mungo. It is an
islet in Loch Leven, where St Munn's Church once was,
and the burial-ground still is. Munn, or Munna, is a con-
traction for Mo-Fhindu, "My Findan," and is a pet name
for St Finnan. Kilmonivaig, in 1449 Kilmanawik, in 1500
Kilmonyvaig, stands for Kill or Church of St Mo-Naomhoc,
or St Naomhan. Kilmallie appears in 1292 as Kilmalyn,
in 1532 Kilmale, and 1552 Culmaly. This was also, spell-
ings and all, the old name of Golspie. A Kilmayaille is
mentioned in Tarbert of Kintyre. The name is a difficult
one at best. There is no St Malli — the A is long — though
there is a literary Charles O'Malley from an ancestral
O'Mailli. Possibly our saint here is Amhalghaidh or
Aulay, confused with Norse Olave (whence M'Aulay),
with the usual MO prefixed. Kilmallie would then stand
for Cille-mo-Amhalghaidh.

In examining the place-names we may begin with
the great natural features, the lakes, rivers and mountains.
Loch Linnhe is known in the locality as An Linne, " the
Pool " or " Sea-loch ;" the Lochiel part is called An Linne
Dhubh, " the Black Pool," the part outside Corran An
Linne Sheilich, " the Willow Pool." Lochiel, in 1461
Locheale, Lochheil in 1492, and Lochiel in 1520, still
awaits explanation. Loch Lochy has already been
explained as the lake of the river " Dark Goddess." It
must be remembered that lakes and glens take their names
from the rivers that flow from or through them, a fact noted

PLACE NAMES OF LOCHABER. 47

by Adamnan in speaking of Loch Ness, which he calls
the " Lake of the River Ness." Loch Arkaig is named
from the River Airceag ; its etymology is unknown. The
root ARK means " defence " m Celtic ; but possibly the
root here is ERC, darkish, the " dun " river being perhaps
the force of the word. Equally enigmatical is Loch Treig
and its river Treig, where the E is long. In modern
Gaelic Treig means " forsake." Loch Eilde means the
River and Loch of the Hind ; Loch Gulbin, Torgulbin,
etc., come from GULBAN, a beak. Loch Leven and the
River Leven, Gaelic Li'un, point to a Celtic Li-vo-na,
root LI, flow, Gaelic LIGHE, a flood. There is a Leven in
Lennox and another in Glen-Lyon similarly pronounced.
The name is Pictish originally, as, indeed, may be the
other difficult names above passed in review: perhaps
older still.

In regard to the bens and glens, the latter follow the
river names, and the former are nearly all easily derived
by anyone that knows Gaelic. Ben Nevis is the excep-
tion. There we have Glen-Nevis and the River Nevis.
A sea loch in the south of Knoydart is called Loch Nevis,
and hence we are sure that it is the river that has given
its name to Glen and Ben Nevis. The local pronuncia-
tion is Nibheis (Eng. Nivesli), which would give a primi-
tive form, Nibestis, but probably Nebestis is the right
form, from NEB, burst, flow; the name may have been a
goddess name allied to " Nymph " by root and idea.
Glen-Spean, of course, takes its name from the River
Spean, and the SP initial is hardly ever native Gaelic — ■
certainly not old Gaelic. We may conclude that Spean is
Pictish, originally Spesona, the root SPES, SPE or SQES,
SQE, as in Spey, to cast forth, squirt, vomit, Gaehc SGEITH ;
and the old ItaHan river name, Vomanus (root VOM), may
be instanced as analagous. The idea is that of a fast-
flowing, " spatey " river, the word " spate " being also dis-
tinctly aUied. Glenfmtaig comes from the River Fintag,

48 PLACE NAMES OF LOCHABER.

the " white river," a common river name. Mrs Mackellar
explained Glende^sary (Glendessorach, 1505) as the
" Glen of the South Shealmg," DEAS-AIRIGH : anyway the
root is DEAS, right or south. Glen-pean (so in Blaeu,
Glen-pona, 1505), Glen-kingie (Glen-Kinglen, 1505), and
Glen-gloy must be left alone at present ; Glenroy is the
" Glen of the Red River ;" Glen-sulag, from Suileag river,
the river full of " eyes " or pools ; and Glen-luy (Glenloy,
1505, Glenlie, 151G), " Glen of Calves."

Fort-William gets its name from the fort built for
Wilham of Orange near there in the end of the seven-
teenth century, but the village was originally named after
his consort, Mary, hence Maryburgh. A hundred years
earlier (159T) an Act of Parliament directed the creation
of three burghs in the West Highlands to maintain the
cause of " civility and policy ;" these were to be in Kin-
tyre, Lochaber, and Lewis. The final result came to be
the erection of the towns of Campbeltown, Fort-William,
and Stornoway, but only the former procured the benefits
of the Act in becoming a Royal Burgh. The Gordons,
who owned the Inverlochy estates till their demise with
the last duke (1836), changed Maryburgh into Gordons-
burgh when the fit of " Orangeism " was past, and the
village was last century so known. Sir Duncan Cameron
of Fassifern, in succeeding the Gordons, changed the
name to Duncansburgh ! This has also given way to the
" garrison " name of Fort-William, it being An Gearasdan
in Gaelic. Auchintore-beg (Auchintor-beg, 1496) was its
pre-village name, the field of the TODHAR or manure.

Only a few of the leading farms and other such names
can here be taken. Callart, so in 1522, is explained as
Cala-ard, the " high bay " literally, but " upper ferry "
really, as opposed to the Ballachulish one. Ballachulish
(Ballecheles, 1522), " Straits town," Kinlochmore, Cor-
uanan (" Lamb's Corry,") Blar-nan-cleireach, and such

PLACE NAMES OF LOCHABER. 49

in " Mamore " are easy. Onich, Offanych in 1522, is, as
its older form proves, from OMHANACH, " foam-frothed "
place ; Cuilchenna is shown by the old form, Culkenan
(1522), to mean " Back of the Head-ie ;" Corran means a
small promontory between two bays, not a " sickle," as
usually explained ; Drumarbin, Blaeu's Druimerbin, Drum-
arbane of 1522, is no doubt " Ridge of Roes." Lundavra
is in 1502 Dundabray, a fort or forts in a small isle in
Mamore, explained by Mrs Mackellar as Dun-da-rath„
" Fort of two RATHS or enclosures," there being two islets.
Mr Livingstone explains the name as wave (lunn) of the
double crest (bra) ; but Lundavra seems a phonetic assim-
ilation arising from Loch Dun-da-bhra. Dun-dearduil is
etymologised in the Ordnance maps into " Fort of the
Foreign Bard!" The Dearduil here is a common fort
name, usually explained from the heroine Deirdre, Mac-
pherson's Darthula.

In Kilmonivaig the most interesting farm name is
Keppoch; it is from the old Gaelic CEAPACH, a tillage
plot, a holding, in root the same as CEAP, block. Fersit,
the "two Fersenas" of 1500, and Blaeu's Farset, comes
from FEARSAD, an estuary, sand-bank, which suits the
place. Names like Blarour, Tirandrish, Achluachrach,
Achaderry, Tulloch, Innerroy, and Innis or Inch have
only to be pronounced in GaeHc and their secret is out.
Lianachan is from LEAN, a mead ; Sliabh Lorgach, east of
Loch Treig, gets its name from its moraine " tracks " or
lines; Bothuntin, Gaelic Both-hundainn, Bothinton in
1444, is one of the many BOTHS or " steads " of Brae-
Lochaber, and it is a puzzhng name, for Hundaidh or
Hundainn did duty in Gaelic for Huntly ; only here the
appearance of the name in 1444, 1466, and 1476 precludes
connection. It is evidently the same name as we have in
Contin, a " confluence " place.

50 PLACE NAMES OF LOCHABER.

In Kilmallie we may note Corpach, so named, as the
Old Statistical Account says, from the fact that here they
rested with the bodies before embarkation on their way to
lona. Annat comes from the obsolete ANNAID a mother-
church, doubtless where the anchorite had his cell and little
chapel. Fassfern is the " abode " or FASADH of the alder ;
Errocht means in old Gaelic a " meeting ;" Moy, a " plain ;"
and Glastor is etymologised correctly on the ordnance maps
•Glas-doire. Other Lochaber names of interest — and there
are many more such — are worthy of record and study.

PLACE NAMES

OF

LOCHALSH.

PLACE NAMES OF
LOCHALSH.

LOCHALSH is undoubtedly the Volsas or Volas Bay
of Ptolemy, the geographer of the early part of the
second century. It is therefore one of the oldest
names in Scotland. Its next appearance in written
form is more than thirteen centuries later: this is
in 1464, in a Crown charter to Celestine of the Isles, where
the name is spelt Lochalsche. A common form in early
writings was Lochalch or Lochelch, and then Lochalse
(1576), now Lochalsh (Gaelic Loch-aills' or even Loch-ais',
where the L, as usual, drops before the S. Probably the
form Volsas is the ancestor of our modern form ; Volas
might be apt to land in Loch-aill, whereas Volsas would
give, according to well-known phonetic laws, latterly
Fallas or such. That root may be VOL, roll, as a wave ;
Eng., WELL.

Lochalsh formed part of Argyle, which anciently
stretched as far as Lochbroom ; it belonged to North
'Argyle, the present county being South Argyle. It also
belonged to the Earldom of Ross. It was the " patr-ia,"

PLACE NAMES OF LOCHALSH. 54

or habitat, of pre-Mathesons, and the TOISEACH, or thane,
of Lochalsh — the Chief of the Mathesons — was one of the
Earl of Ross's leading vassals. Similarly Kintail was no
doubt held by a TOISEACH, who latterly was Mackenzie of
Kintail. The Edinburgh MS. (1450) indicates four clans
in early times (1200-1400) as inhabiting from Lochalsh to
Lochbroom — Mathesons in Lochalsh ; Mackenzies in Kin-
tail ; Gillanders or Rosses in Gairloch ; and Nicolsons in
Lochbroom. Applecross was holy ground, and belonged
to the Churih.

In 142T Mackmaken or Matheson of Lochalsh is
mentioned as leader of two thousand by Fordun ; he was
vassal to the Earl of Ross, and concerned in his rebellious
conduct. In 1449 Lochalsh was in the hands of Celestine,
brother to John, Earl of Ross, granted to him by the Earl
or his father, and confirmed by the Crown in 1464. What
became of the Chief of Mathesons or how he was treated
we do not know : at anyrate he had a new overlord. Sir
Alexander of Lochalsh succeeded Celestine (died 1476),
and in 1492 granted with other lands elsewhere to Ewin,
son of Alan, Chief of the Camerons, the half of Lochalsh,
14 merklands out of the 26, and the King confirmed it in
1495, and renewed it in 1539. Meanwhile Sir Donald
Gallda succeeded Alexander, and died in 1518, leaving
his two sisters co-heiresses. One was married to Glen-
garry, the other to Dingwall of Kildun. The other half
of Lochalsh thus belonged to these two. They shared
the farms between them. Thus the Davoch land of Bal-
macarra belonged half to Glengarry and half to Dingwall,
and so with the other holdings. In 1539 Glengarry has a
direct Crown charter for his share of Lochalsh. Owing to
circumstances arising from Blar-na-Leine and the conse-
quent raid on Glens Moriston and Urquhart by Glengarry
and Lochiel, their shares of Lochalsh passed by forfeiture
into the hands of the Grants — Freuchy and Glenmoriston.
But they don't seem to have reaped any benefit from this

PLACE NAMES OF LOCHALSH. 55

" sheepskin " allotment to them of these lands. Dingwall
in 1554 sold his share of Lochalsh to Mackenzie of Kin-
tail, who was fast acquiring territory and power ever since
the fall of the Earldom of Ross. Freuchy in 1571 made
peace with Glengarry, and over a marriage contract with
Glengarry's son and Freuchy's daughter gave him back
his lands and his (Freuchy's) share of Lochalsh. Lochalsh
was thus in the hands of three men in 1571 — Glengarry,
Kintail, and Grant of Glenmoriston (5 merklands). The
quarrels between Kintail and Glengarry began about
1580. Glengarry was not popular in Lochalsh — the old
Mathesons had not yet, possibly, forgotten the Macdonald
usurpation — and at anyrate Glengarry himself was unwise
and harsh. The Mackenzie Chief fomented the quarrel,
then openly intervened in it, hostilities breaking out
about 1580, which went on intermittently till 1603, with
much loss in blood and status to Glengarry. The final
result was that in 1607 Glengarry was compelled to part
with the lands of Lochalsh to his more astute rival of
Kintail, who thus in that year acquired the whole of Loch-
alsh save Glenmoriston's five merks and the Church lands,
the latter of which, however, became his in 1610, and in
1633 the Earl of Seaforth is retoured for all Lochalsh.

The Mackenzies held Lochalsh for two hundred years,
the last Lord Seaforth parting with it in 1801. The pur-
chaser of Lochalsh was Mr, afterwards Sir (1818), Hugh
Innes, who had made his fortune in London by commerce.
He was some time member for the Wick Burghs, and,
dying without issue, his property came into the hands of
his grand-niece (Katherine Lindsay), v/ho married Mr
Isaac Lillingston. The Lillingstons were much beloved
by the Lochalsh people, and receive great praise from
Duncan Matheson, one of the clan historians of the time.
After the death of her husband Mrs Lillingston sold
Lochalsh to Mr, afterwards Sir, Alexander Matheson in
1851, whose son, Sir Kenneth, is the present proprietor.

5G PLACE NAMES OF LOCHALSH.

The place-names of Lochalsh are nearly all Gaelic.
The Norse names are remarkably few — nine or ten in all.
There is at least one Pictish name — Lundie and Loch
Lundie (Lunde, 1495; Lundy, 1527). It is a common
name in Pictland, from Fife to Sutherland inclusive. It
is possibly the same name as we have in London, ancient
Londinium. The root may be a nasahsed form of LUD,
marshy, boggy ; Gaelic, LODAN.

The Norse names are as follows : —

Stromeferry. This is a hybrid ; " ferry " is Eng-
lish and " strome " is the Norse " straumr," current,
stream, applied to the Strome channel here. It is common
in the Orkneys and in the Norse regions generally.

Ulhava, an islet near Duncraig. This is the same
as Ulva, near Mull ; it means " Wolf's Isle "— ULF-EY.
Ulf may have been a person's name.

DuiRINISH (Durris, 1548, Durness, 1554, Dowrnes,
Durinische, 1607). This means Deer's Ness or headland
— " dyra-nes." The name appears as Duirinish in Skye
and Durness in Sutherland.

Erbusaig (Arbesak, 1554, Erbissok, 1G33, pro-
nounced now Earbasaig with two r's for euphony's sake).
It appears to mean Erp's Wick or bay, Erp bemg a per-
sonal name borrowed by the Norse from the Picts. The
Gaehc form of Erp is Ere, a common name in ancient
times, as in the case of Fergus Mac Ere, first King of
Dalriada.

Pladaig. The Norse chief root here is FLAT, flat;
compare Pladda and Fladda for Flat-ey, " Flat Island."
Whether AIG is a Gaelic termination or the Norse VIK, a
wick or bay, is hard to say.

PLACE NAMES OF LOCHALSH. 57

SCALPAIDH, pronounced Scalpa, means Shallop or
Ship River— " Skalp-a." Scalpa, in Skye, is Ship Isle,
.and in the Orkneys it is for Ship-isthmus (EIDH).

Reraig (Rowrag, 1548, Rerek, 1554, Rerag, 1607,
1633), Gaelic Reiraig, seems to be for REYRVIK, Reed Bay.
There is another Reraig in Lochcarron.

AVERNISH (Awernis 1459, Awnarnys 1527, Avarrynis
1548, Evernische 1607, Averneis 1633) ; Gaelic A(bh)arnis.
It is likely Norse " Afar-nes," Big or Bulkyness.

Ceann-AN-OBA ; Gaelic, " Ceann an oib." Head of
the ob or bay ; the word OB is in Norse HOP. It appears
as Obbe in Harris, as Oban, and Ben Hope in Sutherland.
Ob-an-Duine is a little north of Plockton.

These are the undoubted Norse names. It is tempt-
ing to refer Loch Calavie, far eastward among the hills,
to the Norse KALFR, calf, especialy as in the next Glen is
Loch an Laoigh, beside which is Coire Seasgach (corry of
the heifers). The difficulty in regarding it as Norse is
two-fold : it is far inland and the pronunciation is Cail-
bhidh, where the termination in " i " is unaccountable from
Norse sources. There is a Glen Calvie in Strathcarron.
Strathasgaig, Gaelic Srath-asgag, may be hybrid, Asgaig
coming from the Norse " Aska-vik," Ash or Ship Wick ;
but the Norse ASK has the vowel short, and this makes the
etymology doubtful. No Gaelic root in ASG, FASG, or
even TASG or SASG can be suggested.

We shall now deal with the Gaelic names mentioned
in the old records, commencing at the north end of the
parish and working around the coast.

58 PLACE NAMES OF LOCHALSH.

Ardnarff, G. Ard-arbha, Ard-an-arbha ; " Height of
the corn(land)." In 1554 Ardnanarf 15T4 Ardenarra, 1607
Ardonarrow.

Inchnairn ; G. Innis-an-fhearna ; " Inches or the
Links of the Alder." In 1548, 1554, and 1607 Inchenarne,
1574 Inchnairnie.

Fernaig ; G. Fearnaig, " Placs of Alders." In 1495
Fairnmoir, Fayrineagveg (there were two Fernaigs), in
1527 Fayrnagmore, Fayrinaegveg, &:c.

ACHMORE, "Big Field"; in 1495 and 1527 Achmoir,
in 1548 Auchmoir. Along with it went Killochir (1548,
1607) or Cuyloir (1527), a name seemingly lost.

ACHACHONLEICH, "Field of the Straw or Stubble" ; in
1495 Achechoynleith, 1527 Achchonelyth.

Braeintra ; G. Braigh' an t-Srath, " Upper part of
the Strath." In 1495 Brayemtraye, 1633 Breaintread,
1548 Brayeyntrahe.

Craig, Duncraig, from G. CREAG, hill. In 1548
Cragy et Harsa, 1554 LIE Craig ; in 1607 Craig et Harsa.
The latter name is unknown to the present writer.

ACHANDARRACH ; G. Achadh-nan-darach, "Field of
the Oaks." In 1495 Achenadariache, 1527 Achendariach,
1548 Auchnadarrach.

ACHNAHIXICH ; G. Achadh-na h-inich ; 1548 Auchna-
howgych, 1554 Auchnaheuych, 1574 Auchinnahynneych,
1607 Auchnahinginche, 1633 Auchnahenginche. Duncan
Matheson spelt it Acha na Shinich, and he says that at
Achadh-da-temaidh (Field of two descents) there the
Mathesons used to rally as to a rendezvous when they took

PLACE NAMES OF LOCHALSH. 59

the field. They drank of the sacred stream of Altan-
rabhraidh (Burn of the Murmuring) and started. If
AONACH, fair, gathering, were dialectically feminine in old
Lochalsh, as well it might, for the word was originally
neuter, then we might explain the name as Achadh na
h-Aonaich, "Field of the Fair" — even "Field of the Ren-
dezvous." A word INGNEACH suits the old forms and
pronunciation best.

Balmacarra, G. Bail' mac-ara. The old forms are
— 1548 Ballimaccroy ; 1554, 1607, and 1633 Ballamaccarra ;
1574 Ballemakcarra(ne). The name looks as if it meant
"Township of the M'Ara family" (M'Ara being genitive
plural). The surname M'Ara or M'Carra is and was
common in Perthshire ; but it is not found elsewhere.
Balmacarra may be a corruption, like Ben Mac Dui ; per-
haps. Whale-ton (Muc-mhara) ?

AUCHTERTYRE, G. Uachdariridh, for Uachdar-thire,
"Upper part of the Land." Old forms are— Wochterory
(1495), Ochtertere (1527), Ochbertirie (1548).

ACHTAYTORALAN, G. Achadh-da-toralan. Old forms
are — Auchtatorlyne (1548), Auchtatorlane (1554), Auchrid-
tidorillane (1574), Auchtatorrelan (1607). The word
TORALAN or TORRALAN is of doubtful force ; it may be a
derivative like TORRAN, knoll, from TORR, but the name
Achadh-da-tearnaidh, already referred to, makes it pos-
sible that here we have a name of similar form and force,
viz., TORLUINN, descent, better TUIRLING. With Achtay-
toralan went Ardach (1548), Ardache (1607), Ardacht
(1574) ; It means " Highfield."

NOSTIE. G. Nosdaidh ; in 1548 and 1574 Nosti, 1554
Noyste, 1607 and 1633 Nostie. It seems to be from OSD-
THIGH, inn, with the article in the dative (or locative) before

60 PLACE NAMES OF LOCHALSH.

it, as 'N-Osd-thigh, just as we have it in Nonach further
east.

Ardelve, G. Aird-eilghidh, " Height of the Fallow
Land." In 1548 Ardelly, 1554 Ardelf (which suggests a
locative Ard-sheilbh, " High-property,") Ardillie in 1574,
1607 Ardelleive, 1633 Ardelve.

CONCHRA, G. Conachra, which appears to be a deri-
vative of CRO or CRA, an enclosure, fold (compare the Cro
of Kintail, Cra in the north of Arran, and elsewhere in
both forms). The CON is the old preposition CO, CON,
with ; it means here a collection of CRO-s, the whole word
Conchra meaning " Place of folds." In 1548 Connachry,
1554 Concry, Conchra in 1574 and 1633, in 1607 Conchara.

Sallachy, G. Salachaidh, "Place of Willows;" old
Gaelic SAILECH (gen.), willow, now SEILEACH, the Scotch
SAUGH, for SALCH, old English SALH. Sallachy is com-
mon as a place-name. Compare Sauchie-burn for older
Salchie (Stirling), where possibly the word is Scotch. Old
forms are Sallach in 1548, Salche in 1554, Sallachie in
1574 and 1633.

Old names that seem to have dropped out of the run-
ning are these — With Fernaigbeg go Fadamine (1495),
Fynimain (1527), Fineman (1548), and Acheache (1495)
Acheachy (1527), Auchcroy (1548, 1607). The two merk-
lands of Culthnok, Achnacloich, Blaregarwe and Acheae
are mentioned in 1495 and 1527 (Achiae in 1527) and
later. With Auchtertyre appears Achich in 1548, Achiche
in 1607.

Names that do not appear in the old documents will
now be taken.

PLACE NAMES OF LOCHALSH. 61

PORT-A-CHULLIN, G. Port a' Chuilinn, " Holly Port."

Plockton, G. Am Ploc, " The Lump," applied to the
humpy promontory which ends in Ruemore (G. Rudha-
mor, "Big Cape"). Duaird is G. Dubh-aird," "Black
Point. Lon-buidhe is " Yellow mead."

Strathie, G. Srathaidh, " Straths." A plural loca-
tive.

Sean-Chreag, "Old Rock."

PORT-EORNA, G Port an Eorna, " Barley Port."

Drumbuie, " Yellow Ridge."

PORTNACLOICHE, " Port of the Stone."

Palascaig, Loch Palascaig; doubtful.

BADICAUL, G. Bada-call, " Hazel-Clump." There is a
Badcall in Rosskeen and another in Eddrachilles.

Kyle of Lochalsh. Kyle in G. is Gaol, a narrow,
COILLEMORE, " Great Wood."

Glen UdalAN. In Gaelic, UDALAN signifies a swivel
or swingle tree. It is difficult to explain the connection
here. It is likely that the river was first named Udalan.
There is a Ben Udlaman on the confines of Badenoch.

KiRKTON. The Gaelic is Clachan, "village,"
" church." The burying-ground is called Cnoc nan Ain-
geal, " Angels' Knoll."

62 PLACE NAMES OF LOCHALSH.

KiNNAMOIXE, G. Ceann-na-moine, " Moss-head."

ElLEAN TlORAM, " Dry Island " (a common name),
is at the entrance to Loch Long, " Ship Loch," a name
found in South Argyll and elsewhere. Camas Longart,
" Bay of the Encampment," from LOXGPHORT. The River
Ling is in Gaelic Abhainn Lumge, " Ship's River," con-
nected with Loch Long.

AULTNASOU, G. Allt-nan-subh, " Berry Stream." It
was called Aultnasou in 1721.

NONACH, G. Nonach. Loch na h-onaich, not far off,
shows that we have here the article AN with OXACH. We
may compare Onich, near Ballachulish, which is derived
from Omhanach (locative Omhanaich), " Place of Foam."

POLL-AX-TARIE, G. Poll-an-tairbh, " Bull's Pool,"
where the legendary battle between the Mathesons and
Sutherland men took place.

Patt, on Loch ]\Ionar, G. Pait, "Hump." The
shootings of Riochan (Riabhachan, " Brindled Place,")
and Sail-riabhach (from a hill so called, " Brindled Heel,")
are near here.

The names of the rivers, lochs and hills not already
mentioned are easy, save in the case of Loch Monar. The
word Monar seems to be merely a more phonetic form of
G. MOXMHUR, a murmuring noise ; purling of a stream or
of water would be its meaning in this case. Coire-na-
sorna, near Loch Calavie, is interesting as giving a fem-
inine genitive to G. SORN, furnace, gully; but the word
was both mas. and fem. in early Irish. We have the cor-
rect genitive in Loch Houm, which stands for Loch

PLACE NAMES OF LOCHALSH. 63

Shuirn, *:he loch taking its name from SORN. This is
proved by the Dean of Lismore's line —

" Leggit derri di wurn
eddir selli is sowyrrni "

(" An end of merriment between Shiel and Hourn ;" that
is, in the Clan Ranald country).

PLACE-NAMES

OP

THE HEBRIDES

PLACE-NAMES OF
THE HEBRIDES

PART I.

The name Hebrides is, like the name lona, due
to a clerical blunder; and Hector Boece is the
author of it. He misread the Classical Hebudre
with a middle vowel u, as Hebrida, with a
medial ri. The oldest form of the name appears
in Mela (1st century a.d.) as H£emoda3, of which
he says there were seven. Phny accepts Mela's
Haemodas, and adds 80 Haebudes, while
Ptolemy (2nd century) has only the Aiboudai,
that is, Aebudse, 5 in number. These he
separately names Aebuda, one and two, Ricma,
Malaeos, and Epidium. An attempt has been
made to identify the two Uists with the two
Aebudae. Uist appears as Ivist in the old Norse
poetry, and it has been possibly modified to

68 PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES.

sound like the Norse i vist, a habitation. In any
case, we cannot be certain that either in Aebudae
or in Uist we have anything resembhng a Celtic
spelhng of the original word meant. Uist, as
we now have it, has been handed down on Norse
hps. Of Ptolemy's other three islands, Malaeos
is clearly Mull; Adamnan mentions it also as
Malea and the Norse as Myl. Adamnan besides
mentions lona, that is, Hii or I, St Columba's
Isle, and he further notices Coloso (Colonsay),
Egea (Eigg), Ilea (Islay), Longa (Luing dr
Lunga?), Sainea (Shuna), Scia (Skye), Terra
Ethica (Tiree), and the unidentified ones,
Airthrago, Elena, Hinba, Oidecha (Texa?), and
Ommon. Many of these w^ere re-named by the
Norsemen, and their locality can only be
guessed. Ptolemy doubtless also means Skye
by his Sketis, though it is placed eastw^ard of
Cape Wrath and his Orcades Isles.

That the names of the western islands before
the advent of the Norsemen were Celtic is
probable; that Celts inhabited them is equally
so. The names Orcades is distinctly Celtic;
the root is ore, pig, allied to the Latin porcus,
and the English farrov:, for the Celtic languages
have lost initial p in every native word. The
name Skye, Norse Skidh, Adamnan' s Scia and
Ptolemy's Sketis, has been properly identified
with Gaelic sqiath or sgiadh, wing. The name
of Malaeos, now Muile, that is. Mull, may come

PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES. 69

from a root mal, which Dr Whitley Stokes
compares with Albanian mal, mountain range,
border, Lettic mala, border; to which we may
add Gaelic mala, eyebrow. The idea would
therefore be " the mountainous island "^
" Muile nam morbheann." Ptolemy's Epidion
has not been identified; but the root is clearly
the British or Pictish epo, horse, and the Epidii
of Kintvre must have been so named, as the
Echaidhs and Eachanns of Gaelic old and new,
from their horsemanship. The name Colosus
in Adamnan, now Colonsay, Gaelic coll-asa, may
have something to do with coll, hazel. The
word Hii, or I, or lona, is extremely puzzling —
Dr Whitley Stokes suggests a connection with
Latin plus, holy, or Celtic i-ios. Tiree is in
Adamnan Insula or Terra Ethica, " land of
corn," eth being his form of old Gaelic ith,
corn.

We are, so far, justified in assuming that the
Western Isles were under the sway of the Celts,
and that their inhabitants spoke a Celtic lan-
guage until the advent of the Norsemen. The
latter people appear first about the year 794,
and terrible was the confusion and havoc that
they caused. They completely colonised the
Orkneys and Shetland, which the Celtic popu-
lation never recovered; and almost the only
remembrance of them there is the name of the
Orkneys. Nowadays, the old idea that the

70 PLACE-NAMES 01- THE HEBRIDES.

Teutonic invaders of the Celts annihilated the
previous population has been abandoned, both
for Saxon and for Norse conquests. But if it
was anything like the truth anywhere, we may
claim it as such for the Long Island. The Gaelic
names were clean swept out of the island; the
present Gaelic names are post-Norse imports.
But the further we go south among the isles, the
less sweeping does the clearance seem to have
been. Lews was evidently re-named by the
Norsemen, but in the southern isles the pre-
ponderance of Gaelic names shows that the
Gaels were absorbed gradually, not extirpated,
as they were in Lews. At present, the propor-
tion of Norse names to Gaelic ones in Lewis is
as 4 to 1 ; in Islay it is as 1 to 2 ; in Arran as 1
to 8; and in Man it is about the same, or rather
1 to 7 J. It is not clear if Gaelic was ever com-
pletely exterminated in Arran and the more
southerly isles. It is most likely that it was not;
inter-communication between Ireland and Scot-
land would help its continuance. The battle of
Clontarf (1014) undoubtedly wrought harm to
the Norse and Danish power. The Islands
asserted their independence of Norway, but
were cruelly subjugated again by Magnus Bare-
legs in 1098. In 1156 those islands south of
Ardnamurchan were ceded to Somerled, a Norse
Celt, who started seemingly a Gaelic-Norse
kingdom of the Isles. In 1266 the Hebrides

PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES. 71

were finally ceded to Scotland, after being 470
years under Norse sway. The Gaelic language
seems to have rapidly spread itself through the
Isles in the time of the Norse decadence, and at
the cession of the Isles. At the present time,
to parody the expression " Hiberniores Hibernis
ipsis," we may say that the Norsemen of Lewis
at present are Goideliores Goidelis ipsis — more
Gaelic than the Gaels themselves.

We may quote a passage from the lays of
Magnus Barefoot' s time, recounting his domgi
in the Isles. It will also serve the purpose of
showing the early twelfth century form of the
island names: — "Fire played fiercely to the
heavens over Liodhus (Lewis); he (Magnus)
went over Ivist with flame: the veomen lo«t
life and goods. He harried Skidh (Skye)
and Tyrvist (Tiree) .... the Mylsk (people of
Mull) ran for fear. Far over the flats of Sandey
he warred. There was a smoke over II (Islay);
the king's men fed the flame. Further south,
men in Cantyre — Santiris — bowed beneath the
sword-edge. He made the Manxmen — Man-
verja — to fall."

So much did the Gaelic population of the
mainland feel that the Isles were Norse that the
proper Gaelic name of the Hebrides has been
Innse Gall, " The Islands of the Galls or
Strangers." The word Gall now means a Low-
lander or English-speaking person; originally

72 PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES.

the word was used by the Gael, as by the
Eomans, to designate the Gauls of France and
Britain, who came as strangers in contact with
the Gael of Ireland in the earlier centuries of our
era. Similarly the name Welsh comes originally
from that of the Volcae, a people on the northern
border of Gaul, and marching with the Teutons,
who named all Celts after them.

Dean Munro in his survey of the Isles in
1549 mentions and describes 209 of them. Of
these names many are repeated — there are about
eight Fladdas, and many more are easily under-
stood on the score of derivation; so that at this
part of our subject we need only refer to the
more important islands. The first name that
claims attention is that of Lewis. This in Norse
times was Ljodh-hiis, the contemporary Gaelic
of which was Leodhiis. The Norse word may
mean "loud house" and "lay house," the
latter meaning either song or people; but these
meanings are unsatisfactory, and resort has been
had to Gaehc, old and new. Martin (1703)
derives the name from a Gaelic word leog,
" water lying on the surface of the ground," a
word for which he is the first and sole authority.
The fact is that we do not know the pronuncia-
tion of Martin's word. The modern Gaelic
name is spelt Leodhas, and pronounced in Gaelic
phonetics as Leo's. In the present state of our

PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES. 73

knowledge, it is impossible to say what the name
may mean.

The Harris portion of the Long Island is in
Gaelic called Na h-Earradh. In old documents
of three centuries ago the name appears vari-
ously as IIar(r)ay, Her(r)e, Herrie, and, with a
plural form, Harreis (1588). Captain Thomas
adduces other places so called, such as Harris in
Bum, Herries in Dumfries, Harray (Orkney),
and Harrastadhir in Iceland; and he further
derives the root word from Norse har, high, with
a plural havir, and a comparative h^erri, higher,
allied to a noun haedh, height, whose plural is
haedhir, which, he thinks, might develop into
har-ri by a shifting of the r. The name Harra-
stadhir is rather to be referred to Norse liarri,
master, king, and the Orkney Harray may be of
the same origin or descended from the word
herad, district. The meaning which Captain
Thomas attached to the name Harris was that
of " The Heights." Unsatisfactory as the
phonetics are, this is the best derivation as yet
offered for Harris. The final .s in the English
name Harris is, of course, the sign of the plural.

St Kilda is known in Gaelic as Hirt, which is
its old name, the term St Kilda being only two
centuries old and of doubtful origin. In ancient
Gaelic irt signifies " death," and possibly the
island received its name from its remote western

74 PLACE-NAMES OP THE HEBRIDES.

position, for the Celts connected the West with
the abode of the dead.

The Uists we have akeady discussed; and
before passing on we may notice the most im-
portant islets in the Sound of Harris and there-
about. Taransay is St Taran's ey or island;
Scalpay (in Harris and Skye) is " Ship-isle,"
from Norse Skalpr, a ship, whence also the old
Orkney Skalp-eidh or ' ' ship isthmus ' ' ; Scarp is
the Norse Skarpr, sharp, and is the same as the
English scarp, escarpment; Pabbay is a common
name, appearing in Iceland and the Orkney and
Shetland Isles as Papey or Papa, and it signifies
Pope's or Priest's Isle; Shillay, or Shelley
signifies "seal-isle"; Ensay is for engis-ey,
" meadow-isle "; Tahay is for Ha-ey, high-isle,
the same as the Hoy of the Orkneys; Coilsay is
for " gill's isle," gill being a ravine; Boreray is
for Borgar-ey, that is, "Burgh-isle" or
" fortress-isle," not, as Captain Thomas sug-
gested, Boru-ey, " bore-isle " — thus, Dun-
vorrerick is the Dun or Fort of Borgar vik, that
is, Fort-bay. Personal names appear often in
these island names — -Bernera is for Bjorn's-isle
(Bear-isle); Grimisay is for Grimm's-isle; Her-
metray is for Hermund's isle, as Gometra,
further south, is for Godmund's isle; Eriskay is
doubtless, as Professor Munch said, Eric's isle,
by metathesis of the s; and Barra is St Barr's
isle. The Flannen Islands (na h-Eileanan

PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES. 75

Fiannach) are called after St Flannen. Taransay
we have already explained as St Taran's isle.

The name Benbecula is a curious perversion
of the Gaelic Beinn-a'-bh-faoghla," "Hill of
the Ford.'' Scaravay and Scarba are for skarf-
ey, "cormorant (skarfr) isle"; Haskir is the
Ha-sker, high-skerry, and Heisker is probably
for heidh-skar , bright-rock ; Vallay is for ' ' field-
isle," from voUr, field; Lingay is for ling or
heath-isle, from Norse lyng, heath; Hellisay is
from hellir, cave, also appearing in Orkney.
The names Vatersay and Sandray easily explain
themselves, from water and sand (vatn and
sandr of Norse); Foula, or Fula, is for "fowl
(Norse fugl) isle." There are four islands called
Wiay, Dean Munro's (1549) Buya or Bywa, now
pronounced as Fuidhaidh, to which we may
compare the Icelandic Veey or "house-isle,"
Ve being very common in Norse place-names.
Names like Fuday, Fiaray, Killegray, and Min-
guiay, (pronounced MeaWa), we pass over as
inexplicable to us, and come to Skye and its
environs.

Eaasay and Eona are slumped together in
the Norse name appHed to them, viz.,
Eauneyjar, the raun-isles, a word which Pro-
fessor Munch explains as meaning experiment.
Despite the absence of initial h, we should refer
it rather to hraun, lava, rough ground, which is
characteristic of the several Eona Islands that

76 PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES.

exist. The Norse Eaunen are bare rocks in the
!5ea. Captain Thomas explained Raasay as " roe
isle," from ra, roe; but this would give a geni-
tive rar, not ras. It is difficult to say what the
root word in Raasay is. Hrauns-ey is possible.
There are some eight Fladda Isles on the Weat
Coast; these all mean Flat Isle, the Norse
Flat-ey. Another common name is Soa or
Sheep-Isle, from the Norse Saudhr, sheep;
again Haversay is for hafrs-ey, " he-goat isle."
Isay is ice-isle; and Trodday appears to mean
pasture isle, from trodh, pasture, a name which
appears in Trotternish, which Captain Thomas
strangely refers to trylldr, enchanted, or Troll-
ness, though how this result could phonetically
occur one cannot see.

We now come to the parish of Small Isles,
which comprises Canna, Rum, Eigg, and Muck.
The first name — Canna — has been explained
from the Norse Kanna to mean the ' ' can shaped
isle"; it appears as Kannay in 1549. Rum,
pronounced like the English " room," appears
in the Annals of Ulster under the year 676 with
the genitive Ruimm; and Dr Stokes refers this
" lozenge-shaped island " to a root identical
with Greek rhombus. As the root of this
appears to be vreng, wrench, the comparison is
doubtful. Nor is Captain Thomas's derivation
at all happy ; first he refers Uist to I-fheirste, or
Isle of Fords or sandbanks (Gaelic fearsad), and

PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES. 77

then Rum is taken from I-dhmim, ridge-isle . The
supposed Gaehc i for isle is, as Dr Stokes says,
clearly the Norse word ey borrov/ed ; as a matter
of fact, it does not exist in Gaelic at all. Eigg
is Adamnan's Egea, and may be referred to an
oblique form of Gaelic eag, a notch. Muck is
good Gaehc; it is " pigs' isle " ; Eilean nam muc.
There is also a Horse Isle near.

Further south we meet with Coll, Tiree, and
Mull, names already discussed. The name
Gunna recalls the Norse gunnr, war, so common
in proper names among the Norse. Lismore is
Gaelic — the great lios or enclosure. The islands
variously called Luing and Lunga or Lungay,
seem all to be of Gaelic origin; and to contain
the Gaelic word for ship (long) as base. Lunga
and Lungay have certainly submitted to Norse
influence. The two isles called Shiuna, and the
isle of Shona, seem to be formed from Norse
sjon, sight, a root which appears in Norse place-
names in connection with " scouting" positions.
Kerrera is in the Sagas called Kjarbarey. and
possibly means " copse isle." The Calf of Mull
is in Norse Mylarkalfr, Mull's Calf, and in Gaelic
it is Calbh. These Calf islands are common.

Passing island names like Treshinish, Erraid,
and Seil, we meet with Ulva, that is lilf-ey, or
wolf's isle, Ulf, or Ulfr, being really a person's
name here ; Staffa is staff-ey, from stafr, a staff,
referring to its basaltic pillars, as Professor

78 PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBKIOES.

Munch pointed out; Jura is, as the same
authority says, for Dyrey, that is, Deer's Isle,
whence also Duirinish and Durness, Deer's Ness.
Colonsay (Norse Koln) is in Adamnan, as we
already sa^Y. There are some half-dozen isles
called Oronsay, Gaelic Or'asa, without n, and
Captain Thomas happily explained the name as
Orfris-ey, from the Norse orfiri, ebbing. As
Vigfusson says, Norse " Orfiris-ey is the proper-
name for islands which at low-water are joined
to the mainland." And this is true of the
Scottish isles so called. Oigha, of which there
are two at least, is pronounced Gidhaidh, and
appears in the Sagas as Gudhey or Gudey, that
is, God-isle, or good-isle. Arran is in the
Norse called Hersey or Herey, doubtless an
attempt at the Gaelic name Arann. This is an
oblique use of Gaelic ara, a kidney, as Or
Cameron pointed out. The Arann isles off
Galway are similarly named and explamed.
The island is kidney-shaped. Bute is in Norse
Saga and modern Gaelic called Bot, but what
the name means it is not easy to say. The
Cumbraes were called by the Norse Kumreyjar,
the isles of Kumr, which name is usually ex-
plained as referring to the Kymry or Welsh of
Strathclyde.

PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES 79

PART IT.

The ubiquity of the Norsemen in the Western
Isles is indicated further by the fact that even
lonely St Kilda fell under their sway, and its
leading features show Norse names. The names
of the adjacent islets are Norse; Boreray and
Soa are the isles of the Borg (burgh), and the
Saudlir (sheep). A hill on the east of St Kilda
itself is variously given as Oiseval or Ostrivail,
which stands for Oserveaul — that is, Norse
Austr-fell, or "East-hill." The Norse fell,
hill, as a rule, appears in Gaelic as bhal or val.
Other Norse words undergo wonderful changes
in passing into Gaelic, so much so that at times
their own mother (language) would have diffi-
culty in recognising them. Norse setr, a seat,
holding, appears in Gaelic as siadair or seadair,
and in the place-names as shader. Bolstadhr
and Bustadhr come to be bos, bost, or bus ; and
fjordhr, genitive fjardhar, a firth, becomes
terminally art, ard, ord, ort; and it may even
disport itself as port, Snizort is Sneisfjordhr,
spit-frith; Cnoideart is for Cnut's or Canute 'f
Frith, etc. Violent initial changes also take
place in borrowing these Norse words. Many
Norse names begin with h, and it is a peculiarity
of Gaelic that /i, as Macalpin humorously re-
marked in regard to the singularity of Highland

80 PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES.

character and institutions, though not recog
nised as a letter in GaeHc, " is used not only in
every word, but almost in every syllable
expressed or understood." It is a parasitic
letter, and leans upon some other consonant.
Hence Norse words beginning with h may be
supported by a t. Norse holmr appears as tolm,
genitive tuilm, an island or inch. According to
Captain Thomas, this word appears terminally
as am, um, while in the Northern Hebrides it
becomes by metathesis " mol," as in Kisa-mol,
for Kastel-mol. Compare Cobhsamul or Cos-
mul, Linmul, etc. Habost, that is, ha-bolstadhr
or high-town, appears as Tabost ; Loch Thamna-
bhaidh stands for t-hamna-vagr, that is, haven-
voe, haven-bay; Loch Thealasbhaidh is for
Hellis-vagr, cave-voe, etc.

In considering the place-names of the
Western Isles, we intend to utilise more or less
in full the work of the late Captain Thomas,
R.N., W'ho wrote one or two papers on this sub-
ject for the Society of Antiquaries, in whose
Transactions they lie buried unknown to the
general public. The first paper on the " Extir-
pation of the Celts in the Hebrides " appeared
in 1876, and the other on " Islay Place Names "
in 1882, wherein Captain Thomas was helped
by the well-known Gaelic scholar, Mr Hector
Maclean, Islay. We shall take in alphabetical

PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES. 81

order the leading Norse words that enter into
the composition of these Island place-names.

A, that is, d, a river. This word, which
forms the stem of so many place-names in Ice-
land, is rare in Lewis and the Isles. Laxa in
Iceland, and Laxa of Shetland, are synonymous
with Laxay of Lochs in Lewis. It stands for
lax-a, that is, salmon-river, lax being the Norse
for salmon. Other salmon rivers will be men-
tioned when we come to dalr, a dale. Few of
the small rivers in Lewis have distinctive names,
but the Creed seems to be an exception, and tells
of odoriferous plants and flowers; for krydd
means spice, and krydd-jurt signifies spice-
herbs.

Ass, that is, ass, a rocky ridge. A strange
corruption has befallen this word in Shetland,
where Vind-ass has become Wind-house. So
Burn-house gives us the well-known name of
Burns. There are two places called Valtos in
Lewis, and a third in Skye, and there is no oss,
that is, oyce or river-mouth, there. Furthe]',
we have Garry Valtos in South Uist. In the
Orkneys, Waldbrek, Waldgarth, and South Wald
seem to be cognate words. Assuming this, we
may put Vold-ass, that is, field-ridge, down as
the original form where Void is an olden form
of Vollr, a field. For the phonetics we may
appeal to Norse threskjoldr, a thrashing floor,

6

82 PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES.

where we have voUr as oldr; and further, that
the T.awmaii in Slietland in 1307 dates from
Tingvold, that is, thing-voUr, the field of
assembly, which appears in Dingwall also.
Perhaps Valdaras in Iceland may be exactly our
Valtos.

Bekkr, a rivulet, brook. This rare word in
Norse topography appears to occur only in Die-
bek in Harris, the Gaelic of which is Ceann-
Dliibig. Dubec in Skye is no doubt the same
name. As Captain Thomas remarks, we do not
know the meaning of the prefix, except that it is
not Duhh, Gaelic Mack.

Bakki, bank. It was hardly to have been
expected that this word should have been retained
so near its original form as in Back, Stornoway;
Hdboc — Highbank (Gaelic form Tabac), in
Bernera of Lewis ; Bakka in Taransay (Taransay-
banks), Harris; and Baclid in Barra. Bacca-
skill occurs in the Orkneys; Backa and Bacca in
Shetland; while Bakki is the name of thirty
farms in Iceland.

Bol-stadhr, a homestead. This word is
widely diffused over the northern and western
islands. In " Landnc4mab6k " it only occurs
twice, and it forms no compound except with
Breidh — broad, which is repeated eight times
(Breidhabolstadhr). In the Shetland directory
there are (2) Busta, (4) Bousta, but in combina-

PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES. 83

tion it is written (27) -bister, and but once
-buster only. In the Scottish dialect i has fre-
quently the sound of u. The Orkney rental of
1595 contains (44) -bustar and (3) -busier; only
a few of which are named after men. In the
Lewis rental Bolstadhr occurs as Bosta in
Bernera, Uig; and when used as a generic term
it is shortened to -bost. Many of these names
are easily interpreted; thus, Melbost — there are
two of them — is for Mel-bolstadr, Links-Farm;
Leurbost, Leir-bolstadr, mud or clay farm:
Ci'ossbost, Kross-bolstadr, Cross-Fajm; Calbost
is shortened in the same way as in the Orkneys
and Shetland (Caldale, Calback) from Oaldbost,
Kald - bolstadhr, Cold -Farm. Garbost, as
written by Martin, would be pronounced Garta-
bost by the Gael, and was originally Geira-
bolstadhr, Geirr's-Farm; Geirr is a proper
name. The Orkneys give Garraquoy; Shetland,
Garragarth or Gerragarth; and Iceland, Geira-
bolstadhr. It is but right to say that Geira may
mean a " gore " or sHce of land.

At Shawbost, on the west of Lewis — vari-
ously written Sheabost, Shabost — is a lake, into
which the sea sometimes flows; this is the Sjar.
Loch Seaforth gets its name from the pent up
salt lake, Saer, which forms its head; hence
Scefjoidh, Ssefirth, Seaforth; and the oyce at
Kirkwall is called the " Little Sea " ; Shawbost,
then, is Sja-bolstadhr, that is, sea-lake-farm.

84 PLACE-NAMES OP THE HEBRIDES.

There are two Habosts in Lewis; neither of
them are upon high ground; the adjective, there-
fore, is the same as in so many places called
Holland, Hallandi, Hall-lendi, in the Orkneys,
and the still more common Houlland in Shet-
land. Hahost has been Hall-holstadr; from
Hallr, a slope, dechvity. So Captain Thomas
thought.

Swanibost is the same as Swanbustar, in the
Orkneys; and is cognate with Swynasetter in
Shetland, and Sveinseyri, and Sveinavatn in
Iceland. Swanibost stands for Sveina-bolstadr,
Svein's-Farm; from Sveinn, a proper name.
Shelibost (the Gaelic form of which is Seilabost),
in Harris, is identical with Skelbustar in the
Orkneys, and cognate with Skeljavik in Iceland;
and in its Icelandic form is Skeljar-bolstadhr,
Shelly-Farm; from skel, a shell. Besides Nisa-
bost, in Harris, there is another in Skye, and
Nesbustar, in the Orkneys; all of which repre-
sent Nes-bolstadhr, Ness-Farm, from Nes, ness.
Horgibost, Harris, must be written in Gaelic
Torgabost; the Norse horgr signifies a heathen
place of worship. Captain Thomas thought
that in the Orkneys it appears as Howbister ; and
cognate names in Shetland are Houby, Huxter,
Hogsetter. "' In this case," he adds, "as in
several others, the name has suffered less
change among the Gael than in the northern
islands. On this farm is a fine Cromlech, figured

PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES. 85

in the Crania Britannica, hence its name, Hauga-
bolstadr, How-Farm; from Haugr, How, cairn,
sepulchral mound." As a matter of fact, horgr
and haugr are different words of Hke meaning.

Borg — 1, a small dome-shaped hill; 2, a wall,
fortification, castle. In Iceland ten different
places are called Borg, but " it may be ques-
tioned whether those names are derived simply
from the hill on which they stand (berg, bjarg),
or whether such hills took their name from old
fortifications built upon them; the latter is more
likely, but no information is on record, and at
present ' Borg ' only conveys the notion of a
hill." In Shetland Borg is still represented by
"Burgh" in two places, but the influence of
Scottish speech has changed it to " Brough ' ' in
eleven others ; in the Orkneys also ' ' Brough
prevails. In the Hebrides, when written in
Enghsh, it is " Borve " ; in Harris (twice); in
Barra, and in Skye. Borve, in Barvas, Lewis,
appears as Borg, Bora (error for Borva),
Barove; and the Gaelic form is Borgh (in pro-
nunciation the r is duplicated, Bor-rgh); hence
arises the English form Borve. The name is,
archasologically, of great importance, for in
Shetland, the Orkneys, and the Hebrides it
almost always indicates the location of a pre-
Norse Pictish tower; but there are a few excep-
tions, at anyrate in the Orkneys, viz., Burrow

S6 PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES.

Head, Stroiizii; Bunvick, Saiidwick; and the
Brough of Birsa.

So completely is the original meaning of the
word forgotten in the Hebrides, that it is usual
to put Dun (that is, castle) before it; thus, Dun
Borgh (grammatically Dun Bhuirgh) means
Castle-castle. Captain Thomas thinks Professor
Munch wrong in saying " that it (Shetland) has
had no fixed settlers upon it before the arrival
of the Norsemen." — (P. 90, Mem. Soc. Nor.
Antqs., 1850-1860). He has here for a moment
forgotten the Borgir or Pictish towers, which
have never been claimed as Scandinavian, and
are consequently pre-Norse. Says Captain
Thomas: — "But my more immediate business
is with a long paragraph on pp. 103-104 of the
same volume, to this effect — Burra, in Shetland,
following the analogy of the Orkneys, should be
Borgarey, but it is almost certain that in ancient
times it was called Barrey; this theory depend-
ing on the statement that a part of King Hacon'e
fleet, coming from Norway, passed south of
Shetland, sailed ' vest fyrir Barreyjarfjordr,'
and saw no land till they made Sule Skerry, west
of the Orkneys. Barreyjarfjordr was, therefore,
the Bay of Scalloway, and the present Burra was
Barrey. To all this it is answered, that a ship
leaving Norway and seeing no land until she
arrived at Sule Skerry must have passed between
Shetland and Fair Isle, which part of the sea

PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES. 87

may very well have been called Fiithareyjar-
fjordr or Fridhareyjarfjordr, i.e., Fair Island
firth, and that Barreyjarfjordr is certainly a mis-
copy of either of these names, so that the ship
would not enter or be near the Bay of Scalloway.
Besides, I myself have been on the site of the
Picts' Castle, of which the stones were carried
away to build the pier of Scalloway. Burra in
Shetland, like Burra in the Orkneys, is Borgarey,
Castle-isle.

" It follows that Alfdis, Konalsdottir, of
Barrey (Barreysku), did not come from Shet-
land, and we are at liberty to suppose that she
was a native of Barra, Hebrides. We are told
in Gretti's Saga (Danish translation) that the
father of Alfdis, the Barra girl, was Konall ; her
grandfather, Steinmoor; her great-grandfather,
Olver Barnakarl {i.e., Olver the child's-man);
he obtained this honourable title because he
objected to join in the Viking sport of throwing
the children of their victims up into the air and
catching them on the points of their spears.

" There is no further mention of KonAll; it
may be hoped he met an early death; Alfdis
would then come into the family of Ofeigr
Gretter, her uncle, who had fled, with all his
family and servants, from Harold Fairhair to
the Barra Isles. It may be gathered that these
islands formed the stronghold of a clan of
Vikings; and a cousin of Alfdis, Aldis by name,

88 PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES.

was there married lo a woudeu-legged Viking.
Ultimately, we are told, they all went to Iceland;
but the topographical names prove that either
some remained behind or that other Vikings
supplied their places — probably both. Alfdis,
the Barra girl, was married in Iceland to a
grandson of Olaf the White, King of Dubhn."

Bragor, in Barvas of Lewis. This word does
not occm" in Oleasby's " Dictionary," perhaps
from the misfortune of neither author nor editor
being nautical men. Braga is applied to reefs
on which the sea breaks wdth extra violence, and
Bragor is named from the shoal water lying sea-
ward of it. Mackenzie's chart has " Bragd "
for a reef oft' Skegersta, Lewis; and if this is not
— but probably it is— a clerical error for Braga,
it would show how well the old Norse forms have
been retained in Lewis, for the word is probably
Bragd-arr, and formed from " Bragd," the
" fundamental notion of which is that of a
sudden motion." In the Orkneys are two reefs
called Braga, and Break-ness is Bragir-ness.
(Captain Thomas).

Briiy a bridge. This word is represented by
Bru in Iceland; Brow, Brugarth, in Shetland;
and Brogar in the Orkneys. Brue, in Lewis, is
at the outlet of Loch Barvas.

Beer, hoer, hyr — (1) a town, village; (2) a
farm, landed estate. The only certain " by "
in Lewis island is Eoropie, which has caused the

PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDE.S. 89

ridiculous appearance of ' ' Europa Point ' ' on
some maps, and explained as meaning the
extremity of Europe. Eoropie is simply Eyrar-
baer, i.e., Beach-village; from Eyrr, a beach.
In Shetland they would say, " The boat is at the
ayre " ; that is, on the beach as distinguished
from rocks. There are at least four islands in
the Outer Hebrides and two in Skye bearing the
name Oransay, Ornsay. " In every case that
I know of they are connected at low water by a
reef to another island." (Captain Thomas).
The real name is Ortiris-ey, or Ebb-isle, from
orfiri, ebbing, not from eyrr, beach.

Dalr, a dale. Dcel, a little dale. There are
over 130 names compounded with dalr in the
Landnamabok, and the " dales " are propor-
tionally numerous in the Orkneys and Shetlands.
They are scarcely so frequent as farm names in
Lewis. Swordale occurs twice in Lewis, and
the map of Skye has three dales of that name.
The Ny Jardharbok has Sward boeli. Swordale
is for Swardhardalr — Sward-dale; from Norse
Svordhr, sward, green-turf. Swordale in Lochg
contains a coppice of willows and birches which
are the last living trees of the native forest, of
which the name is commemorated in the
adjacent " Birken Isles." Laxdale indicates
the presence of a salmon river. There are no
salmon caught in the Orkneys, nor is Lax con-
tained in their name system. Neither are there

90 PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES.

salmon in Shetland, yet there are Laxlirths and
Laxa, so that either the salmon have deserted
the country or the Northmen have given the
name of Lax to the fine sea trout. Laxdale, in
Lewis, and Lacasdle, in Harris, are synonymous
with Laxar-dalr in Iceland. Salmon-iiver-dale;
from Lax, a salmon. Eoradale is written for
Eyrar-dalr — Beach-dale; from Eyir, a beach.
Hodel, spelled Rodle and Eoudil in the same
rental, is cognate with Roeness, Shetland, and
Raudhanes, Iceland, and must have been
Raudhi-dalr — Red-dale; from Raudhr, red.
Ranigdale, a wretched place on the shore of
Loch Seaforth, is probably. Rannveigar-dalr ;
from Rannveig, a proper name. On the west
side of Lewis there are Dale-Beg — Little Dale,
and Dalemore — Great Dale; and als(i Noith and
South Dale. All these are sharp, little valleys,
and their original has been Dael — a little dale.
But it has to be remarked that when dale pre-
cedes, the combination is of Gaelic origin,
though the word dail is borrowed.

Eidh, an isthmus, neck of land. In 1576
Eidh in Shetland had become Ayth. now Aith,
but a much greater change took place with
Eidhs-vik, which in 1576 was Aythiswick, but
now Ea-swick and E-swick. Eidh, in the Ork-
neys, is often very corrupt. It remains almost
intact in Aith, Aithstown ; less conspicuous in

PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES. 91

Ai-sdale ; but Haugs-eid has become Hoxa ;
Eidh-ey, Eday; and Skalp-eidh, Scapa.

Eidli has many strange forms in tJie
Hebrides : le, Ey, Y, Ay, Eie, Huy, Ui, Vy.',
Uiy, Uie, Eye; written in Gaehc it is Uidh
(pron. Oo-ee). Uiy, Eiy, in Taransay, is simply
Eidh — isthmus. Branahuie, Stornoway, is
better written in the Gaehc form, Braigh ua
h-Uidhe; where Uidhe represents Eidh, Aith-
' isthmus. Braighe is the Gaehc for upper part,
upper end; and Braigh na h-Uidhe means the
farm at ' the upper (nearer) end of the isthmus ' ;
Uie-head occurs again at Vattersay, Barra. The
peninsula of Eye is near Stornoway.

Endi, the end. Mossend, Stornoway, as it
stands, is modern Enghsh, but it is hkely to have
been derived from Mos-endi — Mossend; from
Mosi, moorland, moss. Tobson; any Scandi-
navian name beginning with H may, when used
as a Gaelic word, have an initial T, and th(^ H
deleted to put it in the nominative case; thus
Tobson is a Gaehc from of Hops-endi — the end
of the hope or tidal lake.

Ey, an island. Ey, in some form (a, ay, in
Gaelic aidh), is the termination of the name of
nearly every island in the Hebrides that is
smaller than a land, or larger than a holm.
Captain Thomas notices only those that are
named in the rentals. He says — " There are
three islands, in the Outer Hebrides, called

92 PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES.

Bernera, for Bjarnar-ey; Bjorn's-isle, from
Bjorn, a proper name. It is to be noticed, the
names of these islands are pronounced by the
people, not as they are written in English, but
in their Norse forms (e.g.) Be-ornar-ay {vide
' Princess of Thule '). Besides Scalpa, in
Harris, there is another in Skye, and both have
snug httle harbours; there is also Scalpa, Skalp-
eidh, in the Orkneys. Scalpa is for Skalpey,
Ship's-isle, from Skalpr, a kind of boat or ship —
shallop. There are two Shellays, one belonging
to Harris, the other to North Uist. Shellay is
the Gaelic pronunciation of Sellay, and this is
for Sel-ey, Seal's-isle, from Sel — seal. Ensay
is a remarkably fertile island, and well deserves
the name of Engis-ey, Meadow (Grassy)-isle ;
from Engi, a meadow. Scarp is again repeated
in Barra as Scarpamutt. Scarp, more properly
Scarpay, is for Skarp-ey, Scarped or Cliffy-isle;
from Scarpr, scarped. Hermitray is indeter-
minate. [It is Hermundarey, or Hermund's-
isle.] Taransay, St Taran's island. The ruins
of his church are still traceable, and a stone
cross from it is in the Museum. A curious
legend is related by Martin (West. Isles, p. 48);
but I suspect he has inverted the names, and
written ' Tarran ' for ' Che ' (in later copies,
' Keith '), and the contrary. There is a St
Tarannan, Abbot of Bangor, commemorated on
the 12th June. There are four islands having

PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES. 93

the name of Pab-ay, in the Outer Hebrides;
another in Skye; two (Papa) in the Orkneys;
three (Papa) in Shetland; and one (Papey) in
Iceland. The name is very interesting, for it
indicates that Culdees, Celi-de, Servi-Dei, were
located there before the devastation by the
Northmen. Pabay, Pabbay, for Pap-ey,
Priest's-isle; from papi — priest."

Fjordhr, a firth, bay. This word fjordhr
takes many forms in the Hebrides— -such as
"port, fort, forth, furt " ; and by aspiration
becomes in Gaelic orthography fhurt; hence
written phonetically " ort, ord, irt, urd," etc.
In the Orkneys and Shetland it is " firth."

" Resort on the west, and Erisort on the east
side, divide the mountains from the lower
(though anything but level) part of Lewis. I
believe them to be the same word. On looking
into the history of the word, it is found written
' Eriford, Erisport, Iffurt (error for Isfurt),
Herrish — Arisford ' with the Gaelic Loch pre-
fixed. These words plainly represent Herris-
firth." Such is Captain Thomas's idea We
have already remarked on the name Snizort and
Knoydart. Further, there are Gruinard (grein-
fjordhr, the split-firth), Moidart (Modha, a large
river, loam, vapour), Enard, Eport, Skiport
(ship-firth), etc.

94 PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES.

PART III.

Following the alphabetical order of the chief
Norse words which enter into the topography of
the Western Isles, we came, at the end of our
last article, to the word fjordhr, or firth; and
its appearance in the names of places, after six
hundred years of Gaelic pronunciation, as ard,
ort, and port, though extremely puzzling to an
outsider, is just what we might expect from the
laws that regulate aspiration and accentuation
in Gaelic. It is the rarer words which precede
these Gaelic terms that puzzle the student of
place names. Thus Gruinard has been vari-
ously explained as green-firth, split-firth, and
shallow-firth (Norse, Grunna-fjordhr), and the
latter is doubtless the correct derivation in the
case of the Islay Gruinart, for shallowness does
characterise the firth there.

We left, in our last number, an important
word out of our alphabetic list, in our eagerness
to discuss its compound form, bolstadhr. This
is the simple bol, which means a building or
farm. Thus the Icelandic Kirkjubol appears as
the Sutherlandshire Kirkiboll and the Tiree
Kirkapool. The island of Tiree, indeed, shows
a plethora of these bols, but in the deceptive
form of poll or pool — there are Crossai)oll

PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES. 95

(Cross-town), Barrapoll (Barley-town), Hellipoll
(Helgi, holy), and VassipoU. In Islay there is
Corsopoll, and in Coll, Crossipoll (both Cross-
town), and there is Harrapool in Strath, Skye,
a name which must be connected with the Norse
Harrastadhir, discussed in connection with
Harris. Sutherlandshire presents, among
others, Eriboll (Beach-town) and Skibo (Skelbol,
Shell-town); and Ullapool shows the same word
combined with a personal name (Ulli).

Resuming our alphabetical list of the most
general Norse names, and still relying largely
on Captain Thomas, the first we take up is Fell,
fjall, the Norse for hill. It appears in Gaelic
terminally, as bhal, val, and even in the good
Gaelic form of Mheall, which has the same
meaning. Compare Coinn-mheall in Suther-
landshire. It is the commonest name for a hill
in the Outer Hebrides, and, as its force is now
lost, the prefixing of the Gaelic Beinn (hill)
duplicates the sense. "It seems at first un-
accountable that the lakes and hills in the
uninhabited parts of these islands should have
retained their Scandinavian names to this day.
But, in fact, the whole country was divided for
a pasture among the town-lands of the coast, and
about midsummer nearly all the people removed
with their herds to the moors, so that the most
desolate spots were yearly inhabited and de-
pastured; and it is from this cause that so many

96 PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES.

of tlie place-names have been remembered.
Copeval in Harris is for Kupu-fell, Bowl
(6haped)-f ell ; from Kupadhr, bowl-shaped con-
vex " — (Captain Thomas). Goatfell in Arran
is unmistakable.

Gardhr, an enclosure, garth. In the " Com-
playntes " of Shetland, 1576, gardhr becomes
garth or gar, seldom goird, gord, gorde. In
the "Old Rental" of the Orkneys (1503),
gardhr is represented by garth, which in 1593
has generally become gair, and is now commonly
ger or gar. In the Hebrides, Gardhr is compli-
cated by the Gaelic garradh (garden), a word
borrowed from the English, and also by the
native Gaelic word garadh, copse, den, which
appears in the names of one or two glens (Glen-
Garry). As in the case of dail, when Garry is
prefixed the name is Gaelic. Names of farm*
which appear to be Scandinavian are — Croi-
garry, for Kraer-gardhr, that is, Kros' -garth;
from Kro, a pen; here the place which at first
was only a sheep-fold has become settled ; Asmi-
garry, for Asmundar-gardhr, that is, Osmund's
garth or farm; there is another Oshmigarry in
Skye. The mutations to which the proper name
is subject is shown by the Orcadian " Asmundar-
vagr," which passes in 1503 to " Osmundwall,"
and at last appears as " Osnawall." Timi-
garry may be Tuma-gardhr ; where Tumi is
Thomas. Eusigarrv, Rushigarry, in Bernera,

PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES. 97

Harris, has been Hris-gardhr, Bush-girth; from
Hris, a shrub, brushwood. Trumsgarry, in
North Uist, may be for Thrums-gardhr, that is.
Thrum's, or Slow man's garth.

Gil, a narrow gh^n with a stream in ii,
appears terminally very often. In vSkye we
have rivers and streams named Varra-gill, Vikis-
giil (Wick-gill), Oisgil (Oyce-gill), and possibly
the place names Galtrigil (Hog's-gill) and Crisi-
gill (Cross-gill) may belong to the same word.
The word Udrigill, which appears so often in
connection with points and capes, could easily
be explained phonetically as Ytri-gil or Further-
gill, if the physical features of the places always
suited. In Arran, we have Scaftigill (Shaft-
gill) and Catacol (Cat or Ship's gill); and in Islay,
as a farm name, Giol. Tralagill in Assynt is
doubtless Troll's gill.

Gisl, a hostage, bailiff, and a person's name.
The name is not found in the Orkneys, nor in
Shetland, but it is not uncommon in Iceland
(Gislakot, Gislabeer, etc.). Gisla, in Uig, Lewis,
ivS certainly formed from this word, and may be
a proper name. The terminal part may be a,
water, or hie, shelter, or hlidh, slope.

Gnipa, a peak. This word occurs in the
Orkneys, in Gal-neap; Neep, in Shetland; Nipa,
in Iceland. In this case, the Scandinavian form
is better preserved in Lewis than in the northern

7

98 PLACE-NAMES OF THE UEBUIDES.

islands, as it is written and pronounced Kneep,
but its Gaelic form, Crip, is rather confounding.
There is a Oreepe in Skye, not far from Dun-
vegan.

Gras, grass; pi. gros. We find Gresmark,
Grashol, in Iceland; Grassfield, Girsigarth, in
Shetland; Grassholm, Girsa, in the Orkneys;
and Grasabhaig, a Gaelic form of Grasa-vik,
Grasswick, in Uig, Lewis. The name of Gress,
Stornoway, stands for gros — pastures; and a
hint for the reason of the name may be found in
Macculloch, who says, " A body of limestone
occurs at Gres " (p. 194, Vol. I., Western Isle»).

Grof, a pit. There are Grof and grafirgill,
in Iceland; Graven, Graveland, Kolgrave, in
Shetland; and Grawine, in the Orkneys. In
the Hebrides there is Graffnose, in South Uigt;
Grafirdale — erroneously spelt Cravodale — in
Harris ; and Gravir, in Lochs of Lewis ; it stands
for Grafir, pits, ravines.

Heimr, an abode, a village. This word it
rare in Lewis, but it appears to occur in Borsam,
Harris; and the ancient form may have been
Borrs-heimr or Bas-heimr. (Captain Thomas).

Holl, a hill, hillock. This term, although
not common, appears to occur in Arnol, Barvas;
for Arnar-hoU, Orns-hill, where Orn, gen.
Arnar, is a proper name, though the noun orn
means an eagle, that is, the English erne. In
Lionel, Barvas, we have Lin-holl, Flax-hill.

PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES. 99

Kjos, a deep, hollow place. There are
several places named Kjos in Iceland; and
Keotha, in Shetland, may be the same word;
but it is surprising to find in Keose, Lochs,
Lewis, the name so well preserved. It occurs
again on the east side of Loch Seaforth.

Klettr, a rock, chff. In the Orkneys, a
precipitous, detached holm is called a Clett;
while, in Lewis, clet is applied to any rou^h,
broken-faced hill. It is one of the most common
name* for a hill in Lewis. Inaclete is probably
cognate with Ingyebuster, Orkneys; Ingasten,
Shetland; and Einganes, Engamyrr, Iceland;
for Engjaklettr, that is, clet of the meadow.
Enaclete is also for Engja-klettr. Hacklete is
certainly Har-klettr, high-clet. Breaclet is
paralleled by Braebost, Skye; Breaquoy, Ork-
neys; Breidharhlidh, etc., Iceland, and stands
for Breidhar-klettr — that is, Broad-clet. Dira-
clet, Harris, is cognate with Jura ; with Duirinish,
Skye, Deerness, Orkneys. There are no Dyr
commemorated in Shetland; for Dyra-klettr is
for Deer's-clet; Dyr means an animal, t deer.
Breasclet may be Breidhar-as-klettr — Broad-
ridge-clet.

KoUr, a top summit. KolLr, in Iceland, is
represeated by Coal, in Shetland, and, perhaps,
t)y Colsettr, Orkneys. It is Coll, in Lewis;
otherwise Koll, Kolle, for Kollr.

100 PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES.

Kross, a cross. There are ten places with
this name, Kross, in Iceland; and three (Corse,
Cross, Crose), in the Orkne3^s; and in Shetland
it appears in various forms in combination.
Besides Cross, in Barvas, there is Grossbost in
Lochs, Lewis. Crossapoll, in various forms,
has already been noticed in regard to Tiree,
Coll, and Islay.

Midi, a jutting crag. This as Mull, Moui, is
in common use in the northern islands, and is
not infrequent in Lewis; but it does not enter
into the name of a farm except in Clashmeil,
Harris, which may be Klas-muli, and cognate
with Klasbardhi, Iceland. Joyce is wrong (p.
383) in deriving Mull in the Mull of Galloway
and Mull of Kintyre from Mael, Gaehc, a bare
promontory; it is from Norse Muli, a high, bold
headland, and not implying " bareness." Other
mulls are the Mull of Deerness and the Mull of
Papa Westray in the Orkneys; Blue Mull in
Unst, Shetland; Mi^ilin (thrice), Faeroes; Muli
(seven times repeated), Iceland.

Nes, a ness or nose. Ness is a very com-
prehensive topographical term, including not
only the high chalk cliffs of Cape Grinez, but
also the low shingle beach of Dungeness. It is
usually written nis in Gaelic, and pronounced
" nish." Sometimes "Ness" becomes not
only the name of a " ness " proper, but of a
large district. The Northmen invariably called

PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES. 10 1

the modern county of Caithness by the name of
Nes, and the northern district of Lewis is known
by the same name, Nes. There are ten farms
called Nes in Iceland, and Ness occurs both in
the Orkneys :uid in Shetland. In the Lewis
Eental the entry is " Fivepenny Ness "; John-
ston's map gives " Fivepenny " alone; and the
Ordnance map translates the latter into Gaelic,
" Cuig Peghinnean," Five Pennies. Aignish
is called by the aU-observant Martin, " Eggi-
ness " ; and he remarks : — " The shore of Eggi-
ness abounds with little smooth stones, prettily
variegated with all sorts of colours. They are
of a round form, which is probably occasioned
by the tossing of the sea, which in those parts
is very violent " — (p. 10, West. Isles). In
Captain Thomas's opinion also, Aignish was
probably named from these egg-shaped pebbles,
thus Aignis would stand for Eggia-ness,
from Norse egg, an egg. But egg also means
an edge, which equally well explains the
name. Steinish is represented by Stein-nes in
Iceland; Stennis, Orkneys; and Stennis in Shet-
land. The decay of the great conglomerate
has, around Stornoway, left great quantities of
smooth, water-worn boulders and pebbles —
hence Steinish for Stein-nes, from steinn, a
stone.

Arinish, better written Arnish, has its
counterpart in Skye (Arnish); as also Arnisort

102 PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES.

(where ort = fjordhi), occurring again in leeland
as Arnarnes, Arnanes; from Orn, a proper name
meaning eagle, the feminine of which is Orna.
Captain Thomas thus refers to words in Kkr : —
" Aaernish is repeated again in South Uist as
Earnish, and again in Skye, where we have also
Eaasay. Although there is no record of the
roe-deer in Lewis, this name tells us that they
were once there. Eaernish, otherwise Eairnish,
is close to the Birken Isles, and *' roe ' are
included in a contract for protecting the game
in 1628 (p. 190, De. Eeb. Alb.). For Raar-
ness means Eoe-deer's-ness; from Ea, a roe."
Since writing the first part of these papers, Eev.
Mr Mactaggart, of Glenelg, has drawn our atten-
tion to the fact that Eaasay is sometimes heard
pronounced Eaarsa, with an r. This spelling
we knew of as existing in Dean Munro's work
(1549), but thought it an oddity of his own. The
word may mean " roe-island," though still the
double genitive in rs is difficult to account for.
We might look on ra as both masculine and
feminine.

We find the meaning of Breinish by com-
paring it with the oft-repeated Brabuster, in the
Orkneys, and Brebuster, in Shetland, which are
contractions of Breidharbolstadhr, Broad-farm,
of which there are ten in Iceland. Breinish,
then, is for Breidhar-ness, Broad-ness. Gar-
nish, Uig, appears again as Garnish, North Uist,

PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES. 103

and as Carness, in the Orkneys. It seems to be
cognate with Kjara and Kjors-eyri, in Iceland;
if so, Garnish stands for Kjarr-ness, Bushy-ness ;
from Kjarr, copsewood, brushwood. Haroldsen
has Kiorr, to mean palus; gen. kiarrar, terra
gahiiosa, aquatica; this describes both the Car-
nesses; but the word, in this sense, is not in
Cleasby's Norse Dictionary. Callernish is an
interesting name and place. It may have been
Kjalar-ness ; from Kjolr, a keel, a keel-shaped
ridge. But the fine Celtic megalithic cross-circle
and avenue which stands upon the top of it sug-
gests that the Northmen may have given to the
point one of the names of Odin, viz., Kjallarr.
Kjalar-nes is a place name in Iceland. Quidi-
nish seems to be cognate with Quidamuir, and
Quiderens, in Shetland, and is probably an
abbreviation of Kviganda-nes, Quey-nes; from
Kviganda, a young cow or bullock. Manish is
repeated in Skye; and in the aspirated form of
Vanish (in Gaelic, Mhanis) it occurs at Storno-
way, Benbecula, and South Uist. In Iceland
man, mana, is a common prefix (mana-vik,
man-a), where mani is a proper name. " Aii
intimate acquaintance with Stockinish enables
me to give its etymology; it is Stokki-nes, Stakk-
ness, from a chasm (stokkr), navigable at high
water, which separates the island from the main.
Stokkr means the narrow bed of river between
two rocks; compare stok-land, an isolated rock.

104 PLACE-NAMES OF THE UEBRIDES.

Molliiigiaish is in fact two words, Mol Lin<^inish;.
wiiere Mol is the Oaelic for beach. Lingiiiish i*
foi- Lyngar-nes, Ling-ness, Heather-ness ; from
Lyng, heather. Hushinish, in Harris, occurs as
Ku Ushinish (an iteration of the idea of cape) in
Lewis, and again in South Uist; and cognate
names are Husabost, in Skye; Housby, in the
Orkneys; Housay, in Shethmd. Husa-nes, in
Iceland, is identical, meaning ' House-ness ' ;
from Hiis, a house." — (Captain Thomas).
Orishernish in Skye is for Grisarnes, or pig's
ness.

Oss, that is, oss, the mouth or outlet of a
river, oyce. In Barvas the termination is, no
doubt, oss, i.e., Barv-oss. The prefix may be
an obscure form of Bara, a wave, billow; but
we do not find any other name like it, and there-
fore do not receive the usual help from analogy^
In Aros we have the combination of a (water)
and oss; the noun aross means a river mouth or
oyce in Norse.

Papi, a pope, priest. The Scottic clerici,
Celi-de, Servi-Dei, must have been bold and
hardy seamen, for some of them sailed in the
month of January, about the end of the eighth
century (a.d. 795?), to Iceland, and stayed there
till August, and when the island was colonised
by the Northmen in a.d. 874, they found missals,
bells, and crosiers at places on the south-east
coast, which from that circumstance they called

PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES. 105

Papyli and Papay. One of these clerical sailors
informed Dicuil that he had sailed (from Shet-
land most probably) to the Faeroes in thirty-six
hours, in a four-oared boat. This, as the
distance is about 180 miles, would give the
moderate rate of five miles per hour. At that
time hermits had lived there for nearly one
hundred years. There is neither Papyli nor
Papa in the Faeroes, but they must l)e com-
memoi'ated in Vestmann-hafn, though the name
as it stands only indicates the former presence of
the Gael or Westman. In Shetland, before the
devastation by the Northmen, the Celi-de or
Culdees were established in Papal, Unst; Papal
Yell; and at Papal Burra; as well as on Papa
Stour, Papa Little, and Papa, in the bay of
Scalloway. In the Orkneys they were located
at Papley, South Ronaldsha; Paplay, Holm; and
Papdale, at Kirkwall; as also at Papa Stronsay
and Papa Westray. In the Hebrides the Ceh-
de are commemorated at Payble, North Uist;
Papadill (papa-dalr), Rum; Paible, Harris; and
Pyble (Byble, Bible !), Lewis. All these forms
are variations of Papyli, which represents
Papabyli, PapbyH, or Priest's-abode, one labial
absorbing the other. Besides these, the Servi-
Dei must have been established on Pabbay,
Skye; Pabay, Barra; Pabbay, Loch Boisdale,
South Uist; Pabay, Harris; and on great and

106 PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDEP?.

little Paba}', Lewis; the original foini being
Pap-ey, oi- Pi'iest's-island.

Bif, a reef in the sea. Reef, as the name of
a farm, occurs in Lewis, South Uist, and the
Orkneys; and as Rif, in Iceland; in every case
from an adjoining " reef."

Setr (1) a seat, residence; (2) mountain-
pastures, dairy-lands. This noun, so common
in the names of farms in the noi'thern and
western islands, is not to be found at all among
the seven thousand in the Icelandic Ny Jardhar-
bok. In the Orkneys and Shetland the
" setters," which originally were only summer
" seats," have become fixed residences and
cultivated lands. In Lewis, in mid-summer, the
home farms are almost deserted, the men being
at the herring fishing, and the women and cattle
on the moors. There are thirteen " Shadirs "
named in the Lewis Rental; when written in
Gaelic the word is Seadair, pronounced shader.
There are places of this name in Lewis; Bernera,
Harris; and in Skye. In the Orkneys we have
seater; in Shetland, setter; in Landnamabok,
saetr. Some of the differentiated " setters " of
Lewis can be readily resolved. Grimshader is
identical with Grymsetter in the Orkneys,
Greemsetter in Shetland; and cognate to Grim-
stadhir, in Iceland. Grimr is a very common
Scandinavian proper name, and the leaPRed
editor of the " Icelandic Dictionary" would fail

PLACE-NAMES OP THE HEBRIDES. 1©7

persuade us that it by no means implies an un-
amiable person. Grimshader, for Grim-setr,
means Grimm' s-setter, seat or pasture. Ker-
shader is met with as Cursetter, in the Orkneys ;
for Kjor-setr, that is, Copse or Brushwood
setter. Besides Quishader, in Lewis, there is
Quinish, Bernera, Harris; Vallaque, North Uist;
and the far-famed Cuidhrang, in Skye — a Gaehc
spelHng of quoyrand, Kvi-rand, round-quoy.
" In the Orkneys," says Captain Thomas,
" quoy is a subsidiary enclosure to the principal
farm, and is the only exception I know of to the
rule v/hich governs Scandinavian names, by
being used as a substantive prefix. Sometimes
a quoy is only a few square yards of land,
enclosed by a rough stone wall, to rear and pro-
tect young cabbage plants; this, in Shetland,
would be called a cro. In Shetland we have
' Queys, Quiness,' etc., but the name is not
common; in Iceland, Kvi-bol, Kviar-ness.
Quishader, for Kvi-setr, fold or pen setter;
from Norse Kvi, a fold, pen. Earshader has
cognate representatives in Air, Irland, in the
Orkneys; Erebie, Sandsair, Ireland, in Shet-
land; and Eyri; Eyarhus, in Iceland. Ear-
shader, for Eyrar-setr, Beach-setter, from Eyrr,
a gravelly bank, beach. Linshader is the
embarking place for crossing to C^allernish, and
may very well be Hlein-setr; from Hlein, a rock
projecting like a pier into the sea ; but it is more

108 TLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES.

probably Lon-setr, that is, Creek-setr; from
Lon, an inlet sea loch." Shiilisheder, which
appears in the Long Island and in Skye, may be
from Sula, a |)illar, a root word which appears ia
Sulisker islet (Pillar-skerry), and in the Assynt
mountain name of Sulvein, the pillared hill.

Other shaders are Limshader, Sheshader,
Gurshader, Carishader, Geshader, and Ung-
shader, but their interpretation is not easy, for
the prefixes may be variously resolved.

Uigshader, in Skye, means Wick or Bay
Seat; and Ellishader, the Ellister of Shetland,
may stand for Hellis-setr, or Cave-seat. Ard-
elester and Ellister, in Islay, have similarly
been explained.

PART IV.

Gaelic and Norse differ widely in their methods
of combining compound words so as to make
up a place-name. Gaelic places the possessive
genitive second, and the generic term (town,
village, hill, field, etc.), first; Norse places the
genitive first. It is similar with the qualifying
adjectives — Norse, as English, places the adjec-
tive before the noun; Gaelic places it after.
This helps us immensely in deciding upon the
Norse or Gaelic character of a place-name. For
instance, if val or mheall comes after the parti-

PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES. 109

i^ular possessing' noun or the qualifying adjec-
tive, we deal here with the Norse fell and not
with the Gaelic meall. Thus, Griomabhal (grim-
fell) would, in Gaehc, be Meall-gruamacli.
Gaelic has borrowed one or two of the Norse
generic terms, notably dail (dale) and sgeir
(skerry or insulated rock). When dail or sgeir
comes first, the combination is of Gaelic origin ;
when these words come last we deal with a Norse
name. Thus we have Dal-more and Skerry-
more, the big dale and skerry, as against Swoi-
dale (Sward-dale) and Ilasker (High Skerry) of
the Norse. We must be specially careful, in
dealing with dal and sker, to remember their
position in the compound.

The above remarks and cautions have been
necessitated by the fact that in pursuing our
alphabetical list of Norse generic names in our
insular topography, we have come to the word
Sker, which so many people who deal in etymo-
logy fancy to be a native Gaelic word. It is the
Norse sker, a skerry or rock. It is a common
word in place-names all round Britain, applied
to rocks and skerries ; but as entering into farm
and town-land names it is rare. We have Vati-
sker in Lewis, which Captain Thomas referred
to the adjoining Vadha-sker, or dangerous
skerry. The famous Talisker is probably the
hall of the rock (Norse hollr, a hall).

110 PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES.

Stadhr, a "stead" or abode. This word
appears in the Enghsh steading and homestead.
In Iceland stadhr or stadhir forms the termina-
tion of 61 local names in the old Landnamabok.'
In local topography in the northern Isles it
means the place on which the dwelling stands.
In Shetland, by 1576, stadhr had usually been
shortened to sta. This is frequently now
changed to ster.

In Earl Sinclair's rental of his share of the
Orkneys (1502), which in part seems to have
been copied from an older document, stadhr is
represented by " stath," " stayth," " staith."
By 1595 " staith," " stayth," had been reduced
to "sta," but a real corruption was introduced
by " stane," and this has now generally become
" ston," " ton," " tonn." We can trace the
whole change in Grims-stadhr, which in 1503
appears as Grymestath; in 1595, Grymston and
Grymestan, and which is now written Gremiston.

In Lewis stadhr is not an uncommon generic
term. Skegirsta — the Gaelic form of which is
Sgiogarstagh — is the same name as Skeggja-
stadhr in Iceland and Skeggestad in Norway,
ai4d indicates that Skeggi was located there.
Mangarsta, occurring as Mog-stat, Mugstot,
Monkstadt in Skye, and as Mangaster in two
places in Shetland, was Munku-stadr, and tells
us that it was formerly the abode of monks.
Meahsta is Melastadr; from Melr, i.e., sand-hills

PLAGE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES. Ill

overgrown with bent grass, in Scottish '' hnks."
We have Melbost twice in Lewis ; Melsettr in the
Orkneys, and Melby in Shetland. In Iceland
there is Melar, and the same name as m Lewis,
Mel-stadr. All these places are sandy, and
in sunmaer luxuriantly green. The monks of
Mangaster may have joined in spiritual joys with
the Oailleacha Dubha, i.e., nuns, the site of
whose house is still to be seen at Mealista.

There are two " Tolsta '* in Lewis, which
may have been Tolu-stadhr, that is, Toh's-stead,
of whom seventeen are named under a great
variety of spelling as pilgrims in the Reichenau
Obituary; but it is strange that neither in Ice-
land, Shetland, nor Orkney, is any name like
Tolsta found. This would suggest that the name
may really begin with h, and be Hol-stadhr,
hollow or low stead. Crowlista or Crolesta may
be for Kro-hljidh-stadhr, or Pen-lea-stead, but
we cannot be certain. Borrowston is possibly
Borgar-stadhr, Burg-stead; the ston originated
in the same manner as the Orkney names from
Btadhr considered above. There is no tun,
town, in Lewis, and it is rare in Iceland, being
appiied to insignificant places, and equally rare
in Orkney and Shetland, where false analogy and
En^^ish influences modified the sta.

In Harris we have Scarista, and there is
another Scarista in Uig, Lewis, not named in the
Rental; these are synonymous with Skara-stadr,

112 PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBHIDES.

in Iceland. Skari (skorey, in Shetland) is a
young gull still in its grey plumage; but it is also
a nickname, so that Skara-stadr if* not the
'•' stead of a skorey," but the " stead of Skaii.""
This word skari is borrowed into Gaelic as
sgaireag with a like meaning (see Mr M'llury'e
interesting remarks on this bird in the 3rd
volume of the Highland Monthly, page 353).

Erista in Uig adjoins some quicksand which
has been fatal to horse and driver, and Captain
Thomas suggests the root as yrja in sand-yrja,
quick-sand, adducing the Icelandic place-name,
Irjar. But it is likely the same root word as in
Erisort.

Strond, a strand, coast. It is represented by
Strond in Harris, Strand in Shetland, and Stiond
in Iceland. Strandabhat appears twice as a
lake-name in Lewis; it means strand water.

Troll, a giant, troll; trijlla, to enchant;
tryllskr, bewitched. Ballantrushal, properly
Baile anTruiseil, a township in the west of Lewis,
which takes its name from Cloch an Truiseil, the
Trusel-stone. This is a gigantic monolith or
standing stone, which, as Captain Thomas re-
marks, well deserves the title of Tryllskar-steinn,
that is, the stone of enchantment, and which
has become Tryskall, Tryshall, by metathesis.
Doubtless, in Trysil Fiall in Norway the same
form is seen. The legend connected with the
stone is best related in another place. The

PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES. 113

sagacity of the topographer is sometimes severely
taxed — " L Vnsal Sago " is not to be directly
recognised " Trusal Stone," nor does "B
Trade ' ' immediately suggest ' ' Baile an
Truiseil." That is how maps are made.

Toft, a knoll, or toft or tuft. This is bor-
rowed into Gaelic as a common noun in the form
of tobhta, or tota, and it generally means turf.
It appears in Lewis as Totta, Totaichean Aulaidh
(Oiave's Tofts), and in Skye in Totscore.

Tung a, a tongue, tongue of land. This is
a very frequent place-name in Northern and
Western Scotland. It is frequent in Iceland,
and occurs as Toung in both Orkney and Shet-
land; it is Tong in Lewis, and Teangue in Skye.

Vdgr, a creek or bay. It is a troublesome

though most important word in topography, for

both its V and // may disappear in Gaelic. In

Iceland the word is clear and easy ; it is common

as a place suffix. In Shetland vagr retains iti

right sound as " voe," except only in Scalowa,

Scaloway, the final way being a concession to

folk-etymology working on the English " way.''

Compare Bible Head (Paible), and Europa Point

of Lewis. Scaloway stands for skala vagr,

shieling or hall bay, skali being a hut or hall.

The Orkneys have few bays or voes; but here

there is a great confusion between vagr and

vollr, a field, for both are made to end in "wall"

8

114 PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES.

now; nor is the confusion lessened by the fact
that voe and field are almost always adjacent.
Many farms in Orkney end in -wall. One of
them, Bigswall, is not near the sea, so that vagr
is out of the case. Nor can we doubt as to
Green-wall being Green-vollr, that is, Green-
field; or Ting-wall, meaning Thing-vollr. But
there is a parish Walls in Shetland, and another
Walls in the Orkneys, both of which are histori-
cally Vagarland ; Osmandwall is Asmundar-vagr ;
Widewall is Vidhivagr; and Kirkwall, originally
Kirkjuvagr, continues as late as 1525 as Kirke-
vaag. It is evident, therefore, that in the
Orkneys -wall may represent either vagr or vollr.
On this point Captain Thomas says : — "Yet it is
with extreme reluctance that I yield to this con-
clusion; there is no difficulty with wall from
vollr, but how, I ask, could vagr come to be
represented by wall? From whence came the
II? Was it that Scottish immigrants finding the
sound of vd represented it in writing by ' wall,'
the II at first being silent? But the opinion I am
inclined to adopt is that both forms were current ;
as noted above, where ' wall ' represents vagr,
a vollr is also present. Besides Kirkju-vagr,
there was always in fact Kirkju-vollr (Kirkfield),
Kirkwall; and so of the rest. And the parish
names Walls appear to me to be used m contra-
distinction to the peculiarly mountainous dis-
tricts of Sandness in Shetland, and Hoy in the

PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES. 115

Orkneys; if so they would have been called
veUir, Englished by Walls (Vales). It is true,
however, that both ' walls ' are largely inter-
sected by ' voes.' The solution of the question
depends upon whether most weight is given to
the induction from observation, or to the
historical documents."

In the Hebrides this unfortunate word vagr
is plagued by complications of another kind.
The Rentals, indeed, record the names of farms
with greater purity than in the northern islands,
but they have been written by Northern Saxons;
V is turned to w, and vagr becomes " way " ; no
doubt, when first written, " way "' rhymed with
"far," but now, in common English speech —
from the influence of the written form — it
rhymes with " day." But in the native (Gaelic)
speech, no word can have an initial v in the
nominative case ; also if two nouns are combined
to form a word, the suffix, if capable, suffers
aspiration. These rules are sometimes strictly
followed and sometimes not. We will take the
examples of Carlo way, which undoubiediy was
Karla-vagr, that is, Carl's bay. In Karla-vagr,
the final r in Norse merely emphasised the pre-
ceeding consonant. When the Gael took posses-
sion of the word Karla-vag, they would do, as the
northern islanders have done, viz., drop the g,
and next they would consider va' to be a noun
in the genitive case, and would therefore soften

116 PLACE-NAMES OF TUE HEBRIDES.

the d to ai, thus sounding " vai," which in Gauhc
orthography would be bhaidh, bhai.i^h, and of
which the nominative w'ould be bagh, badh; this,
again, translated into English, w-ould be " bay."
In this roundabout manner the vagar of Harris
have become the " bays." Karla-vagr, reduced
to Karla-vai, would be written Carlabhaidh, and
Teutonic influence, changing the v or hh to w,
brings us to Carlo-way.

Stornoway : this name is repeated (Loch
Stornua) in Kintyre. In Iceland there w^ere
formerly Stjornu-stadhr and Stjornusteinar,
but these names are now obsolete. Storno-
way— which is spelt in thirteen different
w-ays — has been referred by Captain Thomas
to Stjornu-vagr, Star's-voe; where Stjarna,
Star, is a proper name. " The only person
I find," adds Captain Thomas, '"recorded
bearing that name is Oddi, who was so
learned in astronomy that he was called ' Stjornu-
Oddi.' He had a remarkable dream, ' Stjornu-
Odda Draumr,' but it appears to have had
nothing to do with the stars (Nordiske Old-
skrifter, XXVII.). It may be noted that no
place on land in Kintyre bears the name of Stor-
noway, which disposes of the foolish Gaelic
etymology of Sron-a-bhaigh, Bay-nose." This
derivation of the Captain's is unsatisfactory.
The root word clearly is Stjorn, steering, the 6
of which is stable, and does not change to a.
Stornoway, we take it, means " Steerage-bay."

PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES. 117

Stimeravay stands for stemdi-vagr, the
stopped-up voe, which describes the place. For
Carloway, Blaeu's Atlas has Carleywagh; there
is no cognate in the Orkney or Shetland Isles,
unless Charleston in Aithsting. In Iceland there
i» Karlafjordhr, that is, Carl's firth, where Karli
either means carle or a man's proper name.
Flodeway either stands for Fljota-vagr (stream
or flood voe) or Flota-vagr (Fleet's voe).

Vatn, water, lake. This is by derivation the
same word as English water and the Greek
hudor, hydrant, etc. It is very common m
Hebridean place-names, where it appears al
bhat or vat. The lake named Langavat or Long-
water appears several times; and there are
Breidh-bhat (Broad lake), Skara-bhat (Skari's
water, see Scarista), Lacsabhat (Lax or salmon),
and numerous others. An interestmg perver-
sion of vatn appears in Loch Sandwood, in
Eddrachillis parish.

Vik, a creek, bay, wick. This appears ter-
minally in Gaelic as bhaig, aig, or ag. A
common name is Sandwick, that is. Sand-bay.
It is in Iceland, Shetland, and Orkney, in the
Long Island, and as far south as Arran, where
we have Sannox, a plural form to denote that
there are three sand-bays there. Marweg or
Marvig appears as Marwick, in the Orkney and
Shetland Isles. It comes from mar, a sea-gull.
The same name may also appear in Maraig or

118 PLACE-NAMES OF THE HEBRIDES.

Marag, which Captain Thomas erroneously
refers to vagr, voe. The prefix he explains as
myrar or mire (bog) voe. Meavig or Meavag, in
Lewis and in Harris twice, is for Mjo-vik, narrow
\'0e. Kerriwick, otherwise Kirvis. has been
referred to Kirkju-vik, that is, Kirk-wick.
Colivick goes along with Crowlista, explained
under stadhr. There is a Cruely in Shetland.
The simple form of Vick appears often ; we have
the town of Wick in Caithness. There are one
or two parishes called in Gaelic Uig (Lewis and
Skye), that is, Wick. Captain Thomas strangely
refers these to the Norse ogr, an inlet or creek,
which is a rare name, not found in Orkney or
Shetland, and twice in Iceland.

We have now passed in review the principal
Norse words that enter into the place-names of
the Hebrides. The universality of these names
in the Long Island is most remarkable. In con-
sidering the Gaelic names, we shall find that the
Norse names beat them in Lewis by four to one ,
and, further, these Gaelic names are importa-
tions since the re-occupation of the Islands by
the Gael on the fall of the Norse power.

PLACE-NAMES

OF

INVERNESS AND VICINITY

PLACE-NAMES

OF

INVERNESS AND VICINITY

Inverness as a town name goes back to the 12th
century, possibly further — to Macbeth's time
(1057). The name is partly, at least, of Gaehc
origin, which proves that the town could not be
so called in the time of the Picts, who would have
named it Aber-ness, not Inver-ness. The word
hibhir (Inver) means in Gaelic a confluence, and
is by derivation the same word exactly as the
English word " infer." The town derives it»
name, of course, from being at the confluence
of the Eiver Ness. The name Ness appear* in
Adamnan's. life of St Columba as Nesa; the
Norse called it Nis; and the modern Gaelic pro-
nunciation and spelling are the same, viz., Nis.
The word must be referred to an original form

122 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS, ETC.

rtesta according to Celtic philological laws, and
this Dr Whitley Stokes has equated with the
Sanscrit word nadi, signifying river. We may
compare also the old Thracian river name Nestos,
and possibly the mother of the great mythic King
of Ulster, Nessa, he being Conchobar Mac Nessa,
bears the same name, for she may have been a
river goddess. Rivers were worshipped as
deities, as we know from Gildas, and as such
names as Dee and Don (Deva, Divona), meaning
" goddess," prove.

The name Clachnacuddin stands for Clach
nan Cudainn, or stone of the tubs, a phrase
which is explained as referring to the habit of
the women carrying water from the river, and of
resting their tubs on the stone that now forms
the Palladium of Inverness. Markinch stands
for Marc-innis, the horse isle or " inch." The
name is interesting in two ways; firstly, animal
names may come before the word innis, although
Gaelic otherwise insists on all genitive or pos-
sessive forms coming last; secondly, the word
trims, so common all over the country in place
names, is now obsolete in the sense of " island,"
its only meaning in present Gaelic being a shelter
for cattle, such as a clump of wood and the like.

The Haugh and Holme. — The name Haugh is
English, or rather Scotch; the word originally
possessed an /, now lost; Barbour in his Bruce
writes halche, and the Anglo-Saxon form is

PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS, ETC. 123

healh. The Haugh is mentioned in a charter,
1361, as Hale; and the Gaelic people still keep
up the old / in their version of the name, that is,
an Talchan. In borrowing English or Scotch
words beginning with h, the Gaels always intro-
duced a t; so we find the Gaelic of Holme, so
named from the English holm, an island in a
river, to be Tuilm.

Ballifeary. — This appears in 1244 as Balna-
fare, and it is explained as the Gaelic Baile-na-
faire, the town of the watching. Similarly,
Clachnaharry means the stone of the watching.
The town had to place sentinels at these points
to give notice of any hostile visit which the rest-
less clans around might think proper to make to
the town.

Drummond. — This name is common all over
the country. It is the locative case of the word
druim, a ridge, which had a stem ending in men
originally.

Bught. — This is the Scotch word bought,
houcht, signifying a bending, a bay, a pen. The
root is the Teutonic hugan, to bow, which is
possibly alhed to the Gaelic word hog, whence is
borrowed the English word hog.

Kinmylies. — This appears in 1232 as Kin-
myly, and it has been well explained as standing
for ceann mile, mile-end.

Leachkiyi. — This is the Gaelic word leacuinn,
a. face, hillside; it is really, like Drummond, an

124 I'LACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS, ETC.

oblique case from a nominative leac, signifying
cheek or face.

Torrean and Kilvean. — Tiiese are the tor or
hill and the kil or church of St Bean, a saint of
the Celtic Church, usually reckoned first bishop
of Mortlach (11th century). The name Bean,
in Gaelic Beathan, is a derivation of the word
beatha, life; and it has the same force as the
more famous name Macbeth. The saint usually
supposed to be meant here is Baithene, St
Columba's successor, but in modern Gaelic his
name would be Baothan. Dunain means the hill
of birds (dun-ian).

Tomnahurich. — Much fanciful nonsense has
been written about the meaning of this name.
The favourite derivation is that which refers it to
the idea of " boat hill," for the mound looks like
an upturned boat. The Gaelic may be written
Tom na h-iubhraich; and the dictionaries give
the word iuhhrach as meaning a boat. This,
however, is nonsense; there was only one boat
called the lubhrach, and that was the mythic
boat of Fergus MacRo, in which he took over to
Ireland the sons of Uisnech and Deirdre. The
word iuhhrach simply means a yew wood, and
the root word has given some famous place
names. The word appears in Gaulish as Eburos,
and hence we have the British Eburacum, which
is now York (" Yew-town ").

PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS, ETC. 125

Dochfour. — The first part of the name — Doch
— is easy ; it is the contracted form of dahhach,
a tub, and then a measure of land equal to four
plough-gates. The latter part — four — is an
extremely difficult term to unravel. It appears
in many place names, but only in Pictland. We
meet with Balfour, Pitfour, Delfour, Tillipowrie,
Letterfour, &c. It is a maxim in deriving these
names that the chief term lies where the accent
is on the word, and four always carries the
accent. This settles that it is a noun and not an
adjective; for some people will have it, despite
Gaelic phonetics, that /our is simply the adjective
fuar, cold. The preserved / shows that the
word began with p, and this again proves the
Pictish character of the word ; for p is not native
to Gaelic. I have elsewhere suggested that this
word is allied to the Breton peur, Welsh pawr, a
pasture — a derivation which Dr Whitley Stokes,
one of our best Celtic philologists, has accepted
most cordially.

Ahriachan. — This appears in 1239 as Abir-
hacyn, and in 1334 as Aberbreachy. The name
undoubtedly stands for Aber-briachan, the con-
fluence of the Briachan. For the loss of a
syllable between aher and briachan, consider
Arbroath and Aberbrothock. One of the hers
simply has gone. The stream running into Loch
Ness at Abriachan must have originally been
called Briachan; it has now two or three names.

126 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS, ETC.

mostly descriptive of the water — Allt-dubh, Allt-
dearg, Allt-liath. What Briachan may mean it
is hard to say; it is evidently Pictish. The
derivations offered for this place-name (Abri-
achan) have been very numerous ; a full account
of them is given in the third volume of the
Transactions of the Inverness Field Club just
issued (pp. 167-171).

In passing beyond the bounds of Inverness
and Inverness Parish, a word may be said about
Bona, the alternate name to Inverness — the
parish of Inverness and Bona. In 1233 this is
spelt Baneth, and two hundred years later as
Bonacht, Bonoch. It has been explained vari-
ously as Ban-achadh, white field, and Ban-ath,
white ford. It seems to me that it is a reminis-
cence of Ptolemy's Banatia, which some authori-
ties place here, and possibly is due to some
pedant of the twelfth century.

Petty. — This parish name, in Gaelic Peitidh,
is a plural form of the well-known prefix pet, so
common in Pictland, and meaning a farm or
township .

Doves. — This name must be compared to the
parish name of Durris in Kincardine, which is
nearer the Gaelic pronunciation in form than
Dores is. The name seems allied to the word
dorus, a door.

Stratherrick . — This is named after the river
Farigag, and the name Farigag probably stands

PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS, ETC. 127

for Far-gag, " above the cleft or rift," made up
of the preposition far or for (above) and gag, a
cleft or pass.

Urquhart. — This is one of the oldest names
in the district. Adamnan (700 a.d.) mentions
the glen as Air-chartdan. The first part, air, is
the preposition air, on. The significant part is
cartdan, or the later cardan, cardainn. This
last part appears in two other combinations, viz.,
Kin-cardine and Plus-carden. The name is
undoubtedly Pictish, and therefore we have to
look at Welsh, as the nearest of kin to Pictish,
for the explanation of the name. The only likely
one is cerddin, which means the rowan tree.
Kincardine might thus mean the " end of the
•rowan wood"; Urquhart, "by the rowan
wood."

Daviot, Moy, &c. — The name Daviot is not
unique; it appears in Aberdeenshire as a parish
name. The Gaelic is Deimhidh, pronounced
Devidh, Devy nearly, and answering the old
charter form Deveth very well. It seems the
exact modern equivalent of the old Welsh tribe-
name Demetae, now Dyved; and here again we
meet with an old Pictish name. The root dem
signifies "fixed," "sure." Moy is in Gaelic
A' Mhagh, "the plain"; while Dalarossie is
simply Dail-Fhearghuis or " Fergus's dale."

Ardersier, Croy. — The former appears in
1227 as Ardrosser, and in 1570 as Ardorsier;

128 PLACK-NAMES OF INVERNESS, ETC.

the Gaelic, influenced by folk-etymology, is Arcl-
na-saor, the cape of the carpenters. It has been
explained as Ard-ros-iar, the west cape. The
name Croy signifies hard, being from cruaidh,
hard.

Beauly .—This is a mediaeval French name —
heau lieu, pretty place — introduced by the ValHs
Caulium monks in 1232, who founded the Priory.
The Gaelic name is A' Mhanachainn, which may
be rendered the " Monkery," from manach,
monk. Kihnorack is the parish name; this
means the church of Morag, that is, St Moroc.

Foyers. — This is the name of the land below
the falls by the side of Loch IS ess. It stands for
Fo-thir, that is, "low ground." O'Eeilly says
fothir signifies "good land," but the former
meaning is doubtless the correct one here. Fort-
Augustus in Gaelic is Kill-Chuimein, the Kil of
St Cummin, a saint name which occurs more
than once, the first being Cummian the Fair,
who, about 650, wrote a biography of St
Columba.

The county names of Nairn and Ross may
claim our attention for a little. The name Nairn
primarily applies to the river Nairn, and this has
invariably been connected with the woixl fearna,
alder wood, despite the phonetic and other difii-
culties. The names of large rivers and leading
features of the country are the oldest of any;
they go back to the times of other races and

PLACE-NAMES OP INVERNESS, ETC. 129

different languages. Names like Dee, Don, Tay,
Ness, Nairn, &c., cannot be etymologised from
modern Gaelic. We must rise to a hieiier level,
and consider the Celtic tongues as a whole, even
falling back upon European root forms to help
us. And beyond all this, the name may have
been borrowed from a primitive race that used
a language that was neither Celtic nor Indo-
European. The name Nairn is Celtic, for the
termination jm is peculiarly so. The root is
therefore na, possibly nav, which possesses the
idea of sailing, swimming, floating, and is found
in the English word naval and the like. The
name is Pictish doubtless. So also is the name
Eoss; this is alhed to the Welsh word Rhos, a
plain, mead, which is very common in Welsh
place names.

Dingwall. — This is the Norse Tiling voUr,
field of the thing or meeting — the meeting or
paramount place. The name appears in the
Isle of Man and in all places under Norse sway
now or heretofore.

Strathpeffer. — The river or streamlet named
Peffer or Peffery appears three or four times in
Pictland; we have two in Haddingtonshu^e, an
Inverpephry in Perthshire, and this one at
Strathpeffer. The Gaelic of Strathpeffer is
Inbhir-feo'arain ; the Feofharan is the stream
name, where the first / represents the Pictish

130 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS, ETC.

original /), and the second /, now aspirated,
either an / or more probably a b. There is a
modern Welsh word pefr which might suit
phonetically, meaning "fair," "beautiful."

Ben Wifvis. — This, in Gaelic, is Beinn Uais,
the oblique or locative form of Beann Uas; the
word uas is now obsolete, but it was common
once as a personal appellative — Colle Uas being,
for instance, King of Ireland in the 4th century,
and ancestor of the Macdonalds. The word
means " noble," " majestic," and is but a
shortened form of the Gaelic word uasal, proud.

PLACE-NAMES

OF

INVERiNESS-SIIIRE

PLACE-NAMES OF
INVERNESS-SHIRE

Thb County of Inverness can boast neither of
symmetry nor of compactness. It sprawls west-
wards across the northern neck of Scotland
through Skye, dwing under sea to re-appear as
the far-west s^a-bank of the Outer Hebrides.
One thing it can boast of, however, among
Scottish counties : it ig the largest of them. Its
area of 4232 square miles — a square land-piece
of 65 miles per side — is unsurpassed by any
other county in Scotland. And once the Sheriff-
dom of Inverness extended still further. In the
twelfth century it comprehended all the country
north of the Grampians, but the thirteenth
century saw the rise of the shires of Elgin, Nairn,
and Cromarty. For four hundred years there-
after, however, the Sheriffdom of Inverness
included Ross, Sutherland, Caithness, and part

134 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE.

of Argyle. The present Sheriffdoms of Argyle,
Sutherland, and Caithness were constituted m
1631-3 and Ross in 1661, the latter three being
pure dismemberments, so to speak, of Inverness
Sheriffdom. The County of Inverness was thus
finally formed in 1661 curiously by a process of
subtraction, but it has kept its then acquired
bounds ever since, with certain small adjust-
ments. The irregularity of its northern borders
from Harris to Beauly is due to the Mackenzie
influence in 1661; that family wanted the clan
estates to be all in Ross-shire. A scientific
frontier was, therefore, out of the question.

The history of Inverness county is nearly as
sporadic in its character as the county itself.
There is a separate story for the Isles, a second
one for the west coast mainland (Garmoran), and
a third story to tell of the province of Moray
portion of the county. It is really a great pity
that the old province of Moray itself was not
made a county — a pity historically, for it was an
ecclesiastical and almost a political unit. It
included all Inverness east of the Drumalban
watershed east of Lochaber, and comprehended
also the shires of Nairn, Elgin, and even a part
of Banff. Macbeth' s family province of Moray
further included Easter Ross, disputed with the
Norsemen, and its sway at times (11th century)
extended over Banff and Buchan, as we can
see from the Book of Deer. In the 12th

PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE. 135

century the old Earls of Moray were sup-
pressed, and native thanes, with incoming
Normans, began to take their place (early 13th
century); the coast began to be planted with
burghs. The great family of Gumming rose to
power in Buchan, and early in the 13th century
they acquired Lochaber and Badenoch. The
Earldom of Moray was again restored by Bruce
and given to Eandolph, his nephew, inclusive of
Lochaber. The Church also occupied vast and
valuable property in Moray, but the after history
of the Moray portion of Inverness concerns the
rise of the Gordons and their struggles with the
Earls of Moray and the native clans, and
scarcely bears on the place-names, which by
this time were mostly fixed. The West
Coast portion of Inverness-shire, north of Mor-
vern, and extending to Glenelg — that is,
Moydart, Morar, and Knoydart — was called
" Garbh-mhorbhairne," in 1343 Garwmorarne,
the " Garmoran " of the historians. It and
Lochaber formed part of North Argyle, which
once extended to Lochbroom. Garmoran be-
longed to the descendants of Somerled of the
Isles, a side branch (probably junior) to the Clan
Donald. The heiress of Garmoran married John
of Isla in the 14th century, and the property
came to the Clanranald branch of the Mac-
donalds. The Outer Hebrides belonged to the
Norse, and therefore to the King of Man and the

136 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE.

Isles; but after 1263, the date of the overthrow
of the Norsemen, Skye and the Long Island fell
as his share of the booty to the Earl of Ross.
Forfeiting them in the wars of David II. and
Edward BaUiol, he recovered only Skye, the
outer isles going to his rival, the Lord of the Isles.
The Island Lord next century succeeded also
to the Earldom of Ross, sometime after Harlaw.
This Prince therefore held (say) about 1450,
through himself or his kin of Clanranald, all the
Outer Hebrides, Skye and its adjacent isles, Gar-
moran and Lochaber (inclusive of Glengarry).
Glenelg belonged to his vassal, Macleodof Harris.
On the break-up of the Lordship of the Isles
(1475-1493), the local chiefs came to the front
— Macleods of Harris and Glenelg, also of Dun-
regan, Macneills of Barra, Camerons of Loch-
aber, and the numerous but powerful branches
of Macdonald — Clanranald (Garmoran and Uist,
with the Glengarry branch further east, soon to
lucceed in Knovdart another set of Macdonalds)^
the Clan Hugh of Sleat, whence the present Lord
Macdonald, and the disinherited, because ille-
gitimate, Macdonalds of Keppoch, in Brae
Lochaber, whose lands were given to Mackintosh.
The after history of these clans does not concern
our subject; the place names with which we have
to deal were given by the earlier clans, tribes,^
and races which had successively possessed the
land prior to the 15th century.

PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE. 137

The earliest Celtic nation that established
itself in Scotland was the Pictish. They found
before them another race or two, one of which
was fair and square-headed, and the other dark
and long-headed. The Celts arrived in their
iron age, possibly in 600 B.C. The language
spoken by the previous inhabitants is unknown,
the Picts spoke a dialect of Celtic near akin to
the Welsh. Some Inverness County names bear
out this fact. The test letter between the Brit-
tonic and Gadelic or Gaelic branches of old Celtic
is the letter p; old Gaelic had no letter p, and
modern Gaelic developed native p within the last
five or six hundred years; the many borrowed
p's in Gaehc do not here count. Gaelic cuid is
in Welsh peth (for older pett), a thing; this is
the Pictish pet or pit, a possession or farm — ia
«hort, the Gaelic haile in meaning. Here Pictish
and Welsh show p as against Gaelic c, which, so
far, proves Welsh and Pictish closer allied than
Gaelic and Pictish. The pits or pets in Inver-
ness-shire are not now so numerous as once they
were. We have still Pityoulish (Abernethy),
Pitchirn (Eowan-ton) and Pittowrie (Alvie), and
Pitmean (Middleton, Kmgussie), and Pettyvaich
(Byre-ton) in ICiltarlity. Balmaglaster of Glen-
garry was formerly Pit-maglaster or Pitten-
glassie. Several are obsolete — Pitkerrald (St
Cyril's Croft) in Glen-Urquhart, and Pitchal-
man and Pitalmit in Glenelg. Then there is

138 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SniRE.

Petty, the Parish name, which simply means the
" land of farms " or " pets." Pet or Pit hai
given way to its equivalent in meaning, haile,
for two good reasons — the word first, like aher,
was getting obscure, as not belonging to the
ordinary vocabulary; and second, it got mixed
up with another word of nearly like sound but
obscene meaning. This especially has driven it
out.

Another test word is aher, a confluence; the
Gaelic is inhhir or wrer (root her: in-fer);
the Gaelic ahar, now obsolete, having meant
a " marsh " (root of tohar). The Pictish
aher had two dialect forms — aher and oher; the
latter alone has survived in modern names as
spoken in Gaelic — Obair-pheallaidh (Aberfeldy),
Obair-readhain (Aberdeen), &c. Inverness-
shire shows five or six of these ahers : Abertarf ,
or Mac Vurich's old Gaelic Obair-thairbh, so
named from the Tarf or " Bull " river; Aber-
arder (Laggan and Daviot), Gaelic, Obair-ardair,
seemingly ' ' high-water ' ' ; Aberchalder (Glen-
garry), where Calder appears, a name coimmon
in Pictland. It first applied to water, the root
is cal, sound, and the rest seems pure termina-
tion -ent and -ar, the former a participial suffix,
the latter an agent one. The name is un-
doubtedly Pictish. With it may be compared
the Gaulish river names Calarona, Callus,
and Calla . The fourth name is Abriachan :

PLACE-NAMES OP INVERNESS-SHIRE. 189

in 1239 this was Abiihacyn, and in 1334
Aberbreachy. Seemingly the streamlet entering
Loch-Ness here must once have been called the
Briachan; the curtailed phonetics reminds us of
Arbroath from Aberbrothock. Abernethy, a
name repeated in Fifeshire, is in Gaelic Obair-
neithich, in 1239 Abyrnithy; the river is the
Neithich. This has been equated with the Nith
of Southern Scotland, which Ptolemy records as
the Novios or ' ' Fresh ' ' (nuadh) stream, Welsh
newydd. This would make the Pictish phonetics
exceedingly Welsh and somewhat modern; but
it is the best derivation offered.

Two other words come to Gaelic from the
Pictish, and are included in the ordinary voca-
bulary. These are ' dul ' or ' dail,' ' a plain of
fallow land, especially by a river-side,' and
' preas,' ' a bush,' but in place-names, ' a
brake.' The word ' dul ' or ' dail ' is exceed-
ingly common as a prefix; as a suffix it shows the
genitive ' dalach,' both in ordinary speech and
places called Ballindalloch. The word does not
appear in Irish, ancient or modern; but it is
clearly allied to the similarly used word of similar
meaning, W. ' dol,' pi. ' dolydd,' Corn, and
Bret. ' dol.' Many place-names in Wales and
Cornwall bear this prefix. The Perthshire parish
name Dull, G. Dul, bears it in its naked sim-
plicity, and the form ' dul ' is the usual one along
the Great Glen, especially in Glen-Urquhart and

140 PL\CE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE.

Glen-Moriston. The modern spelling, however,
is almost always ' Dal-' in these last cases. The
Wardlaw MS. (17th century) always writes
' Dul-', however. The root seems to be ' dul,'
and therefore not allied to Eng. ' dale ' or Norse
' dalr ' : but it is likelv alhed to the root ' dul/
bloom, as in Gaehc ' duilleag.' The word
* preas ' is not common in place-names ; in the
county we have it in Preas-mucrach (Badenoch),
' Pig-brake place.' The Welsh word allied is
■ prys,' brake, evidently alhed to the W. ' perth,'
brake, whence the names Perth, Logie-Pert, Lar-
bert, Partick, &c. The root, which is ' qr,' is
that of G. ' crann,' W. ' pren.'

Pictish influence may be seen in the common
use of names rare or practically non-existent in
Irish: monadh, hill, as in Monadh-liath ; blar, a
plot, free space of ground — Blairour, ' Dun-
plain ' (Lochaber), fi/dr-na-leine (1545) at
the upper end of Loch Lochy; allt, a burn,
Aldourie, from the " Dourag " burn, while
Dourag itself is from dohhar, water; beinn, a
hill, Irish heann, not much used in Irish place-
names as compared to Gaelic ' beinn ' or ' ben ' ;
cam, a hill, cairn, which Welsh also is fond of
for names of hills, though not used in Ireland
similarly — Cairn-gorm, Gealcharn, and others
very numerous; coire, a corry or kettle —
Corry Mhadagain, the " doggie's corry," a
use of ' coire ' " scarcely known in Ireland "

PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE. 141

(Eeeves); srath, a strath, also a common
Welsh and rare Irish word. The word
which shows most departure from Gaelic use is
both, a house, but used in Pictland for haile. It
finds an especial development in Inverness
county, particularly along the valley of the Great
Glen — Bunachton, for Baile-Nechtain or Nec-
tan's baile; Bochrubm, from old cruibin, a paw, a
back-bent hill; Boleskine, in 1227 Buleske, from
hoth-fhlescdin, " town of the withes," from
flesc, a rod; Bolin (Glengarry), "flax-town";
and Bohuntin (Lochaber), where hunndainn
stands for conntainn, a confluence.

The use of 'rat,' apparently for 'rath,' a
' fortified residence ' originally, in Strathspey
and Badenoch, has also to be noted. The Welsh
has the word ' rhath,' a clearing or open space,
which seems to be the same word, and which
Professor Rhys regards as borrowed from Gaelic.
The exact extent of the use of ' rat ' in Pictland
has not yet been considered, but on the analogy
of Eothiemurchus, we might claim all the names
in Rothie-, as Rothiemay. Raith in Fife, which
certainly looks like the form that Pictish ' rat '
would assume, is claimed for Scotch ' wreath,' a
pen, as are the several other names of like form.
The matter is considered furthei' on under
Eothiemurchus.

The first writer who gives any name bearing
on Inverness-shire is Tacitus, who mentions the

142 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE.

Caledonians, and the geographers represent
them as extending into our county. Despite
some difficulties in the classical form of the name
Caledonia on the score of its phonetics not
according with the root — that given being cald,
the root of coille, English holt, nevertheless the
nameDun/ceW and its Gaelic Dun-chailleann seem
amply to prove that the classic Caledonia means
really as the poet said, " land of the woods " —
the Caledonians being the " Woodlanders."*
Tacitus also records another famous name,
Graupius, which has been misused in MSS., and
appears most often as Grampius, whence comes
the popular form Grampian. Tacitus meant
some hill or hillock near Blairgowrie, but niedi-
a3val imagination could fancy that nothing less
could do justice to this great battle than the Gram-
pian hills as a background and place of retreat.
The root of Graupius is ' grup ' or, rather,
' gruq,' and means 'hooked,' much as some
hills are called 'sockach,' snouted. Ptolemy,
the Geographer of 120 a.d., mentions the
Vacomagi as the tribe inhabiting the " laigh "

* Dr Stokes seiparatea the old Gaelic Cailleu or Caldeu from
tha Classical Cakdonius, with its loug- e bet-ypeu / ana d;
and the Welsh forms old and new (Celidon, C-elyddon; are
certainly derived from the classical form, while the English
form Dun-keld sliows the Welsh phonetics. The question is
v-liether the cla&iieal form represents the real original; if so
the roc'ts of Caillen and of Caledonia are not the eame.

PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE. 143

of Moray; the name divides as Vaco-Magi, the
latter part being magh, a plain, the whole seem-
ingly ' ' Dwellers on the plain . ' ' The name is lost .
His name for Spey is Tvesis, which seems to have
been an attempt at pronouncing Pictish initial
sp, which in old Gadelic would be sqv, and in
Welsh chiD — a troublesome sound. Dr Whitley
Stokes explains Spey as Pictish, from the root
sqe, as in sgeith, vomit, the Scotch spate, Welsh
chwyd. The name appears to mean the
" spatey, vomiting river," and it has the reputa-
tion of being the swiftest of our large rivers. The
Spean, on these terms, Vv^ould stand for Spesona,
another stem from the same root. The Varar
Estuary of Ptolemy answers to the Beauly Firth,
and the River Farrar ideally suits the phonetics.
The root may be var, crooKed. The Island
Sketis, or better Skitis, which Ptolemy places
about 70 miles north-east of Cape Orkas (Dunnet-
Head), is probably the Isle of Skye misplaced, a
view which commends itself to Muller, Thomas,
and Stokes. The latter says that it is " the
wing-shaped Island of Skye; Norse, Skidh; Irish,
Scii (dat. case, date 700 in ' Annals of Ulster '),
Adamnan, Scia; gen. Sceth (date 667 in ' Annals
of Ulster '), Scith (Tigernach, 668) ; means wing,
Ir. Sciath, Sciathan." Dr Stokes' derivation is
the one usually accepted; the Norse Skidh, which
is possibly influenced by ' ' folk-etymology, ' '
means a " log," " firewood," " tablet," and is

144 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIUE.

allied to another Gaelic word sgiath, a shield.
It is interesting to note that the Dean of Lismore
refers to the island as " Clar Skeith " — the
Board of Skith, thus showing that the Norse
name of the island was remembered and trans-
lated by Clar. More modern bards have used
the expression Clar Sgith in regard to Skye.
Thus Rory Mac Vurich in his elegy on Macleod
(published in 1776) says : —

" Dh' fhalbh mo lathaichean eibhinn
O'n threio- sibh Clar Sgithe."

In another on John, Sir Rory's son : —

" 'S e 'n Clar Sgith an Clar raibh sgith."

The earliest charter and record forms of the
name Skye are Skey (1292), Sky (1336), and Ski
in the " Manx Chronicle." Adamnan's ' Scia '
shows no trace of ' th.' The root is Celtic
Ski, cut, slice, and the whole means the '"'in-
dented isle." The root Ski is still the basis of
Gaelic sgiath and Norse Skidh.

Ptolemy's tribes in ancient " North Argyle "
were the Creones, Cerones, and Carnonacae.
The roots cer, ere, car, are here much to the
front, and the root generally means " broken,
rough." Carnonacae especially recalls cam, a
cairn, a favourite name in the district as Ckrn,
Carnan, and Carnach; to which may be added
the Carron, the ' rough ' river, *Carsona.

PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE. 145

The title Hebrides, as applied to the Western
Isles, appears first in Hector Boece's " History
of Scotland." It is a copyist's blunder for the
classical Hebudes or Haebudes, the name given
by Phny to a group of the Western Isles, 30 ui
number, he says. Ptolemy calls the Western
Isles the Eboudae or Ebudae, five in number, of
which two are named Ebuda. This made some
writers attempt to identify the two ' ' Uists ' ' with
the two Eboudae, but the phonetical difficulties
here are too great; besides, the name Uist is, as
Piofessor Munch said, simply the Norse word
i-vist, a habitation. It has lately been conjec-
tured that Ebouda stands for the Greek article
(' e ' or '« '), plus Bouda or Boudda, or later
B<')dda, and is really the old Pictish name of Bute.
This would give that island name the meaning of
" Victoria Isle."

Adamnan, Abbot of lona, who died in 704, has
left us in his " ' Life of St Columba ' ' the most
important document that we possess bearing on
the ancient history of our country. He has
recorded seven or eight names belonging to
Inverness County. Passing over his Dorsum
Britanniae or Drum-Alban, which means the
watershed of Argyle and Perth, continued north-
wards also past the Great Glen, we have the
names Nesa or Ness, Scia or Skye, Egea or Eigg,

Airchartdan or Urquhart, Artdamuirchol or Ard-

10

146 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE.

njimurchan, Aporicuvi Stagnum or Lochaber,
and, lastly, the river whose Latin name is Nigra
Dea (Black Goddess) in Lochaber. The river
Ness is mentioned four times, three times as
Nesa and once (in the genitive case) as Nisae.
We learn also a lesson in topography from
Adamnan — '" a 'cute ould observer," as an
L'ishman would call him — Loch-Ness he calls the
' ' Lake of the River Ness ' ' ; and it is almost
invariably true, however large the loch or small
the river, that the loch is named after the river
which drains it. In addition to this, the river
also names the glen through w^hich it flows; and
we shall instantly find that the proud Ben Nevis
i? named after, the humble nymph who once in
pagan Pictish days ruled over the destinies of the
Nevis stream. The name Ness is, of course,
Pictish; and we need not look at modern Gaelic
as exactly possessing the name in this form. We
must have recourse to roots : Nesa, of Adamnan,
points to Celtic Nesta and a root ned, which we
find means "water," "wet," German netzerXy
to wet, nass, wet, Sanskrit nadi, river. In old
Greece there was the river Neda and in Thracia
the Nestos, which is practically the "Ness."
But we may go farther; in Ireland they had a
heroic personage called Ness, mother of the
famous demi-god king Conchobar Mac Nessa,
who was, as can be seen, metronymically named.
There are indications in the legends that Ness

PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE. 147

was really a river goddess of pagan Ulster; and,
if so, we may regard the Pictish " Nessa " or
' ' Ness ' ' as either the same goddess or her Celtic
cousin. The Celts were great worshippers of
rivers and wells. Gildas before 600 thus refers
to the native worship of the early Britons .-
'■ Nor will I invoke the name of the mountams
themselves and the hills, or the rivers, to which
the blind people then paid divine honour. ' ' One
text represents Gildas as including the fountanis
in the above enumeration, and we have m
Ausonius (circum 380 a.d.), the Gaulish poet,
an invocation to " Divona, fons addite
divis," that is, " Divona, fountain dedicated to
the Gods"; for the name meant "Goddess,"'
and is the same as appears in the Ptolemaeic name
for Aberdeen — Devana, which is still the Gaelic
name of the river Don (Dian or Deathan), and
which still abides in the -deen of Aberdeen. The
river name Dee also means " Goddess " ; and we
see from Adamnan that a river in Lochaber was
called Nigra Dea or Black Goddess. Adamnan
also mentions as in or on the Dorsum Britanniae
the Lake of Loch-dae, and it has been well con-
jectured that Loch-dae is the Gaehc or Pictish of
Nigra Dea, for loch means "dark" and dae
means " Goddess." In short, the river meant
is the Lochy in Lochaber. There are at least
four other rivers of this name : Lochay, entering
the west end of Lochtay; Lochy in Glenorchy,

148 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE.

entering the Orchy above Dalmally; Lochy, or
Burn of Brown, which acts for a short distance
as the boundary of Abernethy parish and Inver-
ness county, and which joins the Avon at Inver-
lochy near Kirkmichael ; and Lochy with Glen-
Lochy at the head of Glenshee.

We may, however, suspect more river names
to have been '' Goddess " river names. This is
undoubtedly the case with the " Earns," of
which we have at least three or four : the Perth-
shire Earn, the Inverness-shire Find-horn, or
White Earn, and the Banffshire Deveron, or
Doveran (oldest charter form Duff-hern) or Black
Earn; and there is the Earn of Auldearn. The
Earn of Strathdearn is called in Gaelic Eire, and
its genitive is Eireann, the same in pronunciation
as the name for Ireland, and it is the same as the
name Erin of Ireland. Eire was one of the last
Tuatha-de-Danann queens of Ireland, to which
she left her name ; she was, in short, one of the
last pagan female deities worshipped in Ireland.
Ptolemy calls Ireland " Ivernia," and the Celtic
form of the name is restored as ' ' Iverjo, ' ' or,
possibly, a pre-Celtic Piverio (stem Piverion),
which has been equated with the Greek land-
name of Pieria, famed as the haunt of the muses.
The root, in that case, would mean " rich, fat,"
and would scarcely apply to a river name.
Adamnan's Evernihs, for " Irish," makes the
whole matter doubtful, and at present we must

PLACE-NAMES OF IN VERNESS-SfllKE . 149

confess ourselves beaten to explain the name
" Eire " or " Eireann " — " another injustice to
Ould Ireland'?"* I am inclined to include with
these Goddess names also the name Nevis, the
local Gaehc of which is Nihheis. This points to
an early Pictish form — Nehestis or Nehesta, the
latter possibly. The root neh or nebh is also
connected with clouds and water, and gives us
the classical idea of Nymph, root nbh — the
fairies of Greece and Rome . The nymph Nebesla,
then, gave her name to, or found her name
in, the River Nevis, and gave her name to Glen-
Nevis, and it again to the famous Ben, which
again renders Inverness-shire unique, not merely
among Scottish but among British counties, by
having as one of its glories the highest hill in
Britain. Loch Nevis also lends proof to the
ai gument that Nevis really denotes water origin-
ally. There was a river in ancient Spain called
the Nehis, now Neyva, which may also show the
root.

Before leaving the river Ness and the other
" Goddess " rivers of the district, I have to

*Tli6 root 'pi' means "fat" and "drink," "water,"
" flow," aud is no doubt the ultimate root of these ' erin '
names, a stem ' pi-vo ' intervening, which is found in th«
Gaelic name of lona, that is I, older Eo, li, Hii, from nom.
' Piva,' loc. ' Pivi.' The rivers Esk, Ptolemy's Iska, are from
*pid-ska, root pid, pi-d, spring, well, Grk. pid-ax, fountain.
So likely Islay and Isla are from *pi-la.

150 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE.

explain that there is another and more popuUii,
possibly more poetic, derivation of the name
Ness than the one I have offered. Once upon a
time, the story goes, the Great Glen which now
lies under the waters of Loch iSless was a beauti-
ful valley, filled with people and plenty. In the
bottom of the vale was a spring of magic virtue,
but there was a geas or taboo connected there-
with. Whenever the stone on the well was
removed and the w'ater drawn, the stone had
immediately to be replaced or else somethmg
dreadful was to take place. One day a woman
came to the well, leaving her child playing on
her hut floor ; but while at the well she heard her
child scream as if it had fallen into the fire. She
rushed to the house to save her child, and forgot
to replace the stone over the well. i'he w^ell
overflowed at once, and soon filled the long
valley. The people escaped to the hills and
filled the air with lamentations, crying, ' Tlia
loch nis ann; tha loch nis ann " — there is a lake
there now^. The lake remained, and from that
agonised cry is still known as Loch-Nis.

Four other names in Adamnan still remani
for us briefly to discuss — Egea, Aporicum, Art-
damuirchol, and Airchartdan. His "Egea"
Insula is the island of Eigg, the g of which we
should expect to be aspirated nowadays, but
here, as in the Ptolemaic Ebouda for Bute, and
Adru for Ben Edair (Howth), the double sound

PLACE-NAMES OF INVEKNESS-SHIRE. 151

of the consonant is not brought out in the old
spelhng. Egea is for Eggea, and now it is in
GaeKc Eige, old Gaelic genitive Ega or Eca. It
is glossed or explained in a media3val MS. as
" fons " or fountain, but the name seems to be
the modern Gaelic eag, a notch. The island is
notched, and so appears in approaching it.
There is another " Egg " island off Glenelg, like
in appearance. The Aporicum Stagnum or
Stagnum Aporum — that is, the " Aporic lake "
or ' ' lake of Apors ' ' — it is twice mentioned —
is, of course, Lochaber. It is usual to regard
the aber here as the Pictish prefix denoting
" confluence," and, no doubt, " Loch of the
Confluence ' ' of the Lochy with the Linne Dhubh
(Black " Pool or Sea-loch ") — Loch Linnhe — is
possible; but the Gaelic aher, a marsh, seems
really to be the origin of the name, especially in
view of Adamnan's plural Aporum or Ahers.
" Loch of the Marshes," therefore, is the mean-
ing of Lochaber. Artdamuirchol or Artdaib
Muirchol is described as a " rough and stoney
district"; it is known still as the Garbh-
chriochan, and in the old charters we saw it was
called Garmoran or Garbh-Morvern or ' ' Rough
Morvern " — Morvern itself being in older Gaelic
'Na Morbhairne " (genitive). In 1475 the
records spell the name as " Morvarne " ; it can-
not be Mor Earraiyin (Great Portion), as often
explained, or Mor Bheannaibh; it is rather like

162 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIUE.

Mor-hhearnaibh, " Great Gaps or Hill-passes."
Coming back to Artdamiiirchol, the predecessor
of Ardnamvrchane (1515), or now Ardria-
murchan, we can easily divide the word into
arda or ardaihh (accusative and locative plural
of ard, high, height), and muirchol. This last
Bishop Reeves explained as " Sea-hazel."
Muir, sea, undoubtedly forms part of the word.
There is no personal name of the form Mur-chol;
so that Dr Reeves is probably right in hii
" hazel " derivation. Lastly, we have Adam-
nan's Airchartdan, which, of course, is Glen-
Urquhart, the older " Wrchoden," and the
modern " Urchadainn." There is an Urquhart
in Cromarty, and another in Moray. The name
is a compound : Air-card-an, the tirst element
being the prefix air, on, beside. The second
part, card or cardin appears in the oft-repeated
Kincardine. It is clearly Pictish, and as Welsh
cardd (older card) means " brake," we may
take it that the Pictish means " wood, forest, or
brake." Urquhart, therefore, means " Wood-
side," as Kincardine means " Woodend." Cf.
Welsh name Argoed, for ' ar-coed,' ' At Wood.'
The word ' cardden ' is also found in Drum-
chardine, older Drumcharding (1514), the for-
mer name of Lentran .

Let us now glance at the county from an
ecclesiastical standpoint. There are thirty-five
parishes in Inverness-shire, some of which it

PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE. 153

shares with its neighbours. Inverness town is
in the territorial parish of Inverness and Bona;
Bona refers especially to the Dochfour end of the
parish, and is supposed to mean the ferry there
crossing the Ness, called " Ban-ath " or
" White-ford." In 1233 the parochial name
was spelt Baneth, and two hundred years later
Bonacht (for Bonath). The prefix cill, the
locative of ceall, a church, appears in only four
of the parishes, though it is otherwise common.
Kil in Scotland almost invariably prefixes a
saint's name ; it is the ceall of some saint. There
are two or three exceptions, and the first on our
hst is one of them : Kilmallie, Kilmalyn in 1296,
Kilmale, 1532, means the church of Maillie, but
there is no saint of that name, and it cannot be,
as is often supposed, a pet corruption of Mairi or
Mary. All cilJs dedicated to St Mary are Kil-
moires or Kilmuirs, Moire being the real old
Gaelic for St Mary, the name Mairi being of late
Scoto-French origin. In Kilmallie parish is the
river Mailhe and Invermailhe; we have also
Kilmaly (1536), or Culmaly (1512), and Cul-
mahn (1471) as the old name of Golspie parish;
the stream at Golspie appears to have no name
save Golspie Burn, so that it may have been
called Maillie. There is a Dalmally in Glen-
orchay, with an Allt-Maluidh running through
it. There is Polmaly (' mailidh ') in Glen-
Urquhart, with Allt-Phuill running into it, which

154 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE.

must have been Allt-maly. Mailidh is a stream
name; in Ireland Maiili is a personal name; but
further than this I cannot go at present. Killin
in Stratherrick, on Lochtayside, and at the upper
end of Garve, means "White-church" {cill-
fhinn), and is not, therefore, named after any
saint any more than Kilmallie. In regard to the
northern Killin there is the proverb —

" Cill-Fhinn, Cill-Dumn
'S Cill-Donainn—
Na tri Cilltean is sine an Albainn."

Kilvaxter, in Kilmuir of Skye, means the cill of
Baxter, which got its name from the trade
of somebody connected with it and the
monastery of Monkstadt. Kilmore in Sleat
means the Cella Magna or Great Church;
there is a Kilmore in Glen-Urquhart. Kil-
monivaig, Kilmanawik (1449), is the church
of St Mo-naomhoc or " my saint " Naomhan
Kilmoi'ack, Kilmorok (1437), seems dedicated to
a St Moroc; the name has long puzzled ecclesi-
astical students, but the form Mawarrock, a
saint's name connected with Lecropt parish, at
once suggests Mo-Bharroc, and we get the well-
known St Barr or Barre, more fully Barr-finn or
" White-head." There were several saints of
the name, as also the name Finnbarr, the same
name reversed, which was also curtailed to Barr,
Findan, and Munn (Mo-Fhindu). The St Barr

PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE. 155

ol" Barra Isle was Finnbarr, whose day was on the
25th September. Moroc's day was the 8th
November. Kihiiuh', in Skye, means St Mary's
Church, but the original name was Kilmaluok
(1538) — Moluoc's or Lughaidh's Church, a
favourite saint. Kiltarlity was in 1234 Kyl-
talargy, in 1280 Keltalargyn; the saint is a
Pictish one — Talorgan, " Fair-browed one."

We have already discussed, in other connec-
tions, Abernethy, Ardnamurchan, Boleskine,
and Abertarff, Cawdor (under the name Aber-
chalder, Cawdor being Caldor in 1394), Petty,
Uist, Barra (that is Barr's ey or isle, mixed
Norse and Gaelic), and Urquhart. Ardersier is
in its oldest form Ardrosser (1226); it seems to
mean Ard-rois-ear, " East-point-height," as
against Ros-marky opposite it. The present
pronunciation is Ard-na(n)-saor, ' Carpenters'
Point ' ; but ' saothair,' a promontory or passage
covered at high water, has been suggested. This
word is common on the West Coast. Taking the
Skye parishes together, we find Bracadale spelt
much the same in 1498— BracadoU; the Gaehc
is Bracadal; the name contains the common
term breac or brae, slope, almost the same force
as Gaelic sliahh, and it comes from the Norse
brekka, a slope, EngHsh brink. Sleat, in 1389
and 1401 Slate, comes from the Norse sletta, a
plain, sUttr, level. It is the only decently level
part of Skye. Strath is a curtailment of Strath-

156 PLACE-NAMES OF INVEIiiNESS-SmilE.

ordail ; it is a hybrid of Gaelic Sratli and Sword-
dale or " Sward-dale," both Norse elements,
usually Suardal in pronunciation. It is a very
common name, this Swordale. Duirinish, in
1498 Dyurenes, stands for Norse " Deer's ness
or head." It is the same as Durness in Suther-
land. Snizort is Snesfard in 1501 ; it possibly
stands for Norse Snaesfjord or " snow-lirth."
Portree doubtless gets its name of " King's
Port " from James V.'s punitive visit to the Isles
in 1540.

Alvie parish, about 1350 Alveth and Aiway,
presents a well-known name, which appears else-
where as Alva, Alvah, Alves, and Alyth, which,
save Alves, show an old form Alveth. It seems
a Pictish stem alvo, an extension of the root al,
rock. Daviot is another old word evidentlv
Pictish, for its old form Deveth (1206-33) is
clearly the same as the British tribal name
Demetse of South Wales, now Dyfed. The root
is dem, sure, strong, Gaelic deimhin. Croy
and Dalcross formed an old parish. The former
is from the adjective ' cruaidh,' hard. Dalcross
is a corruption for what Shaw gives as Dealg-an-
Ross or Dalginross, a name which appears in
Athole and Strathearn. It means ' spit of the
ridge or promontory,' for ' ros ' can be used
inland, as in Abernethy^Euigh-da-ros, ' Shiel
of the two points.' Dunlichity or Flichity
is an alternate name for the parish; this

PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE. 157

is Flechate in 1560, and comes from flichead,
moisture, a derivative from fliuch, wet.
Dores, about 1350 Durrys, is in Gaelic Durus;
this word meant in the old language " a gloomy
wood " (duhhras), an epithet that would well
suit the Inverness-shire Dores, if only the
phonetics were more satisfactory. The name is
Pictish — its termination (' -as ') favours this
idea, and hence the root is ' dur,' strong — ' a
strong hold,' it seems to mean. It has also been
taken to mean ' dorus,' a door or opening; the
roots in any case are the same. There is a
Durris in Banchory parish. Duthil, about 1230
Dothol, has been explained by Lachlan Shaw,
the historian, as the tuaitheal or north-side of
Creag-an-fhithich, while the Deshar or deiseil is
on the south side. This also is the local deriva-
tion, and it seems right enough. Glenelg, Glen-
helk in 1282, means " noble glen," or properly
the " glen of the noble {elg) river." The root
elg is also in Elgin. Kingussie, Kinguscy
(1103-11), is in Gaelic Cinn-ghii^ithsaich,
"Head of the fir-forest"; cinn, or kin, as a
prefix, is the locative of ceann. Kirkhill, a
modern name, comprises the old parishes of
Wardlaw (Wardelaw in 1203-24, an English
name, meaning " Beacon-hill ") and Farnua
(Ferneway in 1238). The latter name means
the " place of alders " in Gaelic, and Shaw, who
so explains it, adds that alders " abound there,"

158 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE.

which they have done till lately. Laggan is for
Lagan-Choinnich or " St Cainneach's hollow,"
and in the old records it appears as Logynkenny
(1239). The church was then up at the end of
Loch Laggan. Moy is the locative of mayh,
plain, and Dalarossie is in Gaelic Dail-Fhear-
ghuis, the Dulergusy of 1224-42, the " dale of
St Fergus," to whom the chapel there was dedi-
cated. Rothiemurchus is in modern Gaelic
Rat-a-mhurchais, which in 1226 is just the same,
Eatemorchus, beside Rathmorcus. The prefix
rat is a common one, confined, however, to Pict-
land; it is an extension of rath, an enclosure or
farm building, but whether the termination is
due to Pictish influence or not can hardly be
said; for in several cases d ends local suffixes,
both in Ireland and Scotland (Irish kealid from
caol, and croaghat from criiach; Scotch Bialaid
in Badenoch, from hial, mouth). In fact riit
takes the place of rath in Pictland ; and beside it
we may no doubt place raig or rathaig as in
Eaigmore and Raigbeg of Strathdearn, although
the old forms show here an internal r : Ravoch-
more; also Kil-ravock, which is now pronounced
Kill-ra'ag. The main body of the word Rothie-
murchus seems a personal name, possibly
Muirgus, " Sea-choice," aUied to Fergus and
Murchadh. The local derivation here is Rat-
mhoir-ghiuthais, ' Rath of the big fir(s),' and is

PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE. 159

not to be despised on the score of phonetics, and
certainly not as to the facts.

The island parishes, besides Skye, comprise
the Small Isles and the Outer Hebrides. Only
Eigg now remains to Inverness-shire. Muck
(Eilean-nam-muc or " Pig Isle "), Canna (Por-
poise Isle, old Gaehc cana, porpoise), and Rum
(origin unknown) belong now to Argyle. St
Becan, from ' bee,' ' beag,' little, seems to have
died in Eum (gen. Euimm) in 676, if we can
judge what the Irish annals and mar-
tvrologies sav correctlv. Eig2 has been
already considered. So, too, have the
LHsts and Barra. Harris was in 1546 Hary,
1546 Harige; Dean Munro (1549) calls it " the
Harrey." The Gaehc is Na h-Earra, which
gave the Enghsh form ' ' the Merries ' ' and
Harris or " the Harris." There is Harris in
Rum and Islay, Herries in Dumfries, and Harray
ill Orkney. It is usual to explain Na h-Earra
as " the heights," and both in Harris and in
Islay this admirably suits, but the Norse words,
whence the name undoubtedly comes, cannot be
easily fitted in. The Norse for " high " is hdr,
plural havir, especially the comparative haerri,
higher (" The Higher Ground " as compared to
low-lying Lewis).

The Church has supplied many other than
purely parish names. Saints' names, generally
wit the prefix cill, are abundant, and saints' weUs,

160 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIKE.

as well as saints' isles, are common. St Columba
is first favourite, something like a score of places
being connected with his name in such forms as
Cill-cholumchille (Kil-columkill) or Cill-choluim,
Tobair-Cholumchille, and Eilean-Cholumchille ;
and Portree bay was named after him originally.
The next in importance of dedication is the
Virgin Mary; Kilmuir or Kilmory are the usual
forms in English of the name. There are
two in Ardnamurchan, Kilmory and Kil-
vorie, Kilmuir in North Uist, and Kilmuir
in Skye as a parish, and in Duirinish, with
several other places. St Bridget, the "Mary
of the Gael," has two or three Kilbrides in the
county — as in Strath, South Uist, and Harris.
St Maolrubha, older Maelruba, appears in place
names as Molruy, Morruy, and Maree (as in
Loch-Maree). His centre in Scotland is Apple-
cross; here he died in 721. He seems
to have been a favourite in Skye ; there is
Kilmaree in Strath, and Cill-ashik was of old
Askimolruy or " Maelruba 's Ferry " ; Kilmolruy
in Bracadale, and Ardmaree in Berneray.
In Skye also Moluag or St Lughaidh has
some dedications — Kilmaluock in Trottarness
and in Raasay; there was a croft Mo-luag at
Chapelpark, near Kingussie, whence the latter
name. St Comgan is celebrated in Ardna-
murchan and Glenelg — Kilchoan; and he was
the special patron of the old Glengarrv family.

PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS- SHIRE. 161

St Cuimine the Fair, the Tth century biographer
of Cohimba, seems to have been celebrated at
Glenelg, Kh'kton (Kilchuimen, 1640). But we
have his name certainly in Cill-chuimen of Fort-
Augustus. St Donnan gave Kildonnan to Eigg
and South Uist. The Pictish saint Drostan, who
is misrepresented as a pupil of St Columba's, was
patron of Alvie; his chapel is still seen in ruins
nt Dunachton, and there is, or was, in Glen-
Urquhart a croft named after him — Croit-mo-
chrostan; and seemingly the patronymic M'Eostie
(Perthshire) comes from Drostan under Lowland
influence. Another Pictish saint was Kessoc,
whose name at least is borne by the ferry of
Kessock (Kessok, 1437). The name Kessoc or
Kessan is from ' ces,' meaning ' spear ' in Gaelic,
but what it meant in Pictish it is impossible to
say. Tarlagan, the Pict, had a ' kil ' on the
north of Portree bay, besides being the patron
saint of Kiltarlity (Ceilltarraglan). Adamnan ap-
pears rarely; Tom-eunan of Insh is named after
him, and a croft of his existed in Glen-Urquhai't.
Such names as Kilpheder, Kilmartin, Kilaulay
(Olave), Kilchalman, Kilcrist (now Cill-chro, or
'' pen kirk," in Gaelic, in Strath), Pitkerrald
(Cyrill), and Kilmichael in Glen-Urquhart,
Killianan (Finan) in Glengarry, Ardnamurchan
and Abiiachan, and others can only be men-
tioned.

U

162 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE.

A most interesting ecclesiastical name ii
Annaid; it occurs very often in Inverness county,
from Killegray of Harris to Groam of Beauly.
Achnahannet is common, and there are Teampall
na h-Annaid, Clach na h-Annaid, and Tobair na
h-Annaid. It means in old Gaelic a patron
saint's church; it is rare, however, in Ireland,
and seems in Scotland to denote the locale of the
pioneer anchorites' cells, that is, their clachans
and Httle oratories, often away in a diseart (Lat.
Desertuvi) or desert (island or remote place).
The name Clachan is common on the West Coast
and in the Isles; it means, firstly, the monk's or
anchorite's bee-hive stone cell — built where
wood and wattle were scarce, so that on the
eastern mainland there are no clachans. The
word developed into the meaning of oratory or
kirk, and, from the cluster of clachans making a
monastic community, into " village," which is
its only meaning in the Lowlands. There are
three in Kilmuir (Skye), for example; one at
least in N. Uist, which is countenanced by Kallin
or Ceallan (Kirkie) and Kirkibost (" Kirkton ")
there. Reilig is now an old Gaelic word for
church-yard, and from Lat. reliquiae; it appears
in the Aird and near Beauly as Euilick. Team-
jpull and Seipeal (Chapel) give many names :
Tigh-an-Teampuill or Temple-House in Glen-
Urquhart, and Pairc-an-t-seipeil (Chapel-park)
in Badenoch, for example. The chm'ch officials,

PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE. 163

too, have naturally left their mark : Balnespick
is Bishop's-ton; Paible is from the Norse Papyli
or Papa-byU, " Pope or Priest's town," a Gaehc
Bail'-an-t-sagairt, and Papay is " Priest's Isle" ;
Mugstad or Monkstead of Skye is the half Norse
representative of Bal-vanich in Benbecula, which
is half Gaehc {manach, monk, from Lat.
monachus). In the same island is Nunton or
Ballenagailleich (1549). There is no Appm in
Inverness-shire — Abbacy or Abbey-land, but
there is "A' Mhanachainn," the Monkery, the
the Gaelic name for Beauly, itself from the Lat.
Bellus Locus or " Beautiful Place," a name no
doubt bestowed on it- — and rightly — by the early
13th century monks.

We shall now notice the District names not
already considered, as we have considered Loch-
aber, Morvern, Strathdearn, &c. The Aird
explains itself; it is the high ground of Kirkhill
and Kiltarlity. Glenmoriston is a difficult name ;
the river, of course, gives the name, and it is
usually explained as for Mor-easan, "river of
great water-falls." It is Pictish, no doubt, and
points to a Celtic ^M6r-est-ona. Stratherrick, the
older Stratharkok and Stratharkeg, comes from
the river Farigag, which means " lower ravine "
river (Gaelic far, below, and gag, cleft). Far is
a common prefix in northern Pictland — Farleitir
("lower slope"), Farraline ("lower linn"),
Farr ("lower place"), &c. Strathnairn derives

164 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SIIIRE.

its name from the Nairn Eiver; this river name
is Pictish, hkely old Naverna, the same root and
partial stem as we have in the Naver of Suther-
land, Ptolemy's Nabaros. The root is uav or
snav, flow, swim, Gaelic ,snamh; and we may
compare the Welsh Nevern as a parallel form to
Nairn. Badenoch is the Gaelic Bkideanach; the
root is haide, submerged, from hath, drov.n. In
Ireland there is Bauttogh in Galway, " a marshy
place," and the river Bauteoge, running through
.Avampy ground. Passing over Lochaber as
already discussed, we come to the ancient lorrl-
ship of Garmoran, the Clanranald land, bounded
on the south by Loch Shiel and on the north by
Loch Hourn, as the poet says in the Dean of
Lismore's Book (1512) —

Leggit derri di vurn
eddir selli is sowyrrni

— " An end of merriment between Shiel and
Hourn." Adamnan's Sale is the above Shiel,
but the Sorn is a later name given by the Gael,
who had by the time they reached it adopted the
Latin ' furnus,' whence ' sorn,' a furnace, un-
doubtedly comes. Loch Hourn is ' Furnace
Lake ' — Lochshuirn, which may be compared
with the Lochalsh name Coire na Soma, the one
a mascuhne, the other a feminine genitive, both
genders being shown in the the early language,
as is not uncommon in the case of a borrowed

PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE. 165

word. The lordship of Garmoran, to which
Skene devoted an extraordinary chapter in his
" Highlanders of Scotland," under the fancy
that it was an earldom, and about which he is
silent in "Celtic Scotland," comprised Moydart,
Morar, and Knoydart. The name, spelt in 1343
Garmorwarne, means ' Eough Morvern,' and
Morvern means ' Great Passes ' — Mor-bhearna ;
the modern Gaelic has adopted the name Garbh-
chriochan, or ' Rough-bounds,' instead. The
Morvern furthers south may be regarded as
adjacent, and perhaps part of the same name;
if not, then it also is bisected well enough by its
own ' beam ' or pass of Lochs Tacnis, Loch
Arienas, and, we may add. Loch Aline, with
their respective streams, to entitle it to a
separate but singular Mor-bhearn. M'Vurich
calls it in the gen. sing. fem. ' Na Morbhairne ' ;
the oldest charter spelling is Morvern as now
(1390), and Morvarne (1475). The name Moy-
dart, G. Miiideard, was spelt Mudeworth in
1343, Modoworth in 1372, and Mudewort in
1373. The name is difficult as to derivation; it
is Norse by its ending ' -ard,' ' -ort,' which is
for ' fjord.' Like Knoydart and Sunart, it likely
comes from a personal name, here Mundi, and
for the phonetics compare the island names
Gometray and Hermitra, from Godmund and
Hermund, and the personal name Tormoid from
Thormund. Better still is the Throiid of

1G6 PLACE-NAMES OP INVERNESS-SHIRE.

Trotternish for comparison. Siinart, in
1372 Swynwort, and m 1392 Swynawort, is
Sveinn's fjord; while Knoydart (Cnudeworth in
1343) stands for Knut's or Canute's fjord.
Arisaig, in 1309 Aryssayk, is the Norse dros-vik,
the bay of the river mouth {dros, river -mouth,
whence Aros, the place name). Morar was in
1343 Morware, Mordhowor, 1517 Moroyn, Mac
Vurich's old Gaelic Moiroin, which last points to
Mor-shron or " Great nose " (promontory) as
the meaning of the word; but Morar or Morwar
stands for Mor-bharr,' Great-point.' Glengarry
takes its name from the river Gareth (about 1309).
There is another Garry in Perth, and the Yarrow
is the same name, while allied by root are the
English rivers " Yair " and " Yare " (Yar-
mouth), and also the French " Garonne," classic
Garumna. The root is garu, or Gaelic garhh,
rough. In Skye we have Trotternish, Water-
nish, and Minginish districts. Trotternish is in
1549 both Trouteruesse and Tronternesse, either
with a u or with n in the main syllable. Mac
Vurich (17th century) gives the then Gaelic as
" Trontarnis " ; it stands for Norse " Thrond-
arnes " or " Thrond's Headland." Waternish
is the Icelandic " Vatnsness" or " Water-ness."
Minginish— Myngnes in 1498, Mygnes in 1511,
and Myngynnes in 1549— contains the prefixed
element ming, which appears in the island names
Mingulay and Mingay, and Mingarry, where in

PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE. 167

every case the Gaelic has no ' ng ' sound at all.
Mingarry is Mioghairidh (Mewar, 1493, and
Meary, 1505, but Mengarie, 1496). The word
here prefixed seems to be ' mikil,' ' great,*
whose accusative is ' mikinn,' ' mikla,' ' mikit '
in the three genders. Hence Minginish means
Eudha-Mor of GaeHc, which it is.

The Norsemen, who held the Isles for some
450 years, have left a deeper impress on the
place-names there than the Gael. Of the name*
usually printed on maps, in directories, or in the
Valuation Eolls for the Outer Hebrides, four are
Norse to the Gaelic one; that is, the proportion
is four-fifths Norse and one-fifth Gaelic. In
Skye the proportion is not so heavily against
Gaehc; practically the two languages are equal.
Of the names on the Valuation Roll, 60 per cent,
are Norse as against 40 per cent, that are Gaehc.
The coast-line of Garmoran is also considerably
Norse, though nothing like the proportion in
Skye; and as we go inland the Norse names get
fewer. There are no Norse names in Lochaber;
so we may conjecture that that district was free
of the Norse yoke. Norse names abound in
Easter as well as in Wester Ross, and they can
be traced south to the Beauly valley, where we
have Eskidale (" Ash-dale ") and Tarradale on
the Beauly River. Further south we do not find
any trace of the Norse power in place names;
nor is it likely that they ever had any conquest

168 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SIilRE.

or sway south of Beauly, despite their own asser-
tions, in their sagas, that they possessed also
Moray. The Norse power in Scothand at its
strongest extended over Caithness, Sutherland,
Ross, Argyle, and Galloway, with, of course, th«
Weste]-n Isles. This was about 980 to 1050.
Gaelic slowly regained its hold in the Isles after
the rise of Somerled and the other patriarchs of
the Clan Donald in the latter part of the 12th
century; but Gaelic in its re-conquest left the
Norse nomenclature of the country practically
intact.

The most prominent Norse words borrowed
are those for island {ey), hill ifjciU), vik
or -aig, bay, nes or nish, headland, dalr
or -dale, a vale, a dale; fjordhr, sea-loch
or firth (fjord), or -ord, -ard, and the various
words for township, farm or settlement (setr,
stadr, holstadr and bol or -bo). The termina-
tion -ay and -a of the island names is the Norse
ey, isle. Beginning with the isles about Harris,
we have Berneray, or " Bjorn's Isle" — Bjorn
either meaning ' ' bear ' ' or being a personal
name, which last it likely is. Fladda, so com-
monly repeated, means " flat isle "; Soay, also
repeated often, is for Saudha-ey or " Sheep-
isle " ; Isay, " Ice-isle " ; Taransay, St Taran'»
Isle; Ensay, " meadow (engi) isle " ; Killegray,
"Kellach's Isle," the Kellach bemg the Irish
•^Cellach" or "Kelly" (Warrior), borrowed

PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE. 169

early by tlie Norse, and now known in the name
MacKillaig; Lingay, "Heath Isle''; Scalpay,
" Shallop^" or " Ship Isle "; Eossay, " Horse
Isle"; Eriskay, "Eric's Isle." Oransay and
Orasay, of which names there are a great number
of isles, is from orjiri, ebb or shallow, and means
that the island is one at full tide only; Pabbay,
"Pope or Priest's Isle"; Sandray is "Sand
Isle ' ' ; Benbecula is only partly Norse ; the
Gaelic is Beinn-a-bhaodhla, and really means
" Height of the Ford," from Gaelic faodhail,
" a ford," itself borrowed from the Norse vadill,
"a shallow or ford." Easay or Earsay
(Eairsay, 1526, Easay and Eaarsay in 1549)
seems to be ' Ear-ass-ey,' ' Eoe-ridge-isle.'

The hills in the isles generally end in -val.
This is the Norse fjall, fell or hill. The name
Eoine-val is common ; this is Hraun-fell, a rocky-
faced hill; the island Eona is also from hraun,
"rocky-surfaced isle." Horne-val is "horn-
fell "; Helaval is " flagstone fell "; and so on.
Layaval in South Uist, and Laiaval in North Uist,
may be equated with Ben Loyal in Sutherland;
perhaps for ' Leidhfjall,' ' levy or slogan hill.'
Mount Hecla in Mingulay has the same name as
the famous burning mountain in Iceland, which
means ' hooded shroud.' Blavein in Skye is for
Bid-fell, 'Blue-fell.'

The sea-lochs in -ord, -ard, -art are too
numerous even to make a selection from; and

170 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE.

the same may be said of the nesses or headlands
(Norse nes). I must pass over also the town-
ships with their hols, hosts, and sias. An odd
change is undergone by holmr, an islet (in a bay
or river), a holm; this may appear either as ter-
minal -am, or -mid, or -lum. We have Heista-
mul and Hestam, both from hestr, horse; tiie
famous Eilean Beagram is probably Bekra-
holmr, "Ram-holm"; Lamalum is "Lamb-
holm," and Sodhulum is from saudhr, sheep.
Airnemul is Erne-holm — " Eagle-holm." Liani-
mul no doubt means "flax-holm." Os means
river-mouth, oyce " ; we have it in the Skye
Ose and Glen-ose, and in Aros. Hoe and Toe
are not uncommon, and we have Howmore in 3.
Uist; this is Norse haugr, burial mound, howe.
Torgabost shows horgr, a heathen place of
worship, and also Horogh (Castlebay).

There is a marked difference between the
Island and West Coast topography and the
eastern mainland in the common names of hills,
dales, lochs, and rivers; in the west we have
cleit, stac, sgiirr, sgeir, and gil, all Norse; in the
east cam, meall, creag, monadh, and gleann.
In the east coire, srath, sliahh, as against the
terminal dal and hreac and gil of the Isles.
Then the absence of terms for wood is most
marked in the west, sco, terminal for skogr, a
shaw, appearing only in Skye, as Birkisco,
Grasgo, &c. In the east, wood is very common

PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE. 171

in the nomenclature. The bird names also differ
much, even when not Norse, from the Gaelic
Mainland. We have orri, N. moorfowl, also a
nickname, in Oreval, hills in Harris and Uist;
mar, sea-mew, in Maraig, ' Sea-mew bay ' ; dm,
eagle, in Arnamul, ' Eagle-head ' (Mingulay),
and Arnaval (Skye); krdka, crow, Crakavick,
* Crow-wick ' (Uist) ; hrafn or hramn, raven,
Eamasaig, ' Eaven-bay ' (cf. Eamsay, Eamsey);
and Geirum, ' Auk-holm ' (Barra).

The mainland haile, farm or township, is
often represented in the Inverness-shire isles by
Norse setr, a stead, shieling. The latter name
appears alone as Seadair (Gaelic) or Shader
(English) in Bernera and ^ Skye. Uigshader
means ' Ox-ton ' (compare Uisgeval and Uisg-
neval, hills) ; Eoishader, ' Horse-ton ' ; Mari-
shader ' Mare-ton ' ; Herishader, ' Lord's-ton ' ;
Sulishader, ' Pillar-ton ' or ' Solan-goose-ton ' —
it is not far inland — all in Skye ; which, however,
prefers host (N. holstadhr), as Husabost,
'House-stead'; Eabost (' Eidh ' or isthmus?);
Colbost (pronounced Cyalabost), ' Keel-ton ' ;
Heribost, ' Lord's-ton ' ; Orbost, ' Orri's-ton ' ;
Breabost, ' Broad-ton ' ; Skeabost, ' Skidhi's-
ton,' as in Skibo (old Scythebol); Carbost,
' Kari's-ton.' The Norse gardr, a garth or
house and yard, which appears elsewhere on
Norse ground, is represented in the Western
Isles and Mainland by its diminutive gerdhi,

172 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE.

which has been adopted into Gaelic as gearrnidh,
the land between machair and moor. It is com-
mon in place-names in its Gaelic use — Gearadu,
' B-lack-garth,' in N. Uist; Geary (Duirinish);
Garry more (Bracadale), Garrafad (Kilmuir), and
Gairidh-Ghlumaig (Kilmuir). Terminally it is
garrij, and is very extensively used with Norse
names — Osmigarry, from Osmund; Calligarry,
from Kah; Grimagarry, from Grimm; Shageary,
' Sea-garth ' (Sagerry, 1541); Flodigarry, 'Float
or Fleet garth ' (though Gaelic has long o) ; Big-
gary, ' Barley ' ; Mugeary, ' Monk's garth ' (?);
and Mosgaraidh, ' Moss ' — all in Skye. In N.
Uist there are Hougheary (ho we), and Trums-
garry (Thrum's); in Benbecula, Creagarry may
be Gaelic, as may be Crogarry there, though
kro may be Norse borrowed from Gaelic (a pen) ;
Mingarry (Benbecula) is ' mickle-garth.' In S.
Uist appears Stelligarry, the first portion of
which is pronounced ' staol,' and is found in
Stulay isle; it is Norse, pointing to steil, steyl,
stadhil or stagil, but these forms are either non-
existent or cannot be used in place-names, save
the last, as in Stagley, 'rock-isle.' Seemingly
we have here a corruption of the proper name
Stulli or Sturla. The Norse has borrowed be-
sides kro the imporant word airigli, shieling,
originally as aerg or erg, as in Asgrims-aergin,
in the Orkney Saga, where it is explained that
erg is Gaelic for setr. Asgrims-erg now appears

PLACE-NAMES OF INVEENESS-SHIRE. 173

as Askarry, even Assary (Caithness), where we
have also Halsary (Hall), Dorrery, Shurrery
(Shureval, ' Pig-hill,' in S. Uist), etc. In Duir-
inish we find Soarary, ' Sheep shiel ' ; in Ardna-
murchan, Smirisary, 'Butter shiel,' and Brunary
(Brunnary, 1498), an ' Airigh an tobair ' ; in
Glenelg, Beolary and Skiary ; in N. Uist, Obisary,
' Bay or Hope ' ; Aiilasary, ' Olaf 's ' ; Eisary,
' Copse-wood ' ; Dusary, Vanisary, and Horisary ;
in S. Uist, Vaccasary and Trasaiy (Thrasi); and
others.

Some of the more interesting land and farm
names may be glanced at. The Norse ounce
and penny lands — especially the latter — have left
their mark. The tirung or ounce-land is equated
with the Mainland davoch or dock, four plough-
gates, whose fourth is the common name Kerrow
(ceathramh, fourth). The Norse for this last
phonetically was fjordlimigr, fourthing or farth-
ing, which appears in the place-name Feoirlig, the
phonetics being the same as for hirlinn, a galley
(N. byrdhingr). It meant ' farthing land.' The
ung was old Gaelic, and existed in Ung-an-ab,
the abbot's ounce-land, in N. Uist in 1561. The
pennyland gives many names : Pein-chorran
(Portree), from corran, point, the masculine
form of corrag. This corran is a very common
name in the Isles, and appears as Corran simply
several times, as at Ballachulish. The usual ex-
planation of ' bay ' is absurdly wrong, therefore,

174 PLACE-NAMES OP INVERNESS-SHIRE.

fiom corran, a sickle, supposed metaphorically
to mean 'bay,' which it does not. Of course
these ' corrans ' often guard sickle-shaped bays,
and hence the mistake. Other penny-lands are
— Penifiller, ' Fiddler's '; Pensoraig, 'Primrose'
(?orN. 'Saur-vik," Mud-bay'); Pein-more (big) ;
Peiness (waterfall); Peinaha; Peinlich; Leiphen
(half-penny); and Pein-gown (smith) — all in
Skye. Peinavaila is the romantic form which
' Peighinn-a'-bhaile ' takes in Benbecula. Pen-
inerin in S. Uist stands for * Peighinn an aor-
ainn' — where mass was said. In Pictland
davoch or dock is the commonest land-measure :
Dochgarroch, ' D. of the rough-land ' ; Doch-
four, of which presently; and Lettoch, near
Beauly, is ' Half-davoch,' like the Aberdeen-
shire Haddo and Haddoch. The terminal ele-
ment -fur enters largely into the names of Pict-
land— Balfour, Inchfur, Dalfour, Dochfour, Pit-
fur (very common), Tillifour and Tillifourie
(Tough), and Trinafour (Perthshire). The form
with / is clearly an aspirated p ; the word is pur,
which seems to exist in diminutive form in Purin
(Fife), older Pourane, Porin (G. Porainn) in
Sirathconan, and Powrie near Forfar. The
Book of Deer has the aspirated Fiirene, repre-
sented now by Pitfour in Deer. The p proves
the word to be Pictish ; and it is possible that the
root is par, as in Welsh paivr, pasture, Breton
peur. The ultimate root is qer, as in preas,

PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE. 175

crann, and perhaps craohh. In Inverness we
have Dochfour, Dochgarroch, and Delfour.

The words gart, corn, goirtean, cornfield,
alhed to Enghsh garden and Norse gardhr, ap-
pear in Boat of Garten and minor places. Cluny
is a very common name ; the Gaelic is Cluanaigh,
a locative of cluanach, meadowy place, from
cluan, a mead. In Badenoch the nom. or ace.
is found in A' Chluanach, west of Kincraig.
Longart, a shieling, camp, is now obsolete, save
in place-names; it is met with inDail-an-longairt,
Coire-an-Longairt, and Badenlongart (1773,
Gaick) — all in Badenoch. The old word was
longphort, ' ship-port,' or harbour, encamp-
ment, which, with a dialect pronunciation of
long as ' low,' gives luchairt, a palace. Tarbert
means isthmus, from tar, across, and root her,
bring, bear. Drummond presents the full stem
of druiyn, back (dromann, dromand), and does
not stand,' as usually said, for Druim-fhinn,
white ridge, still less for Fionn's ridge. Strath-
glass presents the old word glais, stream, which
we have in Inveruglas, the confluence of the
Duglas or Dark-stream (now nameless) ; this is
also found in Southern Scotland, and has given
the famous family name. The word leacainn,
a cheek, hill face or side, gives Leachkin, at
Inverness, and elsewhere, generally with an
epithet. The diminutive sldhean, a fairy knoll,
gives Baihntian and many names else ; the simple

176 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIKE.

sldh appears in Ben Tee, of Glengany, and is
found elsewhere for conical hills, as hi Schie-
hallion, ' Hill of the Caledonians,' with which
the name Dunkeld and Rohallion, near Duukeld,
are to be compared. The lairig is giveri in the
dictionaries as a " plain, hill, sloping hill,"
somewhat contradictory meanings; but the real
meaning is found in the place-names, and that
meaning is ' pass.' In Old Irish we have Idarc,
a fork or ' gobhal.' Finnlarig, both in Duthil
and at Killin, means ' Fair Pass,' as Eev. J.
Maclean, Grandtully, etymologises the Perth-
shire name. In Eothiemurchus we have Larach-
grue or Lairig-dhru, probably the pass of Druie
river (root dru, flow, as in Gaulish Druentia),
which the Ordnance Map, with its wonted per-
versity, names Lairg Gruamach. The place-
name Elrick is common in the county, and theie
must be over a hundred such in Scotland ; it is
from the obsolete eileirig, locative of eileireag,
which meant the cul-de-sac bounded by fallen
trees and other obsti'uctions into which the deer
v;ere driven, and one side of which was formed
of a hill, on the face of which the hunters took
their place and shot the deer. These hills and
places are called Elrick, Eldrick, Elrig, and
Ulrig ; ' eileir ' is given in the dictionaries as a
* deer path,' no doubt from the root elu in eilid,
hind. It is sometimes explained as iolairig, a
knoll on which eagles rested, which is not likely.

PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE. 177

The ' bordlands ' of the royal and other castles
appear in Gaelic as horlum, whence Borlum,
near Fort-Augustus, also the old name for Ness
Castle, whence the famous and notorious Borlum
family got its name. There is Borlum in Skye,
and elsewhere.

We will finally consider some interesting indi-
vidual names, and begin with the furthest west,
which is St Kilda. This name is one of those
known as ' ghost names ' — a geographer's
blunder. In Gaelic the island is called Irt or
7ori, which means in old Gaelic ' death ' ; it is
likely that the ancient Celts fancied this sunset
isle to be the gate to their earthly paradise, the
Land-under-the-waves, over the brink of the
western sea. The Dutch map-makers of the
17th century are responsible for St Kilda or
Kilder. There were some wells near the village
famous for their virtues — Tobar-nam-buadh,
and there was a Tobar-Kilda among them — one
or all of them retaining the Norse name for well,
which is kelda, corrupted into St Kilder's Well
in the 17th century. Kelda is known in the
North of England on Norse ground as kild, as in
Kiidwick, Kiiham (Domesday Chillum), and
Halikeld, 'Holy-well.' The well-names got
mixed with the true name of the island on the
maps. The Dutch were active herring fishers in
the western seas in 'he 17th century, and to

12

178 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE.

them we owe more curiosities than St Kilda —
doubtless the Minch is due to them, the Gaehc of
which is A' Mhaoil, the Moyle, also the old Irish
name for the sea between the ' Maoil ' of Kintyre
and Ireland.

Rodel, o long, stands for Norse Red-dale,
from the colour of the soil.

Lee, in N. Uist, Ben Lee, Skye, N. hlidh,
slope.

Lochmaddy, from viadadh, a shellfish there.

Heisker, Hellisker, 1644, N. 'Rocky skerry.'
Munro in 1649 calls it Helskyr na gaillon (nuns).

Stoney-bridge, in S. Uist, G. Staoni-bris, is
for N. Stein-brekka, 'stone-slope.'

Boisdale, N. Bugis-dalr, ' SKght bay dale.'

Dorlin, Ardnamurchan, G. doiWin^,' isthmus.

Glenfinnan, G. Gleann-Fionain, named after
St Finan, Ellan-Finan having been the old name
of Ardnamurchan parish. St Finan lived in St
Columba's time, is called of ' Swords in Lem-
ster,' and was latterly a leper, taking the
infection for penance. His name appears in
Abriachan and Glengarry in Killianan. He is
not to be confused with St Finnan (short i, from
finn, white); as the following triplet on the last
Glengarry shows, the quantity of the i is long : —

'S ann 'na lai^he !n Gill Fhionain
Dh' fhag sinn biatach an fhiona,
Lkmh a b' urrainn a dhioladh.

PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE. 179

Inveraros, in Eaasay, is a good case of
hybrid; for dros is the Norse for inver.

Point of Ayre, in Eaasay, is derived from
eyrr, a gravelly beach, connected in Britain with
headlands; we have it in Snizort as Eyre (Ire,
1630), and Ken-sal-eyre or Kinsale (sea-end) of
Eyre. There is a Point of Ayre on the north-
east coast of Man; and we may perhaps conjoin
the Heads of Ayr in the county of that name,
and perhaps the county name.

Idrigill, which appears twice as a promontory
in Skye, with Udrigle in Gairloch, stands for
Ytri-kolir, 'Further or Outer Hill.' It is not
connected with gil, a ravine.

Bealach Colluscard (Kilmuir) is interesting
again as showing tautology, for Collu-scard
means Pass of the Hill (kollr), N. skardhr. It
is again repeated in Bealach na Sgairde in
Portree, with somewhat ugly emphasis.

Armadale is Norse, meaning ' bay-dale.'

Skulamus (Strath) seems to be for Skull's
moss, while Strolamus must be for Sturli's moss
(for u as 6, compare Knoydart, which has a
liquid also).

Broadford is a modern name, not Norse.

Tahsker, G. Tallasgar, N. T-hallr-sker,
' Sloping rock.'

Eist (Duirinish), a Chersonese, is from hestr,
horse, that is, 'horse-shaped.' Otherwise, as
in Eilean Heist, it really means ' Horse'-isle.

180 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE.

Greshornisli (Duirinish), pronounced Grls-
innis now usually, is for Grice or Pig Ness.

Eigj^ (Snizort) and Digg (G. Dig) are respec-
tively from Norse hryggr, ridge, and dik, a ditch.
Duntulm is the dim of the holmr, islet.
Staflin, 'The Staff,' from N. stafr, a staff,
applied to basaltic and other pillared rocks, as m
Staff a (basalt isle) and Dunstafnage (Dun-
staffynch, 1309), Dun-stafa-nes.

Loch Arkaig (Lochaber), river Arkaig, from
Celtic root arc, dark, W. erch, dusky; Loch
Arklet, Stirling.

Corpacli, ' place of bodies.' Here, it is said,
the bodies carried to Zona for burial rested to
await sailing.

Banavie, Banvy (1461); compare Banff,
Bamff, also Banba, an old name for Ireland,
from hanhh, a pig. For meaning, compare
Mucrach and Muckerach (Kilmorack), Pres-
Mucrach, mucrach meaning ' Place of Pigs.'

Fersit, Farset (Bleau), from obsolete /earsaicf,
sandbank at the mouth of a river, whence also
Belfast.

Fassfern, G. Fasaidh-fearn, ' Abode or stead
of the alders.'

Glen-quoich, Glen of the Cuaich river, the
river of cuachs or bends. It is a common river
name.

Loch Oich; Oich points to a Celtic Utaka,
root lit, dread , * awesome.'

PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE. 181

Vinegar Hill, Gaick, is in Gaelic ' A Mhin
Choiseachd,' the easy walking. The English is
a fancy name.

Ettridge is for Eadar-dha-eas, ' Between two
falls.' NessintuUich, EssintuUich (1645), is for
'- Water-fall of the hillock.' Phoines is for Fo 'n
eas, ' Below the fall.' So with Phoineas in Kil-
tarlity.

Coylum Bridge; Gaehc, Cuing' leum, ' Nar-
row leap,' which it is.

Achnacoichen (Rothiemurchus), ' Field of
the Owls ' ; so in Lochaber — Achnacochine, in
1509 Auchancheithin.

Eothiemoon (Abernethy), G. Rat a' mhoin,
'Rath or stead of the peat-moss.

Pityoulish, in Abernethy, older Pitgaldish, is
Pictish in prefix, root, and termination {-ais).
The root word is geall, pronounced hke the word
for ' promise.' It is found in many river names :
Geldie Burn, running into Upper Dee; Aber-
geldie; Innergeldie near Comrie; Innergelly in
Fife (river Gelly); perhaps Lochgelly there;
Glen-geoulhe near Cawdor; AUt Gheallaidh at
Dalnacardoch and Knockando. The root is
geld, as in Norse kelda, a well, Ger. quelle,
already mentioned in connection with St Kilda.
A shorter form of the root is found in G. geal, a
leech, root gel, water. Compare Welsh Aber-
gele.

182 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SEIRE.

Granish (Duthil), G. Greanais (Gren-), for
older Granais, apparently from grain, abhor-
rence; but likely Pictish, denoting ' rough place,'
from the same root and stem. The place figures
largely in Druid lore and writings on account of
its stone circles, and is consequently called
Grianais, ' Sun-place,' which does not agree
with the modern pronunciation.

Aviemore, G. Agaidh-mhor; there is also
Avinlochan, the Avie of the loch. Gallovie, as
in G. Gealagaidh and present Blairgie, waa
writtetn in 1603 as Blairovey — both in Laggan.
Ayaidh may be Pictish; compare Welsh ag, cleft,
opening, Gaelic eag.

Craigellachie, whence the war cry of the
Grants, has its name from eileach, place of
rocks, rock, old Gaelic ail, rock. It is a much
be-bouldered and rock-ribbed bare hill.

Morile (Strathdearn), G. Moir'l, seems to
stand for a Pictish Mor-ialon, ' Large clearing,'
Welsh ial, open space. Hence, too, Balmoral.

Kyllachy, G. Coileachaigh, ' Place of moor
cocks.'

The Cuigs of Strathdearn, or fifth parts, are
famous : " Is fhe^rr aon choige' an Eireann na
coig choige' an Strath-Eireann " — "Better is
one fifth in Ireland than the five fifths in Strath-
dearn." The Irish fifth is a province, such as
Ulster. The ' Cuigs ' were — Ciiig-na-fionn-

PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE. 183

druinich (' Bronze Place,' perhaps a smith's
place), Cuig-na(n)-scalan (tents or huts), Cuig-
na-sith (fairy hill, near is the Sidh-bheinn, the
Schiphein of the charters), Cuig-na-fearn
(alders), and, likely, Ciiig-na-muille (mill).

Scaniport, ' Cleft of the Ferry,' over the
Ness.

Foyers, old Foyer, for old Gaehc fothir, good
land, evidently ' low-lying land,' as the land of
Foyers along Lochness is.

Allt-saidh (Glen-Urquhart), ' Burn of the
hound (female).'

Fort- Augustus, from William Augustus, Duke
of Cumberland, so named by General Wade,
circ. 1730.

Fort- William, the fort built at Auchintore
(Bleaching-field) for William of Orange; also
Maryburgh for the village, from Mary, his con-
sort; then Gordonsburgh, from the dukes of
Gordon, who disliked ' Orange ' ; and Duncans-
burgh, on the ' passing ' of the Gordons, from
Sir Duncan Cameron of Fassfearn; and now
finally settled as Fort- William.

Fort-George, built in 1748, takes its name
from the King. The original Fort-George was
the Castle of Inverness.

Essich, Essy in 1456, a locative of easach,
water-fall stream, rapidly falling stream. The
name exists in Strathbogie, Forfar, and Moray.

184 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE.

Castle Heather presents an interesting ' ghost
name.' Further back it was Castle-leather,
older Lathir, and we find the Lordship of Leffare
(1456) apphed to the district along the slope
there. It comes from leathair, a side, found in
Leathair nam Manach, at Beauly, ' Monks' Side
of the Valley,' 'Monks' Hillside '—the Kil-
morack district east of Breakachy Burn. In the
west, we have An Leathair Mhorairneach and An
Leathair Mhuileach — the coastland of Morvern
and of Mull.

Culloden, Cullodyn in 1238, present GaeUc
Cuil-fhodair, 'Fodder-nook,' by popular etymo-
logy. It really comes from lodan, a pool, and
means ' Back of Pool,' or ' Nook of Pool.' As
in many similar cases, there is quite a shower of
* cuils ' near Culloden, going over the Nairn
valley, ending with Cuil-chuinneig, ' Nook of the
iwooden pail,' apparently. It was here that
Prince Charles' staff was stationed before the
battle.

Brochnain is for Bruach 'n-eidheinn, ' Ivy
Bank.'

Tomnahuirich, GaeHc of 1690 Toim-m-
hurich, ' Hillock of the Yew-wood.' The Ward-
law MS. gives both Tomnihurich and Tom ni
Fyrich. This last may account for the deriva-
tion of the name from Tom-na-fiodhraich, fiodh-
rach being alleged to mean 'wood' (A. Mac-

PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SHIRE. 185

kenzie in Inverness Field Club Trans., III., p.

11).

Erchless, a quoad-sacra parish, (H)erchely8
in 1258, Ercles, 1403, Arcles, 1512, appears to
stand for air-glais, On the Glass — the river Glass
passes through the Mains of Erchless. Compare
the neighbouring Urray from Air-rath, On-fort
or Repaired Fort, and Urquhart and Urchany of
Beauly and Nairn (air-canach). The Gaelic is
Air-ghlais.

Glen Affric takes its name, as does the loch,
from the river Affric, which has the old female
name Afric or Oirig (Euphemia), and which
comes from ath-hreac, somewhat-speckled, from
hreac, speckled, a trout. Here it was no doubt
a water-nymph's name.

Glen-Con vinth and Convent, which was an
old parish, appears in old records as Conveth and
Conway, and in Gaelic the name is Confhadh-
aich, which, appHed to the river, means ' noisy,
stormy,' from cvnfhadh, storm.

Lovat, older Loveth, seems a Pictish word
(root lu, stem lu-vo, mud) translated into Gaelic
as A' Mhor'oich, the sea-side plain or swamp.

Two districts of Inverness-shire have had
their names discussed in detail, and both can be
relied upon as much as any work done in this
paper. The districts are Badenoch, which is
considered in the Transactions of the Gaelic

186 PLACE-NAMES OF INVERNESS-SUIRE.

Society of Inverness, Vol. XVI., pp. 148-97,
and Urquhart and Glenmoriston, the place-names
of which are fully discussed in Dr Mackay's
work, " Urquhart and Glenmoriston," pp. 5 TI-
BS.

BADENOCH:

ITS HISTORY, CLANS
AND PLACE-NAMES

Mil; iTh

BADENOCH:

ITS HISTORY, CLANS, AND PLACE-
NAMES

THE LOEDSHIP OF BADENOCH.

Badenoch is one of the most interior districts
of Scotland; it lies on the northern watershed
of the mid Grampians, and the lofty ridge of
the Monadhlia range forms its northern
boundary, while its western border runs along
the centre of the historic Drum-Alban. Even
on its eastern side the mountains seem to have
threatened to run a barrier across, for
Craigellachie thrusts its huge nose forward into
a valley already narrowed by the massive form
of the Ord Bain and the range of hills behind
it. This land of mountains is intersected by
the river Spey, which runs midway between the
two parallel ranges of the Grampians and the

190 BADENOCH :

Monadhlia, taking its rise, however, at the ridge
of Drum-Alban. Badenoch, as a habitable
land, is the valley of the Spey and the glens that
run off from it. The vast bulk of the district is
simply mountain.

In shape, the district of Badenoch is
rectangular, with east-north-easterly trend, its
length averaging about thirty-two miles, and its
breadth some seventeen miles. Its length along
the line of the Spey is thirty-six miles, the river
itself flowing some 35 miles of the first part of
its course through Badenoch. The area of
Badenoch is, according to the Ordnance Survey,
551 square miles, that is, close on three hundred
and fifty-three thousand acres. The lowest
level in the district is 700 feet; Kingussie, the
" capital," is 740 feet above sea-level, and
Loch Spey is 1142 feet. The highest peak is
4149 feet high, a shoulder of the Braeriach
ridge, which is itself outside Badenoch by about
a mile, and Ben Macdui by two miles. Moun-
tains and rivers, rugged rocks and narrow glens,
with one large medial vallev fringed with culti-
vation — that is Badenoch. It is still well
wooded, though nothing to what it once must
have been. The lower gi'ound at one time must
have been completely covered by wood, which
spread away into the vales and glens ; for we find
on lofty plateaux and hill sides the marks of
early cultivation, the ridges and the rigs or

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 191

feannagan, showing that the lower ground was
not very available for crops on account of the
forest, which, moreover, was full of wild beasts,
notably the wolf and the boar. Cultivation,
therefore, ran mostly along the outer fringe of
this huge wood, continually encroaching on it as
generation succeeded generation.

The bogs yield abundant remains of the once
magnificent forest that covered hillside and glen,
and the charred logs prove that lire was the
chief agent of destruction. The tradition of the
country has it that the wicked Queen Mary set
fire to the old Badenoch forest. She felt
offended at her husband's pride in the great
forest — he had asked once on his home return
how his forests were before he asked about her.
So she came north, took her station on the top
of Sron-na-Baruinn — the Queen's Ness — above
Glenfeshie, and there gave orders to set the
woods on fire. And her orders were obeved.
The Badenoch forest was set burning, and the
Queen, Nero-like, enjoyed the blaze from her
point of vantage.^ But many glens and nooks
escaped, and Eothiemurchus was left practically
intact. The Sutherlandshire version of the
story is different and more mythic. The King
of Lochlann was envious of the great woods of
Scotland; the pine forests especially roused his
jealous ire. So he sent his muime — it must

1 Queen Mary ravaged Huntly's lands, and burnt the woods.

192 BADENOCH :

have been — a witch and a monster, whose name
was Dubh-Ghiubhais, and she set the forests on
fire in the north. She kept herself aloft among
the clouds, and rained down fire on the woods,
which burnt on with alarming rapidity. People
tried to get at the witch, but she never showed
herself, but kept herself enveloped in a cloud
of smoke. When she had burned as far as
Badenoch, a clever man of that district devised
a plan for compassing her destruction. He
gathered together cattle of all kinds and their
young; then he separated the lambs from the
sheep, the calves from the cows, and the young
generally from their dams ; then such a noise of
bleating, lowing, neighing, and general Babel
arose to the heaven that Dubh-Ghiubhais popped
her head out of the cloud to see what was wrong.
This was the moment for action. The Badenoch
man was ready for it ; he had his gun loaded with
the orthodox sixpence; he fired, and down came
the Dubh-Ghiubhais, a hfeless lump ! So a part
of the great Caledonian forest was saved amons
the Grampian hills.

Modern Badenoch comprises the parishes of
Laggan, Kingussie and Insh, and Alvie; but the
old Lordship of Badenoch was too aristocratic
to do without having a detached portion some-
where else. Consequently we find that Kincar-
dine parish, now part of Abernethy, was part
of the Lordship of Badenoch even later than

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 193

1606, Vv^lien Huntly excambed it with John of
Freuchie for lands in Glenhvet. Kincardine
was always included in the sixty davachs that
made up the land of Badenoch. The Barony of
Glencarnie in Duthil — from Aviemore to Garten
and northward to Inverlaidnan — was seemingly
attached to the Lordship of Badenoch for a time,
and so were the davachs of Tullochgorum, Curr,
and Clurie, further down the Spey, excambed by
Huntly in 1491 with John of Freuchie. On the
other hand, Eothiemurchus was never a part oi
Badenoch, though some have maintained that ii
was. . The six davachs of Hothiemurchus be-
longed to the Bishops of Moray, and at times
they feued the whole of Eothiemurchus to some
powerful person, as to the Wolf of Badenoch iii
1383, and to Alexander Keyr Mackintosh in
1464, in whose family it was held till 1539, when
it passed into the hands of the Gordons, and
from them to the Grants.

Badenoch does not appear in early Scottish
history; till the 13th century, we never hear of
it by name nor of anything that took place witli-
in its confines. True, Skene, in his CeUir
Scotland, definitely states that the battle of
Monitcarno was fought here in 729. Thi.s
battle took place between Angus, King of
Fortrenn, and Nectan, the ex-king of the Picts,
and in it the latter was defeated, and Angus

13

194 BADENOCH :

shortly afterwards established himself on the
Pictish throne. We are told that the scene of
the battle was ' ' Monitcarno jiixta stagnum
Loogdae " — Monadh-carnach by the side of
Loch Loogdae. Adamnan also mentions Loch-
dae, which Columba falls in with while going
ijwer Drum Alban. Skene says that Loch Insh
— the lake of the island — is a secondary name,
and that it must have originally been called
Lochdae, that the hills behind it enclose fthe
valley of Glencarnie, and that Dunachton, by
the side of Loch Insh, is named Nectan's fort
af)ter King Nectan. Unfortunately this view is
wrong, and Badenoch must give up any claim
to be the scene of the battle of Monadh-carno ;
Lochdae is now identified with Lochy, and Glen-
carnie is in'Duthil. But Dunachton is certainly
Nectan's fort; whether the Nectan meant was
the celebrated Pictish King may be doubted.
Curiously, local tradition holds strongly that a
battle was fought by the side of Loch Insh, but
the defeated leader was King Harold, whose
grave is on the side of Craig Righ Harailt.

From 729, we jump at once to 1229, exactly
five hundred years, and about that date we find
that Walter Cumyn is feudal proprietor of
Padenoch, for he makes terms with the Bishop
of Moray in regard to the church lands and to
the " natives " or bondsmen in the district. It
has been supposed that Walter Cumyn came into

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 195

the possession of Badenoch by the forfeiture and
death of Gillescop, a man who committed some
atrocities in 1228— such as burning the
(wooden) forts in the province of Moray, and
setting fire to a large part of the town of Inver-
ness. Wilham Cumyn, Earl of Buchan, the
justiciar, was intrusted with the protection of
Moray, and in 1229 Gillescop and his two sons
were slain. Thereafter we find Walter Cumyn
in possession of Badenoch and Kincardine, and
it is a fair inference that Gillespie was his pre-
decessor in the lordship of Badenoch. The
Cummings were a Norman family; they came
over with the Conqueror, and it is asserted that
they were nearly related to him by marriage.
In 1068, we hear of one of them being governor
or earl of Northumberland, and the name is
\3ommon in English charters of the 12th century,
in the early part of which they appear in Scot-
land; they were in great favour with the
Normanising David, and with William after him,
fining offices of chancellors and justiciars under
them. William Cumyn, about the year 1210,
married Marjory, heiress of the Earldom of
Buchan, and thus became the successor of the
eld Celtic Mormaers of that district under the
title of Earl of Buchan. His son Walter
obtained the lordship of Badenoch, as we saw,
and, a year or two after, he became Earl of
Menteith by marrying the heiress, the Countess

196 BADENOCH I

of Menteith. He still kept the lands of
Badenoch, for, in 1234, we find him, as Earl of
Menteith, settling a quarrel with the Bishop of
Moray over the Church lands of Kincardine.
Walter was a potent factor in Scottish pohtics,
and in the minority of Alexander III. acted
patriotically ias leader against the pro-English
party. He died in 1257 without issue. John
Comyn, his nephew, son of Eichard, succeeded
him in Badenoch; he was head of the whole
family of Comyn, and possessed much property,
though simply entitled Lord of Badenoch. The
Comyns at that time were at the height of their
power; they could muster at least two earls, the
powerful Lord of Badenoch, and thirty belted
knights. Comyn of Badenoch was a prince,
though not in name, making treaties and kings.
John Comyn, called the Eed, died in 1274, and
was succeeded by his son, John Comyn, the
Black, and in the troubles about the kingly
succession, at the end of the century, he was
known as John de Badenoch, senior, to distin-
guish him from his son John, the Eed Comyn,
the regent, Baliol's nephew, and claimant to
the throne, whom Bruce killed under circum-
stances of treachery at Dumfries, in 1306.
Then followed the fall and forfeiture of the
Comyns, and the lordship of Badenoch was
given, about 1313 — included in the Earldom of

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 197

Moray — to Thomas Randolph, Bruce' s right-
hand friend.

The Cummings have left an ill name behind
them in Badenoch for rapacity and cruelty.

Their treachery has passed into a proverb —

" Fhad bhitheas craobh 's a choill
Bithidh foill 'sna Cuiminich."

Which is equally smart in its English form —

' ' While in the wood there is a tree
A Gumming will deceitful be."

It is in connection with displacing the old pro-
prietors— the Shaws and Mackintoshes — that (.he
il] repute of the Cummings was really gained.
Bu(, the particular cases which tradition remem-
bers are mythical in the extreme; yet there is
something in the traditions. There is a remem-
brance that these Cummings were the first feudal
lords of Badenoch; until their time the Gaehc
Tuath that dwelt in Badenoch had lived under
their old tribal customs, with their tbiseachs,
their aires, and their saor and daor occupiers
of land. The newcomers, with their charters,
their titles, and their new exactions over and
above the old Tuath tributes and dues, must
have been first objects of wonder, and then of
disgust. The authority which the Cummings
exerted over the native inhabitants must often
have been in abeyance, and their rents more a
matter of name than reality. However, by

198 BADENOCH :

making it the interest of the chiefs to side with
them, and by granting them charters, these
initial difficulties were got over in a century or
two. It was under this feudahsing process that
the system of clans, as now known, was
developed.

Earl Randolph died in 1332, and his tvro
sons were successively Earls of Moray, the
second dying in 1346 without issue, when
" Black Agnes," Countess of Dunbar,
succeeded to the vast estates. The Earldcm of
Moray, exclusive of Badenoch and Lochaber,
was renewed to her son in 1372.^ Meanwhile,
in 1371 Alexander Stewart, King Robert's son,
was made Lord of Badenoch by his father, as
also Earl of Buchan ; and in 1387 he became Earl
of Ross through his marriage with the Countess
Euphame. His power was therefore immense;
he was the King's lieutenant in the North (locum

1 Sir W. Fraser, in his " History of tlie Grants," says :
— " After the forfeiture of the Comyns, Badenoch formed a
part of the earldom of Mora}% conferred on Sir Thomas Ean-
dolph. In 1338, however, it was held by the Earl of Eoss,
and in 1372, while granting the Earldom of Moray to John
Dunbar, King Robert II. specially excepted Lochaber and
Badenoch." Sir W. Eraser's authority for saying that
Badenoch was in the possession of the Earl of Ross must be
the charter of 1338 granting Kiurara and Dalnavert to Mel-
moran of Gleucharny; but a careful reading of that document
shows that the Earl of Ross was not superior of Badenoch,
for he speaks of the services due by him to the " Lord superior
of Badenoch." Besides, in 1467, wh^n Huntly was Lord of
Badenoch, we find the Earl of Ross still possessing lands
there, viz., Invermarkie, which he gives to Cawdor as part of
his daughter's dovirry.

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 199

tenens in horealihus partihus regni) ; but such
was the turbulence and ferocity of his character
that he was called the "Wolf of Badenoch."
He is still remembered in the traditions of the
country as " Alastair Mor Mac an Eigh " —
Alexander the Big, Son of the King — a title
which is recorded also in Maurice Buchanan's
writings (a.d. 1461, Book of Pluscarden), who
says that the wild Scots (Scotis silvestrihus)
called him " Ahtstar More Makin Ee." Natur-
ally enough he gets confused with his famous
namesake of Macedon, also Alastair Mor, but the
more accurate of tradition-mongers differentiate
them easily, for they call Alexander the Great
" Alastair Uabh'rach, Mac Eigh Phihp" — Alex-
ander the Proud, son of King Philip." This
epithet of uahh'rach or uaihhreach appears as
applied to Alexander the Great in that beautiful
mediaeval Gaelic poem that begins —

" Ceathrar do bhi air uaigh an fhir
Feart Alaxandair Uaibhrigh :
Eo chansat briathra cen bhreicc
Os cionn na flatha 6 Fhinnghreicc."

Translated —

Four men were at a hero's grave —

The tomb of Alexander the Proud;

Words they spake without lies

Over the chief from beauteous Greek-land.^

1 See " Dean of Lismore," p. 84; Ranald Macdonald's CSol-
lection, p. 133, and Highland Monthly, II., p. 376. ("Ihe
above is from a British Museum MS.).

200 BADENOCH :

The Wolf of Badenoch's dealings with his
inferiors in his lordship are not known ; but that
he allowed lawlessness to abound may be in-
ferred from the feuds that produced the Battle
of Invernahavon (circ. 1386), and culminated
in the remarkable conflict on the North Inch of
Perth in 1396. We are not in much doubt as
to his conduct morally and ecclesiastically. He
had five natural-born sons— Alexander, Earl of
Mar, Andrew, Walter, James, and Duncan — a
regular Wolf's brood for sanguinary embroil-
ments. He had a chronic quarrel with Alex-
ander Bur, Bishop of Moray, w^hich culminated
in the burning of Elgin Cathedral in 1390. But
in nearly every case the Bishop, by the terrors
of the Curse of Eome, gained his point. In
1380, the Wolf cited the Bishop to appear be-
fore him at the Standing Stones of the Eathe
of Easter Kingussie (apud le standand slanys de
le Eathe de Kyngucy estir) on the 10th October,
to show his titles to the lands held in the Wolf's
lordship of Badenoch, viz., the lands of Logach-
nacheny (Laggan), Ardinche (Balnespick, &c.),
Kingucy, the lands of the Chapels of Eate and
Nachtan, Kyncardyn, and also Gartinengally.
The Bishop protested, at a court held at Inver-
ness, against the citation, and urged that the
said lands were held of the King direct. But
the Wolf held his court on the 10th October : the
Bishop standing "extra curiam" — outside the

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 201

couri, i.e., the Standing Stones — renewed his
protest, but to no purpose. But upon the next
day before dinner, and in the great chamber
behind the hall in the Castle of Euthven, the
Wolf annulled the proceedings of the previous
day, and gave the rolls of Court to the Bishop's
notary, who certified that he put them in a large
fire lighted in the said chamber, which consumed
them. In 1381, the Wolf form.ally quits claims
on the above-mentioned church lands, but in
1383 the Bishop granted him the vv^ide domain
of Rothiemurchus — " Ratmorchus, viz., sex
davatas terre quas habemus in Strathspe et le
Badenach " — six davochs of land it was. The
later quarrels of the Wolf and the Bishop are
notorious in Scotch History : the Wolf seized
the Bishop's lands, and was excommunicated,
in return for which he burnt, in 1390, the towns
of Forres and Elgin, with the Church of St Giles,
the maison dieu, the Cathedral, and 18 houses
of the canons. For this he had to do penance
in the Blackfriar's Church at Perth. He died
in 1394, and is buried in Dunkeld, where a hand-
some tomb and effigy of him exist.

As the Wolf left no legitimate issue, some
think the Lordship of Badenoch at once reverted
to the Crown, for we hear no more of it till it
was granted to Huntly in 1451. On this point
Sir W. Fraser says: — "The Lordship of
Badenoch was bestowed by King Eobert II. upon

202 BADENOCH :

his son, the ' Wolf of Badenoch,' in 1371, and
should have reverted to the Crown on the Lord
of Badenoch' s death in 1394. But there is no
evidence in the Exchequer Eolls, or elsewhere,
of any such reversion, and Badenoch seems to
have been retained in possession by the Wolf of
Badenoch's eldest son, who became Earl of Mar.
. . . Alexander, Earl of Mar, and his father,
were therefore the successors of the Comyns as
Lords of Badenoch."

The Lordship of Badenoch was finally
granted to Alexander, Earl of Huntly, by James
II., by charter dated 28th April, 1451, not in
recompense for his services at the Battle of
Brechin, as is generally stated, but upwards of a
year before that event. The great family of
Gordon and Huntly originally came from near
the Borders. Tliev obtained their name of
Gordon from the lands of Gordon, now a parish
and village in the west of the Merse, S.W.
Berwickshire. There, also, was the quondam
hamlet of Huntly, a name now represented there
only by the farm called Huntly wood. The
parish gave the family name of Gordon, and the
hamlet of Huntly gave the title of Earl or
Marquess of Huntly. Sir Adam de Gordon was
one of Bruce' s supporters, and after the for-
feiture of the Earl of Athole he got the lordship
of Strathbogie, with all its appurtenances, in
Aberdeenshire and Banff. The direct male

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 203

Gordon line ended with Sir Adam's great-grand-
son and namesake, who fell at the battle of
Homildon Hill in 1402, leaving a daughter
Elizabeth, who married Alexander Seaton,
second son of Sir W. Seaton of Winton. Her
son Alexander assumed the name of Gordon,
and was created Earl of Huntly in 1449. His
son George was Lord Chancellor, founded
Gordon Castle, and created the Priory of
Kingussie (Shaw's Moray). The Gordons were
so pre-eminent in Northern politics that their
head was nicknamed " Cock of the North."
In 1599, Huntly was created a Marquis, and in
1684 the title was advanced to that of Duke Df
Gordon. George, the fifth and last Duke of
Gordon, died in 1836, when the property passed
into the possession of the Duke of Eichmond and
Lennox, as heir of entail, in whose person the
title of Duke of Gordon was again revived ;n
1786, the full title being now Duke of Richmond
and Gordon.

Save the Church lands, all the property in
Badenoch belonged to Huntly either as superior
or actual proprietor. The Earl of Ross
possessed lands in Badenoch under the lord
superior in 1338, which he granted to Malmoran
of Glencarnie : the lands were Dalnavert and
Kinrara, and the grant is confirmed about 1440,
while in 1467 we find the Earl of Ross again
granting the adjoining lands of Invermarkie to

204 BADENOCH :

the Thane of Cawdor, in whose name they
appear till the seventeenth century, when Inver-
eshie gets possession of them. The Laird of
C J rant, besides Delfour, which he had for three
centuries, also held the Church lands of Laggan
and Insh, that is, " Logane, Ardinche, Bally-
naspy," as it is stated in 1541, and he is in
possession of them for part of the seventeenth
century. Mackintosh of Mackintosh has in feu
from Huntly in the sixteenth century the lands
of Benchar, Clune, Kincraig, and Dunachton,
with Rait, Kinrara, and Dalnavert. The only
other proprietor or feuar besides these existing
in the 16th century seems to have been James
Mackintosh of Cask. The Macphersons, for
instance, including Andrew in Cluny, who
signed for Huntly the " Clan Farsons Band." of
1591, are all tenants merely. We are very
fortunate in possessing the Huntly rental of
Badenoch for the year 1603. Mackintosh ap-
pears as feuar for the lands above mentioned,
and there are tvN^o wadsetters — Cask and Strone,
both Mackintoshes. The 17th century sees
quite a revolution in landholding in Badenoch,
for during its course Huntly has liberally granted
feus, and the proprietors are accordingly very
numerous. Besides Huntly, Mackintosh, and
Grant of Grant, we find some twenty feus or
estates possessed by Macphersons; there was a
Macpherson of Ardbrylach, Balchroan, Benchar,

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 205

(in) Blarach, Breakachie, Clune, Cluny,
Corranach, Crathie, Dalraddy, Delfour,
Etteridge, Gasklyne, Gellovie, Invereshie,
Invernahaven (Inverallochie), Invertromie,
Nuid, Phones, and Pitchirn. There vv^as a Mac-
kintosh of Balnespick, Benchar, Delfour, Gask,
Kinrara, Lynwilg, Rait and Strone — eight in all.
Four other names appear once each besides
these during the century — Maclean, Gordon of
Buckie, Macqueen, and Macdonald. The total
valuation of Badenoch in 1644 was £11,527
Scots, in 1691 £6523, and in 1789 it was
£7124, with only seven proprietors — Duke of
Gordon, Mackintosh, Cluny, Invereshie, Belle-
ville, Grant of Grant (Delfour), and Major
Gordon (Invertromie). The " wee lairdies " of
the previous two centuries were swallowed up
in the estates of the first five of these big pro-
prietors, who still hold large estates in
Badenoch, the Duke of Gordon being repre-
sented by the Duke of Richmond since 1836.
Only one or two other proprietors on any large
scale have come in since — Baillie of Dochfour,
Su' John Ramsden, and, we may add, Macpher-
son of Glentruim. The valuation roll for 1889-
90 shows a rental of £36,165 lis 7d sterling.

206 BADENOCH :

CLAN CHATTAN.

In the above section we discussed the
pohtical history of Badenoch, under the title of
the "Lordship of Badenoch," and in this
section we intend to deal with the history of the
native population of that district. Badenoch
was the principal seat of the famous and power-
ful Clan Chattan. The territory held by this
clan, hov/ever, was far from being confined to
Badenoch ; for at the acme of their power in the
15th century. Clan Chattan stretched across mid
Inverness-shire, almost from sea to sea — from
the Inverness Firth to near the end of Loch-eil,
that is, from Petty right along through Strath-
nairn, Strathdearn, and Badenoch to Brae-
Lochaber, with a large overflow through Rothie-
murchus into Braemar, which was the seat of
the Jarquharsons, who are descendants of the
Shaws or Mackintoshes of Rothiemurchus. The
Clan Chattan were the inhabitants of this vast
extent of territory, but the ownership or
si^eriority of the land was not theirs or their
chiefs', and the leading landlords they had to
deal with were the two powerful Earls of Huntly
and Moray. From them, as superiors. Mackin-
tosh, chief of Clan Chattan, held stretches of
land here and there over the area populated by
the clan, and his tribesmen were tacksmen or
feu-holders of the rest, as the case might be,,

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 207

under Moray or Huntly. It was rather an
anomalous position for a great Highland chief,
and one often difficult to maintain. Major
(1621) describes the position, territorially and
otherwise, of the Clans Chattan and Cameron in
words which may be thus translated : — ' ' These
tribes are kinsmen, holding little in lordships,
but following one head of their race (caput
progenei— ceann cinnidh) as chief, with their
friends and dependents." The lordships were
held, alas ! by foreigners to them in race and
blood.

The Clan Chattan were the native Celtic in-
habitants of Badenoch. There are traditional
indications that they came from the west— from
Lochaber, where the MS. histories place the old
Clan Chattan lands. The same authorities rs-
oord that, for instance, the Macbeans came from
Lochaber in the 14th century, " after slaying
the Eed Comyn's captain of Inverlochy," and
put themselves under the protection of Mackin-
tosh; and this is supported by the tradition still
preserved among the Eothiemurchus Macbeans,
whose ancestor, Bean Cameron, had to fly
Lochaber owing to a quarrel and slaughter
arising from the exaction of the " bo ursainn,"
or probate duty of the time. It may be too bold
to connect this eastern movement of Clan
Chattan with the advancing tide of Scotic con-
quest in the 8th century, whereby the Pictish

208 BADENOOH :

kingdoms aiid the Pictish language were over-
thrown. That thePicts inhabited Badenoch is
undoubted : the place names amply prove that,
for we meet with such test prefixes as Pet
(PitowTie, Pictchirn, Pitmean) and Aber (Aber-
arder), and other difficulties of topography un-
explainable by the Gaelic language. As in most
of Scotland, we have doubtless to deal, first,
with a pre-Celtic race or races, possibly leaving
remnants of its tongue in such a river name as
Feshie, then the Pictish or Caledonian race of
Celtic extraction, and, lastly, the Gaelic race
who imposed their language and rule upon the
previous peoples. The clan traditions are sup-
ported in the matter of a western origin for the
Clan Chattan by the genealogies given in the
Edinburgh 1467 MS., which deduces the chief
line from Ferchar Fota, King of Dalriada, in the
7th century.

The name Cattan, like everything connected
with the early history of this clan, is obscure,
and has, in like manner, given rise to many
absurd stories and theories. As a matter of
course, the classical geography of Europe has
been ransacked, and there, in Germany, was a
people called Chatti, which was taken as pro-
nounced Catti ; but the ch stands for a sound like
that in loch. The name appears as Hesse for
Hatti. It was never Katti, be it remembered.
Yet the Catti are brought from Germany to

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 209

Sutheiiandshire, which in GaeHc is Cataibh,
older Cataib — a name supposed thus to be de-
rived from the Catti. Cataibh is merely the
dative plural of cat (a cat), just as Gallaibh
(Caithness) is the same case of Gall (a stranger,
Norseman). The Cat men dwelt in Sutherland-
shire; why they were called the Cats is not
known. Clan Chattan is often said to be
originally from Sutherland, but, beyond the
similarity of name, there is no shadow of evid-
ence for the assertion. Others again, like Mr
Elton, see in the name Catan, which means, un-
doubtedly, " little cat," rehcs of totemism; this
means neither more nor less than that the pre-
Christian Clan Chattan worshipped the cat, from
whom, as divine ancestor, they deemed them-
selves descended. We might similarly argue
that the Mathesons — Mac .Mhath-ghamhuin or
Son of the Bear — were a " bear " tribe, a fact
which shows how unstable is the foundation on
which this theory is built. In fact, animal
names for men were quite common in early
times. The favourite theory — and one coun-
tenanced by the genealogies — connects the Clan
Chattan, like so many other clans, with a
church-derived name. The ancestor from
whom they are represented as deriving their
name is Gilhcattan Mor, who lived in the lltli
century. His name signifies Servant of Catan,

U

210 BADENOCH :

that is, of St Catan ; for people were named after
saints, not directly, but by means of the prefixes
Gille and Maol. At least, that was the early
and more reverent practice. That there was a
St Catan is evidenced by such place names as
Kilchattan (in Bute and Lung), with dedication
of churches at Gigha and Colonsay. His date
is given as 710, but really nothing is known of
him. This is probably the best explanation of
the name, though the possibility of the clan
being named after some powerful chief called
Catan must not be overlooked. The crest of the
cat is late, and merely a piece of mild heraldic
punning.

It is only about or after 1400 that we come
on anything like firm historical ground in the
genealogy and story of our chief Highland clans.
This is true of the Grants and the Camerons, and
especially true of the Clan Chattan. Every-
thing before that is uncertainty and fable. The
earliest mention of Clan Chattan — and it is not
contemporary but fifty years later — is in con-
nection with the fight at the North Inch of Perth
in 1396, and here historians are all at sixes and
sevens as to who the contending parties really
were. The battle of Invernahavon (1386?) and
the fight at Clachnaharry (1454) are mere tra-
ditions, and the battle in 1429 between Clan
Chattan and Clan Chameron, in which the
former nearly annihilated the latter, is recorded

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 211

by a writer nearly a century later (1521). In
fact, the first certain contemporary date is that
of Mackintosh's charter in 1466 from the Lord
of the Isles, where he is designated Duncan Mac-
kintosh, " capitanus de Clan Chattan," and next
year as " chief and captain " of Clan Chattan,
in a bond with Lord Forbes. Henceforward,
Clan Chattan is a common name in public his-
tory and private documents. It comprised in
the period of its comparative unity (circ. 1400-
1600) some sixteen tribes or septs : these were
the Mackintoshes, Macphersons, Davidsons,
Cattanachs, Macbeans, Macphaiis, Shaws,
Farquharsons, Macgillivrays, Macleans of Doch-
garroch, Smiths, Macqueens, Gillanders, Clarks,
&c. Of this confederation, Mackintosh was for,
at least, two centuries " captain and chief/' ds
all documents, public and private, testify.
These two centuries (circ. 1400 to 1600) form
the only period in which we see, under the light
of history, the Highland clans in their full
development.

The 17th century made sad havoc in the
unity of Clan Chattan. Huntly, ever an eneiiiy
<o Mackintosh, "banded" in 1591 the Mac-
phersons to his own person, and, by freely
granting charters to them, made them inde-
pendent, and detached them from Mackintosh.
Macpherson of Cluny claimed to be head of the
Macphersons, and in 1673 styled himself

212 BADENOCH :

" Duncan jVPpherson of Cluney for himself, and
taking burden upon him for the heall name of
M^phersons and some others called old Clan-
chattan as cheeffe and principall man thereoff, ''
in a bond with Lord Macdonell of Morar. In
support of this claim, the Macphersons appealed
to the old genealogies, which represented Mac-
kintosh as getting the Clan Chattan lands by
marriage with the heiress in 1291, and which
further showed that Cluny was the heir male
descendant of the old Clan Chattan chiefs. Tiie
case in its solemn absurdity of appeal to
genealogies reminds one of a like appeal placed
before the Pope in the claims of King Edward
upon the throne of Scotland. He claimed the
Scottish crown as the direct successor of Brutus
and Albanactus, who lived in Trojan times,
every link of genealogy being given, while the
Scots repelled this by declaring that they were
descended from Gathelus husband of Scota,
daughter of the Mosaic King of Egypt ; and here,
too, all the genealogical links could have been
given. Neither doubted the genuineness of
each others' genealogies ! So with the Mackin-
tosh-Macpherson controversy about the chief-
ship of Clan Chattan. They each accept each
others' genealogies without suspicion or demur.
And yet the manufacture of these and like
genealogies was an accomplished art with Gaelic
seanachies whether Irish or Scottish. We even

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 213

see it going on under our very eyes. The early
chiefs of Lochiel are the de Camhruns of the
13th and 14th century records — hsts and other
documents — impressed into the Cameron
genealogy, which is doubtless correctly given m
the 1467 MS. Again, the Macpherson

genealogy in the Douglas Baronage is in several
cases drawn from charters granted to wholly
different famihes. Dormund Macpherson, 12th
chief, gets a charter under the great seal from
James IV. ; but the charter turns out to be one
granted to a Dormund M'Pherson in the Lord-
ship of Menteith, not of Badenoch ! John, 14th
of Cluny, who " was with the Earl of Huntly at
the battle of Glenlivet," as the veracious
chronicler says, to add a touch of realism to his
bald genealogical account, gets a charter of the
lands of Tullich, &c., lands which lie in Strath-
nairn, and he turns out to be a scion of the well-
known family of Macphersons of |Brin !
Similarly John, 15th of Cluny, is son of the
foregoing John of Brin; and Ewen, 16th of
Cluny, who gets a charter in 1623 of the lands
of Tullich, &c., is a cousin of Brin. Donald,
17th of Cluny, who gets a charter in 1643, turns
out to be Donald Macpherson of Nuid. And all
this time another and a correct genealogy of the
Cluny family had been drawn up by Sir ^Eneas
Macpherson towards the end of the 17th cen-
tiry, which must surely have been known to the

214 BADENOCH :

writer.^ During all the period of 14th to 16th
chief here given, there was only one man in
Cluny, and his name was Andrew Macpherson,
son of Ewen.

The name Mackintosh signifies the son of
the tbiseach or chief, which is Latinised by 0'
Flaherty as " capitaneus sen praecipuus dux."
The Book of Deer makes the relationship of
tbiseach to other dignitaries quite plain. There
is first the King; under him are the mormaers
or stewards of the great provinces of Scotland,
such as Buchan, Marr, and Moray; and next
comes the tbiseach or chief of the clan in a par-
ticular district. The two clans in the Book of
Deer are those of Canan and Morgan, each with
a tbiseach. This word is represented oftenest
in English in old documents by thane, which,
indeed, represents it with fair accuracy.
Tbiseach is the true Gaelic word for " chief,"
but it is now obsolete, and there is now no true
equivalent of the word ' ' chief ' ' in the
language at all. And here it may be pointed
out that the word chief itself was not at once
adopted or adapted for this particular meaning
of chief of a Highland clan. As we saw, the
word at first employed was " captain," then
" captain and chief," " captain, chief, and
principal man," " chief and principal," &c.,

1 See Mr Fraser-Mackint-osh'.s Dunachton, pp. 46-49, for a
full exposS of this remarkable piece of manufacture.

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 215

the idea finally settling down as fully represented
by the word "chief" in the 16th century.
Skene's attempt to argue that captain denoted a
leader temporarily adopted, leading the clan for
another, or usurping the power of another,
while chief denoted a hereditary office, is con-
demned by his own evidence, and by the weight
of facts. Besides, words do not suddenly spring
into technical meanings, nor could chief acquire
the definite meaning applicable to Highland
chief ship, but by length of time and usage for
this purpose. Hence arose the uncertainty of
the early terms applied to the novel idea pre-
sented by Highland clans. The word clan itself
appears first in literature in connection with
Clan Chattan, or rather Clan Qwhewyl, at the
North Inch of Perth, where Wyntown speaks of
'■ Clannys two." The Gaelic word clan had to
be borrowed for want of a native English term;
why should we then wonder at the idea of
toiseach being rendered first by captain, and
latterly by chief?

The Mackintosh genealogies, dating from the
1 7th century, represent the family as descended
fiom Macduff, thane of Fife, as they and Fordun
call him. Shaw Macduff, the second son of
Duncan, fifth Earl of Fife, who died in 1154, in
an expedition against the people of Moray in
1160, distinguished himself, and received from
the King lands in Petty, and the custody of

216 BADENOCH :

Inverness Castle. Here he was locally known
as Shaw Mac an Toiseich, " Shaw, the son of
the Thane." He died in 1179, and was suc-
ceeded by (2) Shaw, whose son was (3)
Ferchard, whose nephew was (4) Shaw, whose
son was (5) Ferchard, whose son was (6) Angus,
who in 1291 married Eva, heiress of Clan
Chattan, and thus got the Clan's land? in
Lochaber. So far the genealogy. It is a pretty
story, but it sadly lacks one thing — verisimili-
tude. Macduff was not toiseach of Fife. In
the Book of Deer he is called comes, the then
Gaelic of which was mormaer, now moirear.
Shaw Macduff would infallibly, as son of the
Earl of Fife, have been called Mac Mhoireir.
With those who support this Macduff genealogy,
no argument need be held; like the humorist of
a past generation, one would, however, like to
examine their bumps. The statement that the
Mackintoshes were hereditary constables of
Inverness Castle is totally baseless and false.
At the dates indicated (12th century) we believe
that the Mackintoshes had not penetrated so far
north as Petty or Inverness, and that we should
look to Badenoch as their place of origin, and
their abode at this time. Unfortunately docu-
ments in regard to the early history of Badenoch
are rare, but an entry or two in the Eegistrum
of Moray Diocese may help us. In 1234,
Walter Comyn, Earl of Monteith, comes to an

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 217

agreement with the Bishop of Moray, in regard
to Kincardine, and Fercard, son of Seth, is a
witness, and in the very next document, also
one of Walter Comyn's, of the same date, ap-
pears a witness called Fercard " Senescalli de
Badenoch," that is " steward of Badenoch."
We are quite justified in regarding him as the
person mentioned in the previous document as
Fercard, son of Seth. Now^ one translation of
toiseach is steward or seneschal — the person in
power next the mormaer or earl. We may,
therefore, conclude that this Ferchard was
known in Gaelic as Ferchard Toiseach. Similarly
in 1440 we meet with Malcolm Mackintosh, chief
of the clan, as " ballivus de Badenoch," a title
of equal import as that of seneschal. We
should then say that the Mackintoshes derived
their name from being toiseachs of Badenoch, the
head of the old Celtic clan being now under the
new non-Celtic mormaer or earl Walter Comyn.
The ease with which the name Mackintosh might
arise in any place where a clan and its tbueacl'
existed explains hov/ we meet with Ma(?kiji-
toshes, for instance, in Perthshire, who do not
belong to the Clan Chattan. Thus there were
Mackintoshes of Glentilt, which was held as an
old thanage, and whose history as such is well
known. Similarly we may infer that the Mac-
kintoshes of Monivaird were descendants of the
old local Toiseachs or Thanes. The Mackintosh

218 BADENOCH :

genealogists have of course annexed them to the
Clan Chattan stock with the utmost ease and
success. In 1456, John of the Isles granted to
Somerled, his armour bearer, a davoch of the
lands of Glennevis, with toiseachdorship of most
of his other lands there, and in 1552 this grant
is renewed by Huntly to " dilecto nostro
Donaldo MacAhster M'Toschd," that is,
Donald, son of Alister, son of Somerled, the
toiseach or bailif, named in 1456. This shows
how easily the name could have arisen.

Skene, while unceremoniously brushing
aside the Macduff genealogy, advances
hypothetically a different account of the origin
of the Mackintoshes. In 1382, the Lord of
Badenoch is asked to restrain Farchard Mac-
Toschy and his adherents from disturbing the
Bishop of Aberdeen and his tenants in the land
of Brass or Birse, and to oblige him to prosecute
his claim by form of law. Skene thinks that
Farchard, whom he finds in the 1467 MS. as one
of the "old" Mackintoshes, was descended
from the old thanes of Brass, and that hence
arose his name and his claim. Being a vassal
of the Wolf's, he was a Badenoch man too.
Rothiemurchus was a thanage, and the con-
nection of the Mackintoshes with it was always
close. Alexander Keir Mackintosh obtained
the feudal rights to Rothiemurchus in 1464, and
a few years later he styles himself " Thane of

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 219

Rothiemurchus." Skene then suggests that
Birse and Rothiemurchus might have anciently
been in the hands of the same toiseach or thane,
and that from him the Mackintoshes got their
name. We have suggested that the name arose
with Ferchard, son of Seth or Shaw, who was
toiseach under the Earl Walter Comyn in 1234,
and his name appears in the 1467 MS. genealogy
as well as in the Mackintosh genealogies.

That a revolution took place in the affairs of
Clan Chattan, with the overthrow or extrusion
of the direct line of chiefs, in the half century
that extends from about 1386 to 1436, is clear
from two sources — first, from the 1467 MS.,
and, second, from the Mackintosh history. The
latter acknowledges that Ferquhard, 9th chief,
was deposed from his position, which was given
to his uncle Malcolm. The reason why he had
to retire was, it is said, the clan's dissatisfaction
with his way of managing affairs ; but the matter
is glossed over in the history in a most unsatis-
factory manner. If this was the Ferchard men-
tioned in 1382 as giving trouble to the Bishop
of Aberdeen, it is most unlikely that he was an
incapable man; in fact, he must have been quite
the opposite. He is doubtless the same person,
for he is given also in the 1467 MS. genealogy.
But further confusion exists in the Mackintosh
account. Malcolm, 10th Mackintosh, who dies
in 1457, is grandson through Wilham 7th (died

220 BADENOCH :

1368) of Angus who married Eva in 1291, the
three generations thus lasting as chiefs from
1274 to 1457, some 183 years! Malcohii was
the son of William's old age, and his brother,
Lachlan 8th, was too old to take part in the
North Inch fight in 1396, sixty years before his
younger brother died ! This beats the Fraser
genealogy brought forward lately by a claimani
to the Lovat estates. It is thus clear that there
is something wrong in the Mackintosh genealogy
here, corresponding doubtless to some revolu-
tion in the clan's history. And this is made
clear when we consult the Edinburgh Gaelic MS.
of 1467, which gives the genealogies of High-
land clans down till about 1450. Here we
actually have two genealogies given, which
shows that the chiefship of the Mackintoshes or
Clan Gillicattan was then either in dispute or a
matter of division between two families. We
print the two 1467 hsts with the Mackintosh MS.
genealogy between them, in parallel columns,
supplying dates where possible : —

1467 MS. Mackintosh History. I46? MS.

William and Donald (12) Fercliar (d. 1514) Lochlan

William (9) Ferchar (11) Duncan (d. 1496) Suibne

Fercliar (1382) (8) LachUn & (10; Malcolm (d. 1457) Shaw

Wiiliam (7) W^illiam id. 1368) Leod

Gii:amichol (6) An-us (d. 1345) Scayth (1338)

Ferchar (1 '234) (5) Ferchar (d. 1274) Ferchard

Shaw (4) Shaw (d. 1265) Cilchrist

Gilclirist William Malcolm

Aigcol (2) Shaw (d. 1210) DoualdCamgiila

Ewcn (1) Shaw (d. 1179) Mureach

Macduff (d. 1154) Suibiio

Earl of Fife ^ Tead (Shaw)

Keill " Nachtain

[Gillicattan ?] Qillicattau

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 221

The similarity between the 1467 first list and
that of the Mackintosh history is too striking to
be accidental, and we may take it that they
purport to give the same genealogy. There are
only two discrepancies from about 1400 to 1200
between them. Ferchar 9th is given as soi; of
Lachlan in the Mackintosh history, whereas the
1467 Hst makes him son of WilHam, not grand-
son. The 6th Mackintosh in the one hst is
Gillamichael, and in the other he is called
Angus. Perhaps he had borne both names, for
Gillamichael means " servant of St Michael,"
and might possibly be an epithet. Mr Fraser-
Mackintosh has drawn the writer's attention to
a list of names published in Palgrave's " Docu-
ments and Eecords " of Scottish History (1837);
this is a list of some ninety notables who, aboal
1297, made homage or submission to Edward I.,
and among them is Anegosius Maccarawer, or
Angus Mac Ferchar, whom Mr Fraser-Mackin-
tosh claims as the 6th of Mackintosh. There
are only two other " Macs " in the list, and
Maccarawer is, no doubt, a Highlander, and
possibly a chief, and, perhaps, the chief of Mac-
kintosh.^ In any case, in the middle of the
15th century, the direct line of Mackintoshes
was represented by William and Donald, sons of
William, whereas the chief de facto at the time

1 Angus McErchar here is chief of the Lamonts in Argyle.

222 BADENOCH :

was undoubtedly Malcolm Mackintosh. How
he got this position is a question.

The second Hst in the 1467 MS. is a puzzle.
Mr Skene called it the genealogy of the " old ' '
Clan Chattan : Why, is not clear. Scayth, son
of Ferchard, is mentioned in 1338 as the late
Scayth who possessed a " manerium " at the
" stychan " of Dalnavert. Mr Skene thinks
that he was of the Shaws of Rothiemurchus, and
that this is their genealogy; and this may be
true, but what comes of his earlier theories in
regard to the Macphersons as being the ' ' old
family here represented? Theories held in
1837 were abandoned in 1880; but in this Mr
Skene could hardly help himself, considering the
amount of information that has since appeared
in the volumes of such Societies as the " Spald-
ing Club," bearing on the history of the
Moravian clans, and especially on that of Claa
Chattan.

The turmoil in the Clan Chattan, which
changed the chief ship to another line, must be
connected more especially with the events which
took place when King James came North, in
1427, when part of the clan stood by the King
and part by the Lord of the Isles. We find in a
document preserved in the Kilravock papers,
that King James grants a pardon to certain of
the Clan Chattan, provided they really do attach
themselves to the party of Angus and Malcolm

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 223

Mackintosh; and this shews that Malcolm, who
was afterwards chief, stood by the king, and
received his favours. Angus possibly was his
brother, for a depredating rascal of the name
of Donald Angusson, supported by Lachlan
" Badenoch," son of Malcolm, evidently Lach-
lan's cousin, gives trouble to various people to-
wards the end of the century. In any case,
Malcolm Mackintosh emerged from the troubles
that were rending the clan victorious, and his
son Duncan was as powerful a chief as lived m
the North in his day.

How much the Clan Battle at Perth, in 1396,
had to do with the changes in the Clan Chattan
leadership it is hard to say. It is accepted as
certain that the Clan Chattan had a hand in the
fight, for the later historians say so, and the con-
temporary writer Wyntoun mentions the chiefs
on both sides, and one of these bears the name
of Scha Ferchar's son, which is an unmistake-
ably Mackintosh name. He says, in Laing's
edition : —

" Tha thre score were clannys twa,
Clahynnhe Qwhewyl, and Clachinya;
Of thir twa Kynnys ware the men,
Thretty agane thretty then.
And thare thai had thair chifftanys two,
Schir Ferqwharis sone wes ane of tha,
The tothir Cristy Johnesone."

224 BADENOCH :

The two clans here pitted against one another
are the clans Quhele or Chewil, and Clan Ha or
Hay, or, according to some, Kay. Boece has
Clan Quhete, which Buchanan and Leslie im-
prove into Clan Chattan.

As so much theorising has taken place upon
this subject already, and so many positive
assertions have been made, it may at present
serve the interests of historic science if we can
reallv decide what clan names the above cannot
stand for. First, there is Clan Quhele or
Chewil. This clan is mentioned in 1390 as Clan
Qwhevil, who, with the Athole tribes, made a
raid into Angus, and killed the Sheriff. They
are mentioned again in an Act of Parliament in
1594 as among the broken clans, in the follow-
ing sequence — Clandonochie, Clanchattane,
Clanchewill, Clanchamron, &c. What clan
they really were is yet a matter of dispute. The
form Che will points to a nominative, Cumhal or
Cubhal, or Keval, but no such name can be
recognised in the Clan Chattan district, or neat
it. Dughall or Dugald has been suggested, and
the family of Camerons of Strone held as the
clan referred to. But this, like so much in the
discussion of this subject, forgets some very
simple rules of Gaelic phonetics, which are not
forgotten in the spoken language, and in the
English forms borrowed from it. Ferninine
names ending in n never aspirate an initial d of

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 225

iJie next ivord. We have Clan Donnachie, Clan
Donald, Clan Dugald, and so on, but never Clan
Yonnachie or Yonald, or such. Similarly, Ckii
Hay or Ha cannot stand for Clan Dai or David-
sons. Let these simple rules of Gaelic phonetics
be understood once for all, and we have made
much progress towards a solution of the diffi-
culty. The word Qwhevil evidently commences
with a C. Skene suggests it is for Caimgilla,
"one-eyed one," the epithet of Donald,
Mureach's son, in the 1467 pedigree. But the
m of cam is never aspirated. Again, as to Ha
or Hay. The Clan Cameron are called, in the
1467 MS. and other places, the " Clann
Maelanfhaidh," the clan of the " servant
of Storn;," a name preserved in the
Macgillony of Strone, which originally was Mac
Gille-anfhaidh, equivalent to Mael-anfhaidh in
meaning.

The name, however, that best suits the Eng-
lish form is that of Shaw or Seadh, that is, Seth.
There is really a difficulty about Mael-anfhaidh
and his clan. The form ought to be either
Clann-anfhaidh, which Wyntoun would give as
Clahinanha or Clahan-anna, or it would be Clann
Mhael-anfhaidh, a form which could not be mis-
taken, were it handed down. The most popular
theory at present is that the combatants were the
Camerons and Mackintoshes, who were enemies

15

226 BADENOCH :

for three centuries thereafter; the Mackintoshes
were represented by the name of Clan Chewill,
the chief being Shaw, son of Ferchar, of the
Eothiemurchus branchy while the Camerons were
the Clan Hay, with Gilchrist Mac Iain as chief.
This is practically Skene's view, and it is the
position taken up by Mr A. M. Shaw, the his-
torian of the Mackintoshes. But the phonetics
point to a struggle in which the Shaws were the
chief combatants, the other side being Clan
Kevil, and, on weighing all sides of the question,
we are as much inclined to believe that it was the
beginning of that struggle in the clan, which is
represented by two lines of pedigree, and which
latterly gave the chiefship even to a junior
branch of one of the lines.

How does the claim of the Cluny Macphersons
for the chiefship of Clan Chattan stand in rela-
tion to these historic facts? They do not appear
at all in the historical documents, but tradition
in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries had
enough to tell of their share in the crisis. At
the battle of Invernahaven, fought against the
Camerons, the Macphersons of Cluny claimed
the right under Mackintosh as chief, but he un-
fortunately gave this post of honour to the Clan
Dai or Davidsons of Invernahaven ; and the Mac-
phersons retired in high dudgeon. The battle
was at first lost to Clan Chattan, but the Mac-
phersons, despite anger, came to the rescue,

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES 227

and the Camerons were defeated. Then ensued
a struggle, lasting ten years, for superiority
between the Macphersons (Clan Chattan) and
the Davidsons, the scene of which, in 1396, was
shifted to the North Inch of Perth. These, th^
Macpherson tradition says, were the two clans
that fought the famous clan fight. The Mac-
phersonf^ claim to be descended from Gilhcattan
Mor, progenitor of the Clan Chattan, by direct
male descent, and every link is given back to
the eleventh century, thus (omitting ' ' father
of") — Gillicattan, Diarmid, Gilhcattan, Muirich,
parson of Kingussie, whence they are ? ailed
Clann Mhuirich, father of Gillicattan a'nd Ewen
Ban, the former of whom had a son, Dougid
Dall, whose daughter Eva, " the heiress of Clan
Chattan," married Angus Mackintosh in 1291,
and thus made him ' ' captain ' ' of Clan Chattan ;
Ewen Ban was the direct male representative,
then Kenneth, Duncan, Donald Mor, Donald Og,
Ewen; then Andrew of Cluny in 1609, a real
historic personage without a doubt. In this list,
not a single name previous to that of Andrew
can be proved to have existed from any docu-
ments outside the Macpherson genealogies, ex-
cepting only Andrew's father, Ewen, who is
mentioned in the Clanranald Eed Book as grand-
father of the heroic Ewen, who joined Montrose
with three hundred of Clans Mhuirich and
Chattan. The direct Gillicattan genealogy is

228 BADENOCH :

given in the 1467 MS., and, such as it is, it has
no semblance to the Macpherson hst. The fact
is that the Macpherson hst previous to Ewan,
father of Andrew, is purely traditional and
utterly unrehable. The honest historian of
Moray, Lachlan Shaw, says — " I cannot pre-
tend to give the names of the representatives be-
fore the last century. I know that in 1660
Andrew was laird of Clunie, whose son, Ewan,
was father of Duncan, who died in 1722 without
male issue." By means of the Spalding Pub-
lications, the Synod of Moray Records, and
other documents, we can now supplement and
add to Lachlan Shaw's information, though not
much. Macpherson of Cluny is first mentioned
in 1591 when Clan Farson gave their " band "
or bond to Huntly. He is then called " Andrew
Makfersone in Cluny," not of Cluny, be it ob-
served, for he was merely tenant of Cluny at that
time. This is amply proved by the Badenoch
rental of 1603, where we have the entry —
" Clovnye, three pleuches . . . Andro
McFarlen {read Farsen)^ tenant to the haill."
In 1609, Andrew had obtained a herit-
able right to Cluny, for then he is
called Andrew Macpherson of Cluny in
the bond of union amongst the Clan
Chattan, ' ' in which they are and is astricted
to serve Mackintosh as their Captain and Chief."

1 The MS. has farsen; " Farlen " is a misprint.

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 229

Huntly had for long been trying to detach the
Clan from Mackintosh by " bands," as in 1591
and in 1543, and by raising the tenants to a
position of independence under charter rights,
which were liberally granted in the seventeenth
century, and which proved fatal to the unity of
Clan Chattan. But it was a wise policy,
nationally considered, for in 1663-5, when Mac-
kintosh tried to raise his Clan against Lochiel,
some flatly refused asking cui bono; others
promised to go if Mackintosh would help them
to a slice of their neighbour's land, and Mac-
pherson of Cluny proposed three conditions on
which he would go — (1) if the Chiefs of the
Macphersons hold the next place in the Clan to
Mackintosh; (2) lands now possessed by Mac-
kintoshes and once possessed by Macphersons
to be restored to the latter; and (3) the assist-
ance now given was not of the nature of a ser-
vice which Mackintosh had a right to demand,
but simply a piece of goodwill. When Mackin-
tosh was in 1688 proceeding to fight the " last
Clan battle ' ' at Mulroy against Keppoch, we are
told that the " Macphersons in Badenoch, after-
two citations, disobeyed most contemptuously."
Duncan Macpherson, the Cluny of that time,
had decided to claim chiefship for himself, and
in 1672 he applied for and obtained from the
Lord Lyon's Office the matriculation of his arms
as Laird of Cluny Macpherson, and only true

230 BADENOCH :

representative of the ancient and honourable
family of Clan Chattan. Mackintosh, on hear-
ing of it, objected, and got the Lord Lyon to
give Macpherson " a coat of arms as cadets of
' Clan Chattan.' " The Privy Council in the
same year called him " Lord of Cluny and Chief
of the Macphersons," but Mackintosh got them
to correct even this to Cluny being responsible
only for " those of his name of Macpherson
descendit of his family," without prejudice
always to the Laird of Mackintosh. In 1724
Mackintosh and Macpherson came to an agree-
ment that Mackintosh, in virtue of marrying the
heiress of Clan Chattan in 1291, was Chief of
Clan Chattan, Macpherson renouncing all claim,
but there was a big bribe held out to him — he
received the Loch Laggan estates from Mackin-
tosh. In this way the egging on of Huntly, the
reputation gained by the Macphersons in the
Montrose wars and otherwise, and an absurd
piece of pedigree, all combined to deprive Mac-
kintosh of his rightful honour of Chief, and also
of a good slice of his estate ! The renown
gained by the Clan Macpherson in the Jacobite
wars, compared to the supineness of the Mac-
kintosh Chiefs, gained them public sympathy in
their claims, and brought a clan, altogether un-
known or ignored until the battle of Glenlivet
in 1694, to the very front rank of Highland
Clans in the eighteenth century. We see the

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES 231

rise of a clan and its ciiiefs actually take place
in less than a century and a half, and that, too,
by the pluck and bravery displayed by its chiefs
and its members.

PLACE NAMES OF BADENOCH.

The Ordnance Survey maps, made to the
scale of six inches to the mile, contain for
Badenoch some fourteen hundred names; but
these do not form more than a tithe of the names
actually in use or once used when the glens were
filled with people, and the summer shealings
received their annual visitants. Every knoll
and rill had its name; the bit of moor, the bog
or hlar^ the clump of wood {hadav), the rock or
crag, the tiny loch or river pool, not to speak of
cultivated land parcelled into fields, each and
all, hovv'ever insignificant, had a name among
those that dwelt near them. Nor were the
minute features of the mountain ranges and far-
away valleys much less known and named. The
shealing system contributed much • to this last
fact. But now many of these names are lost,
we may say most of them are lost, with the loss
of the population, and with the abandonment of
the old system of crofting and of summer migra-
tion [O the hills. The names given to those
minute features of the landscape were and are
comparatively easy on the score of derivation,

232 BADENOCH :

though sometimes difficult to explain historically.
For instance, Lub Mhairi, or Mary's Loop, is ihe
name of a small meadow at Coilintuie, but vhr^
was the Mary from whom it got its name ?

Of the fourteen hundred words on the
Ordnance Maps, we may at once dismiss three-
fourths as self-explanatory. Anyone with a
knowledge of Gaelic can explain them; or any-
one not so endowed but possessed of a Gaelic
dictionary can by the use of it satisfactorily un-
ravel the mystery of the names. Of the remain-
ing fourth, most are easy enough as regards
derivation, but some explanation of an historical
character is desirable, though often impossible
of being got. One of the most interesting names
under this last category is that of Craig Righ
Harailt, or the Crag of King Harold, which
stands among the hills behind Dunachton; yet
there is absolutely nothing known about this
Scandinavian chief; even tradition halts m the
matter. There are only some six score names
where any difficulty, however slight, of deriva-
tion can occur, and it is to these names that this
paper will mostly devote itself. The oldest
written or printed form of the name will be
given, for often the difficulty of deriving a place-
name yields when the oldest forms of it are
found. We have fortunately some valuable
documents, easily attainable, which throw light
on some obscure names. Among these are the

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 233

Huntly Rental for the Lordship of Badenoch for
1603/ and Sh^ R. Gordon of Straloch's map of
Braidalbane and Moray, which was pubhshed in
Blaeu's Atlas in 1662, and which contains a full
and intelligent representation of Badenoch.
The Badenoch part of this map is reproduced
along with this paper for the sake of illustrating
it. It was made about the year 1640.

First, we shall deal with the name of the dis-
trict and the names of the principal divisions of
it, and thereafter consider the nomenclature of
the leading features of the country, whether
river, loch, or mountain, following this with a
glance at the names of farms and townships, and
at the other points of the landscape that may
seem to require explanation. The name of the
district first claims our attention.

Badenoch. — In 1229 or thereabouts the
name appears as Badenoch in the Registrum of
Moray Diocese, and this is its usual form there ;
in 1289, Badenagh, Badenoughe, and, in King
Edward's Journal, Badnasshe; in 1366 we have
Baydenach, which is the first indication of the
length of the vowel in Bad-; a 14th century map
gives Baunagd; in 1467, Badyenach; in 1539,
Baidyenoch; in 1603 (Huntly Rental),
Badzenoche; and now in Gaelic it is Baideanach.
The favourite derivation, first given by Lachlan

1 Spalding Club Miscellany, vol. iv.

234 BADENOOH :

Shaw, the historian of Moray (1775), refers it to
badan, a bush or thicket; and the Muses have
sanctioned it in Calum Dubh's expressive hne in
his poem on the Loss of Gaick (1800) —

" 'S bidb. muiru auu an Dutliaich uam Badau "
(And joy shall be in the Land of Wood-clumps).

But there are two fatal objections to this deriva-
tion; the a of Badenoch is long, and that of
hadan is short; the d of Badenoch is vowei-
fianked by " small " vowels, while that of hadan
is flanked by " broad " vowels and is hard, the
one being pronounced approximately for English
as hah-janach, and the other as baddanacli.
The root that suggests itself as contained in the
word is that of hath or badh (drown, submerge),
which, with an adjectival termination in de,
would give haide, " submerged, marshy," and
this mi^'ht pass into haidean and haideanach,
" marsh or lake land." That this meaning suits
the long, central meadow land of Badenoci',
which once could have been nothing else than a
long morass, is evident. There are several
places in Ireland containing the root badh
(drown), as Joyce points out. For instance,
Bauttagh, west of Loughrea in Galway, a marshy
place; Mullanbattog, near Monaghan, hill sum-
mit of the morass; the river Bauteoge, in
Queen's County, flowing through swampy
ground; and Currawatia, in Galway, means the

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 235

inundated curragh or morass. The neighbour-
ing district of Lochaber is caUed by Adamnan
Stagnum Aporicum, and the latter term is hkely
the Irish ah ar (a marsh), rather than the Pictisli
a5er (a coniluence); so that both districts may be
looked upon as named from their marshes. The
divisions of Badenoch are three — the parishes of
Alvie, Kingussie and Insh, and Laggan.

Alvie. — Shaw says it is a " parsonage dedi-
cated to St Drostan." Otherwise w^e should
have at once suggested the 6th century Irish
saint and bishop called Ailbe or later Ailbhe,
whose name suits so admirably, that, even de-
spite the Drostan connection, one would feel in-
clined to think that the parish is named after St
Ailbhe. In the middle of the 14th century the
parish is called Alveth or Alwetht and Alway,
amd Alvecht about 1400, in 1603 Alvey and
Aluay, and in 1622 AUoway. The name, with
the old spelling Alveth, appears in the parish of
Alvah in Banffshire, and no doubt also in that of
Alva, another parish in Stirlingshire. Shaw
and others connect the name with ail (a rock),
but do not explain the c or bh in the name.
Some look at Loch Alvie as giving the name to
the parish, and explain its name as connected
with the flower ealhhaidh or St John's wort, a
plant which it is asserted grows or grew around
its bank. The learned minister of Alvie in Dis-
ruption times, Mr Macdonald, referred the name

236 BADENOCH :

of the loch to Eala-i oi' Swan-isle Loch, but un-
fortunately there is no Gaelic word i for an
island, nor do the phonetics suit in regard to the
bli or V. The old Fenian name of Alnihu or
Almhuinn, now Allen, in Ireland, the seat of
Fionn and his Feinn, suggests itself, but the
termination in n is wanting in Aivie, and this
makes the comparison of doubtful value.

Insh. — Mentioned as Inche in the Moray
Eegistrum in 1226 and similarly in 138U and in
1603. The name is derived from the knoll on
which the church is built, and which is an island
or innis when the river is in flood. Loch Insh
takes its name from this or the other real island
near it. The parish is a vicarage dedicated to
" St Ewan," says Shaw; but, as the name of
the knoll on which the church stands is Tom
Eunan, the Saint must have been Eonan or
Adamnan, Columba's biographer, in the 7th
century. The old bell is a curious and rare
relic, and the legend attached to it is one of the
prettiest told in the district. The bell w^^s
stolen once upon a time, and taken to the south
of the Grampians, but getting free, it returned
of its own accord ringing out as it crossed the
hills of Drumochter, ' ' Tom Eonan ! Tom
Eonan."

Kingussie. — In Gaelic — Cinn-ghiuhhsaich —

(at) the end of the fir-forest " ; cinn being the

locative of ceann (head) and giuhhsach being a

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 237

" fir-forest." The oldest forms of the name are
Kynguscy (1103-11?), Kingussy (1208-15), Kin-
gusy (1226), Kingucy (1380), Kingusy (1538),
and Kyngusie (1603). It is'a parsonage dedicated
toStCohmiba (Shaw). According to Shaw, there
was a Priory at Kingussie, founded by the Earl
of Huntly about 1490. The Prior of Kingussie
was the tenant of the Churcli croft in 1565 —
Reg. of Moray, p. 450.

Laggun.—'' A mensal church dedicated to
St Kenneth " (Shaw). The name in full is
Laggan-Choinnich, the lagan or " hollow of
Kenneth." The present church is at Laggan
Bridge, but the old church was at the nearest
end of Loch Laggan, where the ruins are still
to be seen. It is mentioned in 1239 as Logyn-
kenny (E.M.), and Logykenny shortly before,
as Logachnacheny and Logykeny in 1380,
Logankenny in 1381 (all from R.M.), and
Lagane in 1603 (H.R.). The Gaehc word
" lagan " is the diminutive of " lag," a hollow.

We now come to the leading natural features
of the country, and deal first with the rivers and
loche of Badenoch. A loch and its river gener-
ally have the same name, and, as a rule, it is the
river that gives name to the loch. A prominent
characteristic of the river names of Badenoch,
and also of Pictland, is the termination ie or y.
We meet in Badenoch with Feshie, Trommie,
Markie, and Mashie, and not far away are-

238 BADKNOCH :

Bennie, Druie, (reldie, Garry, Bogie, Gaudie,
Lossie, Urie, and several more. The termina-
tion would appear to be that given by Ptolemy
in several river names such as Nov-ios, Tob-ios,
Libn-iocS, &c., which is the adjectival termina-
tion ios; but it has to be remarked that the
modern pronunciation points to a termination in
idh, Zeuss's primitive adi or idi; Tromie in
Gaelic is to be spelt Tromaidh, and Feshie as
Feisidh. We first deal with the so-called
" rapidest river in Scotland."

The Speif. — The Highlanders of old had a
great idea of the size of the Spey, and also of the
Dee and Tav. There is a Gaehc saying which
runs thus : —

Spe, De, agus Tatha,
Tri uisgeachau 's mo fo'u athar.

This appears in an equally terse English form —

The three largest rivers that be
Are the Tay, the Spey, and the Dee,

" The river Spey is spoken of as ' she,' and has
the character of being ' blood thirsty.' The
common belief is that ' she ' must have at least
one victim yearly." — W. Gregor, Folklore, III.,
72. In Norse literature the name appears as
Spas (13th century); we have the form Spe in the
"Chronicles" (1165); Spe (1228, &c.); Spee
(Bruce' s Charter to Eandolph) and Spey (1451
and 1603). But the Spey is regarded as repre-

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 239

senting physically and etymologically Ptolemy's
river Tvesis or Tvsesis. Dr Whitley Stokes says .
— " Supposed to be Ptolemy's Tvesis; but it
points to an original Celtic squeas, cognate with
Ir. sceivi (vomo), W. chivy d (a vomit). For
the connection of ideas, cf. Pliny's Vomanus, a
river of Picenum. The river name Spean may
be a diminutive of Spe." The changing of an
original s git to S2:>, instead of the true Gaelic form
sg or so, indicates that the name is Pictish. Tiie
Spean is doubtless a diminutive arising from a
form spesona or spesana.

The Dulnan; in Gaelic Tuilnean, Blaeu's
map Tiilnen. It falls into Spey near Broomhih
Station. The root is tuil, flood; the idea being
to denote its aptness to rapid floods.

Feshie; Gaelic Feisidh. Its first appearance
in charters is about 1230, and the name is
printed Ceffy, evidently for Fessy. If it is
Celtic, its earliest form was Vestia, from a root
ved, which signifies "wet," and which is the
origin of the English word wet and water. That
Feshie is Celtic and Pictish may be regarded as
probable when it is mentioned that in Brecon-
shire there is a river Gwesyn, the root of the
name being gives (for vest), meaning " what
moves " or " goes."

Tromie; Gaehc Trom{a)idh. In 1603 it is
called Tromye. The Gaehc name for dwarf
elder is tromayi, which appears in Irish as tro^n

240 BADENOCH :

or tromm, with genitive truimm. It gives its
name to Trim in Meatli, which in the 9th cen-
tury was called Vadiim Truimm, or Ford of the
Elder-tree. Several other Irish place-names
come from it. In Badenoch and elsewhere in
the Highlands, we often meet with rivers named
after the woods on their banks. Notably is so
the case with the alder tree, Fearna, which
names numerous streams, and, indeed, is found
in old Gaul, for Pliny mentions a river called
Vernodubrum. Hence Tromie is the Elder-y
Biver; while Truim, which is probably named
after the glen, Glen-truim — " Glen of the
Elder '"' — takes its name from the genitive of
tromm. Compare the Irish Cala-truim, the
liollow of the elder. Glen-tromie is the first
part of the long gorge that latterly becomes
Gaick, and, in curious contrast to the ill fame
of the latter in poetry, it appears thus in a well-
known verse : —

Gleaan Tromaidh nan siautan
Learn bvi mhiann bhi 'nad fha.sgatli.

Par am faig-hinu a' bhroiglileag.
An oiglueag 'b an d«arcag,

Cnothan donn air a' challtuinn,
'S iasg dearg air na h-easan.

Guinag, Gitynack, Guinach, or Gynach (pro-
nbunced in Gaelic Goi{hh)meag), falls into the
Spey at Kingussie. It is a short, stormy stream-
let. All sorts of derivations have been offered;

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 241

the favourite is guanag, pretty, but, unfor-
tunately, it does not suit the phonetics of
Goi-neag. The name points to primitive forms
Hke gohni- or gomni-, where the o may have
been a, and the latter form, read as gamni-,
would give us the root gam, which in old Gaelic
means "winter." Hence the idea may be
" wintry streamlet." Compare Coire Ghoibli-
nidh in Rosskeen — W. J. Watson, Place Names
of Ross and Cromarty.

The C alder : in GaeHc Cal(l)adar. This
river and lake name recurs about a dozen times
in Pictland and the old Valentia province be-
tween the Walls, and there is a Calder river in
Lancashire. Cawdor and its Thanes probably
give us the earliest form of the word, applied to
the Nairnshire district. This is in 1295 Kaledor;
in 1310, Caldor; and in 1468, Caudor. But the
Gaelic forms persist in other places, as in Aber-
Callador (1456) in Strathnairn. These forms
point to an older Cal-ent-or, for ent and ant
become in Gaelic ed or ad, earlier et or at. In
the Irish Annals mention is made of a battle,
fought, it is supposed, in the Carse of Falkirk,
called the battle of Calitros, and certain lands
near Falkirk were called in the 13th century
Kalentyr, now Callendar. Not far away are
several Calder waters. Compare also Callatei
burn, Aberdeenshire, pronounced as spelt; in

16

242 BADENOCH :

1564, Auchinquhillater, a farm, now i\.uchalter;
Calder river in Renfrewshire. The root is evi-
dently cal (sound, call), as in Latin Calendae,
and English Calendar, borrowed, like the Gaelic
equivalent word Caladair, from the Latin Calen-
darium.

The Truim. See under the heading of
Tromie.

The Mashie; Masie (1603), in Gaelic
Mathaisidh, pronounced Mathisidh. Strath-
mashie is famous as the residence of Lachlan
Macpherson, the bard, the contemporary and
coadjutor of James Macpherson of Ossianic re-
nown. The bard's opinions of the river Mashie
are still handed down; these differed according
to circumstances. Thus he praised the river : —

Mathaisidh gheal, bhoidheach gheal,

Mathaisidh gheal, bhoidheach gheal,

Bu chaomh learn bhi laimh riut.

But after it carried away his corn he said : —

Mathaisidh dhvibh, fhrogach dhubh,
Mathaisidh dhubh, fhrogach dhubh.
Is mor rinn thu chall orm.

The derivation of the name is obscure.
Mathaisidh could come from mathas, goodness,
but the meaning is not satisfactory. We might
think of maise, beaut}^ but it has the vowel short
in modern Gaelic, though Welsh maws,
pleasant, points to a long vowel or a possible
contraction in the original.

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 243

The Markie; Gaelic Marcaidh. Streams and
glens bearing the name Mark and Markie occur
in Perthshire, Forfarshire, and Banffshire. The
first tributary of the Feshie is Alit Mharkie, at
the mouth of which was of old Invermarkie, an
estate held by the Campbells of Cawdor in the
15th and 16th centuries. The root is doubtless
marc, a horse.

The Pattack; in Gaehc Patag. This river,
unlike those which we have hitherto dealt with,
does not flow into the Spey, but into Loch
Laggan, after making an extraordinary volte
face about two miles from its mouth. First it
flows directly northwards, and then suddenly
south-westwards for the last two miles of its
course. Hence the local saying —

Patag dhubh, bhalgach
Dol an aghaidh uisge Alba

(Dark, bubbly Pattack, that goes against the
streams of Alba).

We find Pattack first mentioned in an agreement
between the Bishop of Moray and Walter Comyn
about the year 1230, where the streams
' ' Kyllene et Petenachy ' ' are mentioned as
bounding the church lands of Logykenny. The
Kyllene is still remembered in Camus-Killean,
the bay of Killean, where the inn is. The
Kyllene must have been the present Allt Lairig,

244 BADENOCH :

or as the map has it, Allt Buidhe ; while Peten-
achy represents Pattack, which in Blaeu's map
appears as Potaig. The initial p proves the
name to be of non-Gaelic origin ultimately, but
whether it is Pictish, pre-Celtic, or a Gaelicised
foreign Avord we cannot say.

Ah Loiorag lies between Lochan na h-Earba
and Loch Laggan. It means the " loud-sound-
ing (Jahhar) one."

The Spean; in Gaelic Spithean. See under
Spey.

We have now exhausted the leading rivers,
but before going further we may consider the
names of one or two tributaries of these.
Feshie, for instance, has three important
tributaries, one of which, Allt Mharkie, we have
already discussed. Passing over Allt Puaidh
as being an oblique form of Allt Ruadh, " red
burn," we come to the curious river name

Fernsdale; in Gaelic Fearnasdail. The
farms of Corarnstil-more and Corarnstil-beg,
that is, the Corrie of Fernsdale, are mentioned
in 1603 as Corearnistaill Moir and Corearinsiail
Beige, and in 1691 the name is CorriarnisdaiH.
Blaeu's map gives the river as Fairnstil. ihe
first portion of the name is easy; it is Fearna,
alder. But what of sdail or asdailf The word
astail means a dwelling, but "Fern-dwelling"
is satisfactory as a name neither for river or
glen. The tributary of the Fernsdale is called

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 245

Comhraig; in Blaeu Conrik. Comhrag
signifies a conflict ; but in Irish and early Gaelic
it signified simply a meeting whether of road and
rivers, or of men for conflict. There are
several Irish place-names Corick, -situated near
confluences. Doubtless this stream took its
name from its confluence with Fernsdale.

On Feshie we meet further up with Alii
Fhearnagan, the stream of the alder trees; then
AUt Gabhlach, which the Ordnance map
etymologises into Allt Garbhlach, the stream of
the rugged place. This may be the true deriva-
tion; it is a big rough gully or corrie with a
mountain torrent tumbling through it.

Allt Lorgaidh is named after the mountain
pass or tract which it drains {lorg, lorgadh,
track, tracing), and which also gives name to
the pi'ominent peak of Cam an Fhidhlei7'
Lorgaidh, the Fiddler's Cairn of Lorgie, to
differentiate it from the Fiddler's Cairn which
is just beyond the Inverness-shire border, and
not far from the other one.

The Eidart, Blaeu' s Eitart, with the neigh-
bouring streamlet of Eindart, is a puzzling
name. The Gaelic is Eideard and Inndeard
according to pronunciation.

We now come to the lochs of Badenoch.
Loch Alvie is bound up with the name of Alvie
Parish, discussed already. Loch Insh is the
Lake of the Island, just as Loch-an-eilein, in

246 BADENOCH :

Rotliiemiirchus, takes its name from the castle-
island which it contains; but eilean is the Norse
word eyland, Eng. island, borrowed, whereas
innis of Loch Insh is pure Gaelic. In Gaick,
along the course of the Tromie, there are three
lakes, about which the following rhyme is re-
peated : —

Tha gaoth nihor air Loch an t-Seilich
Tha gaoth eil' air Loch an Duin;

Ruigidh mise Loch a' Bhrodainn,
Mu'n teid cadal air mo shuil.

The rhyme is supposed to have been the song
of a hunter who escaped from demons by
stratagem and the help of a good stallion on
whose back he leapt. The first loch is called
Loch an t-Seilich, the lake of the willow, and
the third of the series is Loch an Diiin, the loch
of the Down or hill, the name of the steep crag
on its west side. The intermediate lake is
called Loch Vrodain, Gaelic Bhrodainn, which
Sir S.. Gordon in Blaeu's map speUs as Vrodin.
Ihe Ordnance map etymologises the word as
usual, and the result is Loch Bhradainn, Salmon
Loch; but unfortunately the a of hradan was
never o, so that phonetically we must discard
this derivation. There is a story told about this
weird loch which fully explains the name
mythically. A hunter had got into possession
of a semi-supernatural litter of dogs. Wlien

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 247

they reached a certain age, all of them were
taken away by one who claimed to be the true
owner, who left with the hunter only a single
pup, jet black in colour, and named Brodainn.
Before leaving it with the hunter, the demon
broke its leg. Brodainn was therefore lame.
There was a wonderful white fairy deer on Ben
Alder, and the hunter decided he should make
himself famous by the chase of it. ^ So he and
Brodainn went to Ben Alder, on Loch Ericht
side; the deer was roused, Brodainn pursued it,
and was gaining ground on it when they were
passing this loch in Gaick. In plunged the deer,
and after it Brodainn dashed; he caught it in
mid-lake, and they both disappeared never more
to be seen ! Hence the name of the lake is
Loch Vrodin; the lake is there, the name is
there, therefore the story is true ! The word
hrodan represents E. Ir. hrot-chu, a mastiff
Welsh hrathgi; from brod, good, " a broth of a
boy." Loch-Laggan takes its name from the
lagan or hollow which gave the parish its name,
that is, from Laggan-Chainnich or Lagan-
Kenny, at the northern end of the loch. There
are two isles in the lake connected with the old
kingly race of Scotland. King Fergus, whoever
he was, had his hunting lodge on one, called
Eilean an Eigh, and the bther was the dog-
kennel of these Fenian hunters, and is called
Eilean nan Con. The considerable lake or lakes

243 BADENOCH :

running parallel to, and a mile to the soiUli-
east of Loch Laggan are called Lochan na
h-Earba — the lakes of the roe. Loch
Crunachan, at the mouth of Glen-Shirra, has an
artificial island or crannog therein; the word is
rather Crunnachan than Crunachan by pro-
nunciation. A Gordon estate map of 1773 calls
it the ''Loch of Sheiromore," and distinctly
marks the crannog. Taylor and Skinner's
Roads maps, published in 1776 by order of Par-
liament, give the name as L. Crenackan. The
derivation, unless referable to crannog, is doubt-
ful. Loch Ericht, the largest lake in Badenoch,
is known in Gaelic as Loch Eireachd. Blaeu
calls it Eyrachle (read Eyrachte). The lake is
doubtless named from the river Ericht, runnino-
from it into Loch Eannoch. Another river
Ericht flows past Blairgowrie into the Isla, nor
must we omit the Erichdie Water and Glen
Erichdie in Blair Athole. The word eireachd
signifies an assembly or meeting, but there is an
abstract noun, eireachdas, signifying " hand-
someness," and it is to this last form that we
should be inclined to refer the word.

Let us now turn to the hills and hollows and
dales of Badenoch. Many of these place-names
are called after animals frequenting them. The
name of the eagle for instance is exceedingly
common in the form of iolair, as Sron an lolair,
eagle's ness, &c. We shall begin at the north-

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 249

east end of the district, and take the Monadh-ha
or Grey Mountain range first. " Standing
fast " as guard between Strathspey and
Badenoch is the huge mass of

Craig ellacliie, which gives its motto to the
Clan of Grant — "Stand fast: Craigellachie !"
The name reads in GaeHc as Eileachaidh, which
appears to be an adjective formed from the
stem eilech, or older ailech, a rock, nominative
ail. The idea is the stony or craggy hill — a
thoroughly descriptive adjective.

The Moireach; Gaelic A' MJwr'oich, for
A' Mhormhoich, is an upland moor of undulating
ground above Ballinluig. On the West Coast,
this term signifies flat land liable to sea flooding.
It is also the real Gaelic name of Lovat.

Cam Duhh ^Ic-an-Debir is on the Strath-
dearn border, and is wrongly named on the map
as " Carn Dubh aig an Doire." It means — The
Black Cairn of the Dewar's (Pilgrim) Son.

An Sguabach.—Theve is another Sguabach
south of Loch Cuaicli, a few miles from Dal-
whinnie, and a Meall an Sguabaich west of Loch
Ericht. It means the " sweeping " one, from
sguah, a besom. The people of Insh — the
village and its vicinity — used to speak of the
north wind as Gaoth na Sguabaich, for it blew
over that hill.

Cnoc Fraing, not Cnoc an FhrangaicJi as on
the Ordnance map — a conspicuous dome-shaped

250 BADENOCH :

hill above Dulnan river. There is a Cnoc
Frangach a few miles south of Inverness, near
Scaniport. Fraoch frangach means the cross-
leaved heather, of which people ma:!e their
scouring brushes. The brush was called in
some parts fraings' in Gaelic. Compare M. Ir.
f rang can, tansy.

Easga 'n Lochain, with its caochan or
streamlet, contains the interesting old word for
" swamp " known as easg, easga, or easgaidh,
with which we may compare the river name Esk.

A' Bhuidheanaich, in the Ordnance maps
etymologised into yi?n Buidh' aonach, " the
yellow hill or steep," occurs three times in
Badenoch — here behind Kincraig and Dunach-
ton, on the north side of Loch Laggan, and on
the confines of Badenoch a few miles south of
Dalwhinnie. The idea of " yellowness " under-
lies the word as it is characteristic of the places
meant. The root is huidhe (yellow); the rest is
mere termination and has nothing to do with
aonach, which elsewhere is applied to a hill or
slope.

Coire Bog, &c. — Here we may introduce a
mnemonic rhyme detailing some features of the
ground behind and beside Buidheanaich.

Allt Duinne 'Choire Bhuig,
Tuilnean agus Feithlinn,

Coire Bog is Ruigli na h-Eag,
Steallag is Bad-Earbag.

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 251

The Burn of Dun-ness in Soft Corry, Dul-
nan and Broad Bog-stream, the Eeach of the
Notch, the Spoutie and Hinds' Clump " — that
is the translation of the names.

An Suidhe means the " Seat " ; it designates
the solid, massive hill behind Kincraig.

Craig Righ Harailt means King Harold's
Hill, on the side of which his grave is still
pointed out. As already said, it is unknown
who he was or when he lived.

Coire Neachdradh: Glac an t-Sneachdaidli ,
&c. This corrie is at the end of Dunachton buin
after its final bend among the hills. Sneachd-
radh means snows, or much snow — being an
abstract noun formed from sneachd.

Ruigh an Roig : the Eeach of the Roig (?) is
eastward of Craig Mhor by the side of the peat
road. The map places it further along as Ruigh
na Ruaige — the Stretch of the Retreat.

Bad Each is above Glen Guinack : it is mis-
read on the Ordnance map into Pait-an-Eich —
a meaningless expression. It means Horses*
Clump, and a famous local song^ begins —

Mollachd gu brath aig braigh Bad Each;

curses ever more on upper Bad-each, where the
horses stuck and they could not extricate them.

1 By John Cameron, Kingussie ; migrated to America,
where he died about 1891.

252 BADENOCH :

Ehymes about the various place-names- are
common, and here is an enumeration of the
heights in the Monadh Liath between Kingussie
and Craig Dhubh : —

Creag Bheag Chinn-a'-ghiubhsaich

Creag Mhor Bhail' a' chrothain,.

Beinne Bhuidhe na Sroine,

Creag an Loin aig na croitean,

Sithean Mor Dhail a' Chaoruinn,

Creag an Abhaig a' Bhail' -shios,

Creag Liath a' Bhail' -shuas,

Is Creag Dhubh Bhiallaid,

Cadha an Fheidh Lochain Ubhaidh,

Cadha is mollaicht' tha ann,

Cha'n fhas fiar no fodar ann,

Ach sochagan is dearcagan-allt, •

Gabhar air aodainn,

Is laosboc air a cheann.

Glen Balloch; in Gaelic Gleann Baloch. This
name is stymologised on the Ordnance map into
Gleann a' Bhealaich — the Glen of the Pass; but
the word is haloch or balloch, which means
either speckled or high-walled. To the left the
Allt Mhadagain discharges into the Calder : this
name is explained on the map as Mada coin,
which certainly is not the pronunciation which
our Madagain reproduces. Madagan is a
diminutive of madadh, a dog, vwlf. There are

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 253

two corries in Gaick similarly named (Cory
Mattakan, 1773).

Sneachdach Slinnean, or Snow Shouldei', is
away on the Moy border.

Meall na h-Uinneig, behind Gask-beg con-
siderably, means the Mass or Hill of the Win-
dow. There are other places so named —
Uinneag Coire an Eich (Glen-balloch), Uinneag
Coire Ardar, Uinneag Coire an Lochain,
Uinneag na Creig Moire, Uinneag Coire
Chaoruinn and Uinneag Mhin Choire, the latter
ones being all near one another on the north
side of Loch Laggan. The meaning of the
name is an opening or pass, or a notch in the
sky-line. A huge cleft in a rock in the north
end of Colonsay is called Uinneag lorcaill,
" Hercules' Window " — Prof. Mackinnon.

larlraig is the rising ground above Garva
Bridge, and is mis-written for lolairig, place of
the eagles. -"^ There is here a rock where the
eagle nests or nested. Compare Auld Cory na
Helrick of 1773 with the Allt Coire na h-Iolair
of the Ordnance map, both referring to a stream
on Loch Ericht side. There is an Elrick op-
posite Killyhuntly. The name is common in
North Scotland.

Coire Yairack; AUt Yairack; in Gaelic
Earrag, as if a feminine of Errach (spring). It
is spelt Yarig on the 1773 estate map. Perhaps

1 See Introduction.

254 BADENOCH :

it is a corruption of Gearrag, the short one, ap-
phed to a stream.

Shesgnan is the name of a considerable ex-
tent of ground near the source of the Spey, and
it means morass land, being from seasgann,
fenny country, a word which gives several place-
names both in Scotland and Ireland. The most
notable in Scotland is Shisken in Arran, a large,
low-lying district, flat and now fertile.

We now cross Spey, and work our way down
the south side.

Dearc Beinne Bige, the Dearc of the Little
Hill. The pronunciation is dire; in the 1773
map it is spelt Dirichk. It is an oblique case
of dearc, a hole, cave, cleft; it is found in early
Irish derc (a cave), and several places in Ireland
are called Derk and Dirk therefrom. It occurs
at least three times in Laggan — as above; and in
Dire Craig Chathalain, the 1773 Dirichk Craig
Caulan, or cleft of the Noisy Eock, from Callav,
noise; and in Dearc an Fhearna.

Coire 'Bhein, the 1773 Cory Vein, is a
puzzling name. It looks like the genitive case
of hian, skin.

Coire Phitridh, at the south corner of
Lochan na h-Earba, is given in the map as Corie
na Peathraich. The word is probably an ab-
stract or collective noun from pit, hollo vf.

Beinn Eihhinn, the 1773 Bineven, the
*' pleasant hill," is a prominent peak of 3611

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 255

feet high, on the borders of Badenoch and Loch-
aber, from which a good view of Skye can be
got.

Ben Alder, Blaeu's Bin Aildir, in modern
Gaehc Beinn Eallar (Yallar). The word is
obscure.

Beinn Udlamaii, the Uduman of the 1773
map, on the confines of Badenoch and Perth-
shire, east of Loch Ericht, seems to take its
name from the ball and socket action, for udalan
signifies a swivel or joint. Some suggest
iidlaidh, gloomy, retired.

The Boar, An Tore, of Badenoch is to the
left of the railway as one enters the district from
the south. The "Sow of Athole " is quite
close to the " Boar of Badenoch." We are
now at the ridge of

Drumochter, in Gaelic Drum-uachdar , or
ridge of the upper ground.

Coire Bhoite, or rather Bhoitidh, the Vottie
of 1773, is two or three miles away, and finds
a parallel in the name Sron Bhoitidh at the top
of Glenfishie, where the river bends on itself.
The word boitidh means " pig/' or rather the
call made to a pig when its attention is desired.

Coire Suileagach, behind Craig Ruadh and
Drumgask, means the Corrie full of Eyes, so
named from its springs doubtless. The term
suileach (full of eyes) is usually applied to
streams and corries with whirlpools therein.

256 BADENOCH :

Creag Chrocan, not nan Crocean as on the
map, is near the above corrie, and is named
from the deer's antlers which croc means.
Similar!}^ we often meet with cahar (an antler or
caber) in place-names.

The hill of Bad na Deimheis, the Bad na
Fei^h of 1773, overlooks Dalwhinnie to the east.
The name means the " Clump of the Shears,"
a curious designation. We now pass over into
the forest and district of

Gaick, in Gaelic Gaig, which is the dative or
locative of gag, a cleft or pass. It is considered
the wildest portion of Badenoch, and the repute
of the district is far from good. Supernaturally,
it has an uncanny reputation. From the days
of the ill-starred and ill-disposed Lord Walter
Corny n, who, in crossing at Leum na Feinne —
the Fenian Men's Leap — to carry out his dread
project of making the Euthven women go to the
harvest fields to work unclothed and naked, wa:^
torn to pieces by eagles,^ to that last Christmas
of last century, when Captain John Macpherson
of Ballachroan and four others were choked to
death by an avalanche of snow as they slept in
that far-away bothie, Gaick has an unbroken
record of dread supernatural doings. Duncan

1 Henee the exi]>res&ipn — Did Blialtnir au Gaig ort —
Walter's fate in Gaick on yoxx — to signify an ill wish or curse
fii any one.

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 257

Gow, in his poem on the Loss of Gaick in 1799,
says : —

Gaig dhubh nam feadan fiar,

Nach robh ach na striopaich riamh,

Na bana-bhuidsich 'gan toirt 'san lion,

Gach fear leis 'm bu mhiannach laighe ieath'.

Which means that Gaick, the dark, of wind-
whisthng crooked glens, has ever been a
strumpet and a witch, enticing to their destruc-
tion those that loved her charms. How near
this conception is to that mythological one of
the beauteous maiden that entices the wayfarer
into her castle, and turns into a savage dragon
that devours him ! The following verses show-
ing the respective merits of various places have
no love for Gaick : —

Bha mi 'm Bran, an Guile 's an Gaig,

'N Eidird agus Leum na Larach,
Am Feisidh mhoir bho bun gu braighe

'S b'annsa leam bhi 'n Allt a' Bhathaich.
'S mor a b'fhearr leam bhi 'n Drum-Uachdar

Na bhi 'n Gaig nan creagan gruamach.
Far am faicinn ann na h-uailsean

'S iiibhaidh dhearg air bharr an gualain.

The poet prefers Drumochter to Glen-Feshie and
Gaick of the grim crags. The Loss of Gaick is
a local epoch from which to date : an old person

17

258 BADENOCH :

always said that he or she was so many years
old at Call Ghaig. So in other parts, the
Olympiads or Archons or Temple-burnings
which made the landmarks of chronology were
such as the " Year of the White Peas," " the
Hot Summer " (1826?), the year of the " Great
SnoAv," and so forth.

" Vinegar Hill," as the maps have it, is to
the west of the Dun of Loch an Duin ; the Gaelic
is A' Mhin-choiseachd, the easy walking. The
English is a fancy name founded on the Gaelic.

A' Chaoirnich, the Caorunnach of the
Ordnance map, but the Chournich of 1773,
stands beside Loch an Diiin to the left. The
latter form means the " cairny " or " rocky "
hill; the other, the. " rowan-ny " hill, which is
the meaning doubtless. The steep ascent of it
from the hither end of the lake is called on the
map Bruthach nan Spaidan, a meaningless ex-
pression for Bruthach nan Spardan, the Hen-
roost Brae.

Meall Aillig, in the Gargaig Cory (1773), or
Garbh-Ghaig (Rough Gaick as opposed to
" Smooth " Gaick or Minigaig as in Blaeu's
map), appears to contain aiJl (a cliff) as its root
form. Some refer it to aileag, the hiccup,
which the stiffness of the climb might cause.

Coire Bhran, the Coryvren of Blaeu, takes
its name from the river Bran, a tributary of the
Tromie, and this last word is a well-known river

ITS HISTOEY AND PLACE NAMES. 259

name, applied to turbulent streams, and signifies

"raven."

Caochan a' Chaplich, a streamlet which falls
into Tromie a little below the confluence of the
Bran, contains the word caplach, which seems
to be a derivative of capull (a horse). There
is a Caiphch in the Aird — a large plateau, the
Monadh Caiplich in Loch Alsh, and a stream of
the name in Abernethy.

Croyla is the prominent mountain on the left
as one enters Glentromie— a massive, striking
hill. It is sung of in the Ossianic poetry of
John Clark, James Macpherson's fellow
Badenoch man, contemporary, friend, and
sincere imitator in poetry and literary honesty.
Clark's (prose) poem is entitled the " Cave of
Creyla," and in his notes he gives some
topographical derivations. Tromie appears
poetically as Trombia, and is explained as Trom-
bidh, heavy water, while Badenoch itself is
etymologised as Bha-dianach, secure valley.
The Ordnance map renders Croyla as Cruaidh-
leac, a form which etymologises the word out of
all ken of the local pronunciation. Blaeu's
map has Cromlaid, which is evidently meant for
Croyla. The Gaelic pronunciation is Croidh-la,
the la being pronounced as in English. It is
possibly a form of cruadhlach or crnaidhlarh
(rocky declivity), a locative from which might
have been cruaidhlaigh.

260 BADENOCH :

Meall an Duhh-catha is at the sources of the
Comhraig river. It should be spelt Duhh-
chadha, the black pass, the word cadha being
common for pass.

Ciste Mhairearaid or rather Ciste Mhearad,
Margaret's kist or chest or coffin, is part of Coire
Fhearnagan, above the farm of Achlean. Here
snow may remain all the year round. It is said
that Margaret, who was jilted by Mackintosh of
Moy Hall, and who cursed his family to sterility,
died here in her mad wanderings.

Meall Duhhag^ and not Meall Dubh-achaidh
(Ordnance map) is the name of the hill to the
south of Ciste Mairead, while equally Creag
Leathain{n), broad craig, is the name of the hill
in front of Ciste Mairead, not Creag na
Leacainn. Further north is

Creag Ghiubhsachan, the craig of the fir
forest.

Creag Mhigeachaidh stands prominently be-
hind Feshie Bridge and Laggan-ha. There is
a Dal-mhigeachaidh or Dalmigavie in Strath-
dearn, a Migvie (Gaelic, Migibhidh) in Strath-
errick, and the parish of Migvie and Tarland in
Aberdeenshire. The root part is mig or meig,
which means in modern Gaelic the bleating of a
goat.

1 Meall Di(b1i-agaidh, immediateiy behind Aclilum — D.
MoD. [Apparently a correction of Meall Dubhag ; cf. Avie-
more.]

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 261

Creag Follais, not Creag Phulach (sic) as on
the maps, means the conspicuous crag.
Similarly

Creag Fhiaclach, not Creag Pheacach ( !), on
the borders of Eothiemurchus, which means the
serrated or toothed crag, a most accurately de-
scriptive epithet.

Clach Mhic Cailein, on the top of Creag
Follais. The MacCailein meant is Argyle, sup-
posed to be Montrose's opponent, though it must
be remembered that Argyle had also much to
do with Huntly at Glenlivet and otherwise.

Sgor Gaoithe (wind skerry) is behind Creag
Mhigeachaidh.

We have now exhausted the natural features
of the country so far as the explanation of their
names is necessary, and we now turn to the farm
and field names — the hailes and townships and
other concomitants of civilisation. Commenc-
ing again at Craig Ellachie, we meet first after
crossing the crioch or boundary the farm of
Kinchyle, Cinn-Choille, wood's-end. Then

Lynwilg, the Lambulge of 1603, LynhuiJg
(Blaeu), signifies the land of the bag or bulge.

BalUnluig, the town (we use this term for
haile, which means "farm" or "township")
of the hollow.

Kinraim, north and south, on each side of the
Spey. This name appears about 1338 as
Kynroreach; 1440, as Kynrorayth; and Kynrara

2G2 BADENOCH :

(1603). The ki7i is easy; it is ''head" or
" end " as usual. The rara or rorath is diffi-
cult. Rorath, like ro-dhuine (great man),
might mean the great or noble (ro) rath or dwell-
ing-place (the Latin villa).

Dalraddy, Dalreadye (1603), and D(drodie
(Biaeu). The GaeUc is Dail-radaidh, the
radaidh dale. The adjective radaidh is in the
older form rodaidh, which is still known in
Gaehc in the force of " dark, sallow." A
sallow-complexioned man might be described
as " Duine rodaidh dorcha." The root-word is
rod, iron scum or rusty-looking mud; it is a
shorter form of ruadh (red). In Ireland, it is
pretty common, and is applied to ferruginous
land. The adjective rodaidh (dark or ruddy)
might describe the Dalraddy land. It is in con-
nection with Dalraddy that the great Badenoch
conundrum is given : —

Bha cailleach ann Dail-radaidh
'S dh' ith i adag 's i marbh.

(There was a carlin in Dalraddy who ate a had-
dock, being dead). With Dalraddy estate are
mentioned in 1691 the lands of Keanintachair
(now or lately Cinn-tachair, causeway-end),
Knockningalliach (the knowe of the carlins),
Loyninriach, Balivuilin (mill-town), and the
pasturages Feavorar (the lord's moss-stream),
Riochnabegg or Biachnabegg, and Batabog (now

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES 263

Bata-bog, above Ballinluig, the soft swampy-
place). Another old name is Gortincreif
(1603), the govt or field (farm) of trees. CVv/i-
gowan means the Smith's Croft.

DelfouT, DalpJiour in 1603, and older forms
are Dallefowr (1569). The del or dal is for dale,
but what is four? The Gaelic sound is fur.
The word is very common in names in Pittland,
such as Dochfour, Pitfour, Balfour, Letterfoiir,
Tillyfour, Tillipourie and Trinafour. These
forms point to a nominative piir, the p of which
declares it of non-Gaelic origin. The term is
clearly Pictish. The only Welsh word that can
be compared is paivr (pasture), pori (to graze),
the Breton peur. Fiir ha.s nothing to do with
Gaelic fuar, for then Dalfour would in Gaelic
be Dail-fhuar, that is Dal-uar.

Pitchurn, in 1603 Pettechaerne, in Gaelic
Bail-chaorruinn, the town of the rowan. The
Pictish pet or pit (town, farm), which is
etymologically represented by the Gaelic cuid,
has been changed in modern Gaelic to haile, the
true native word.

Pitourie, in 1495 Pitwery, in 1603
Pettourye, in 1620 Pettevre, &c. ; now
BaiVodharaidh. The adjective odhar means
" dun," and odharach, with an old genitive
odharaigh, or rather odharach-mhullach, is the
plant devil's bit. The plant may have given
the name to the farm.

264 BADENOCH :

Baldoxc means the black town.

Kincraig, Kyncragye (1603), means the end
of the crag or hill, which exactly describes it.

Leault, Gaelic Leth-allt or half-bm'n, a name
which also appears in Skye as Lealt, may have
reference rather to the old force of allt, which
was a glen or shore. The stream and partly
one-sided glen are characteristic of the present
Leault.

Dunachton; Gaehc Dun-Neachdain{n), the
hill-fort of Nechtan. Who he was, we do not
know. The name appears first in history in con-
nection with the Wolf of Badenoch. St Dros-
tan's chapel, below Dunachton House, is the
capeUa de Nachtan of 1380. We have
Dwnachtan in 1381, and Dunachtane in 1603.
The barony of Dunachton of old belonged to a
family called MacNiven, which ended in the
15th century in two heiresses, one of whom,
Isobel, married William Mackintosh, cousin of
the chief, and afterwards himself chief of the
Clan Mackintosh. Isobel died shortly after
marriage childless. Tradition says she was
drowned in Loch Insh three weeks after her
marriage by wicked kinsfolk.-^ Mr Fraser-Mac-
kintosh has written a most interesting mono-
graph on Dunachton, entitled " Dunachton,
Past and Present."

1 1475, Baron Macknenan deceased; Laclilan of Gr«llovy
gets the marriage of his daughters [no reference.]

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 265

Achnaheachin; Gaelic Ach' nam Beath-
aichean, the lield of the beasts. Last century
this land held eight tenants.

Keppoclunuir; Gaelic An Sliahh Ceapanach;
Ceapach means a tillage plot.

Coilintuie or Meadoivside. The Gaelic is
Coin an t-Suidke, the Wood of the Suidh, or
sitting or resting. Some hold the name is really
Cuil an t-Shuidh, the Recess of the Suidh.

Croftcarnoch; Gaelic Croit-charnach, the
Cairny Croft.

Belleville is, in its English form, of French
origin, and means " beautiful town." The old
name in documents and in maps was Raitts, and
in the 1776 Roads' Map this name is placed
exactly where Belleville would now be written.
Gaehc people call it Bail' a' Bhile, " the town
of the brae-top," an exact description of the
situation. Mrs Grant of Laggan (in 1796) says
that Bellavill ' ' is the true Highland name of the
place," not Belleville; and it has been main-
tained by old people that the place was called
Bail' a' Bhile before " Ossian " Macpherson
ever bought it or lived there. Whether the
name is adopted from Gaelic to suit a French
idea, or vice versa, is a matter of some doubt,
though we are inclined to believe that James
Macpherson was the first to call old Raitts
by such a name. James Macpherson
is the most famous — or rather the most

266 BADENOCH :

notorious — of Badenoch's sons; bjit though
his " Ossian "is a forgery from a historical
standpoint, and a purely original work from a
hterary point of view, yet it is to him that Celtic
literature owes its two greatest benefits — its
being brought prominently before the European
world, and, especially, the preservation of the
old literature of the Gael as presented in tradi-
tional ballads and poems, and in the obscure
Gaelic manuscripts which were fast disappear-
ing through ignorance and carelessness.

Lachandhu, the httle loch below Belleville,
gives the name to Sir Thomas Dick Lauder's
novel.

Raitts — the Enghsh plural being used to de-
note that there were three Raitts — Easter,
Middle, and Wester. In 1603 the ^lace is
caUed Reatt, and Blaeu has Rait. The Gaehc is
Rat, and this, which is the usual form in High-
land place-names, is a strengthened form of the
older rath or rdith of Old Irish, which meant a
residence surrounded by an earthern rampart.
It, in fact, meant the old farm house as it had
to be built for protective purposes. For the
form rat (from rath-d), compare Bialaid, further
on, and the Irish names Kealid from caoJ and
Croaghat from cruach, which Dr Joyce gives in
his second volume of Irish Place-Names to ex-
emplify this termination in d.

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 267

Chapel-park ; Gaelic Pairc an t-Seipeil. This
is a modern name, derived from the chapel and
kirk-yard that once were there, which was
known as the chapel of Ma Luac, the Irish Saint.
The older name was the Tillie or Tillie-sow,
where an inn existed, whose " Guidwife " was
called Bean an Tillie. Some explain Tillie-sow
as the Gaelic motto that used, it is said, to be over
the olden inn doors, viz., " Tadhaihbh so " —
"Visit here."

Lynchat is now BaiV a' Chait; " Sheep-cot "
town, not Cat's-town, is the explanation given
by the inhabitants. [So also Aodann Chat,
Edincat, in Strathdearn.]

An Uaimh Mhoir, the Great Cave, is a quar-
ter of a mile away from the highway as we pass
Lynchat. It is an " Erd-house," the only one
of this class of antiquarian remains that exists
in Badenoch. It is in the form of a horse-shoe,
which has one limb truncated, about 70 fett
long, 8 feet broad, and 7 high. The walls
gradually contract as they rise, and the roofmg
is formed by large slabs thrown over the ap-
proaching walls. Tradition says it was made m
one night by a rather gigantic race : the women
carried the excavated stuff in their aprons and
threw it in the Spey, while the men brought llif
stones, large and small, on their shoulders from
the neighbouring hills. All was finished by
morning, and the inhabitants knew not what had

268 BADENOCU :

taken place From this mythic ground we come
down to the romantic period, when, according
to the legend, MacNiven or Mac Gille-naoimh
and his nine sons were compelled to take refuge
here — some say they made the cave, and long
they eluded their Macpherson foes. There was
a hut built over the mouth of the cave, and at
last it was suspected that something was wrong
with this hut. So one of the Macphersons
donned beggar's raiment, called at the hut, pre-
tended to be taken suddenly ill, and was, with
much demur, allowed to stay all night. There
was only one woman in the hut, and she was con-
tinually baking; and he could not understand
how the bread disappeared in the apparent press
into which she put it, and which was really the
entry into the cave. He at last suspected the
truth, returned with a company of men next
night, and slew the MacNivens. It is said that
this man's descendants suffered from the ailment
which he pretended to have on that fateful night.

Laggan, the hollow, now in ruins. Here
dwelt the famous Badenoch witch, Bean an
Lagain.

Kerroiv ; in Gaelic An Ceathramh, the fourth
part — of the davoch doubtless — the davoch of
"Kingussie Beige" (1603), with its "four
pleuches."

Kingussie. Already discussed under th'^
heading of Kingussie parish.

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 269

Ardvroilach; Gaelic Ard-hhroighleach; in
1603, Ardhrelache . The form broighleacli
seems a genitive plural from the same root form
as hroighleag, the whortleberry. The word
hroighlich (brawling) scarcely suits with ard a
height.

Pitmain. The Gaelic is only a rendering of
the Enghsh sounds : Piodme'an. In 1603 it is
Petmeane. The reason for their being no Gaelic
form of this word is simply this. The gre;it
inn and stables of the Inverness road were here,
and the name Pit-meadhan, " middle town,'''
was adopted into the English tongue. The
Gaelic people, meantime, had been abolishing
all the pet or pit names, and changing them lo
Bals, but this one was stereotyped in the other
tongue, and the local Gael had to accept the
English name or perpetuate an offending form.
He chose to adopt the English pronunciation.

Balachroan; Bellochroan (1603); Gaelic
Baile-'Chrothain, the town of the sheepfold.
Above it was Coulinlinn, the nook of the lint,
where an old branch of Macphersons lived.

Aldlarie; Gaelic Allt-Lairigh, the stream of
the larach or gorge.

Strone means " nose."

Neujtonmore is the new town of the Moor —
An SHabh.

270 BADENOCH :

Clune and Craggan of Clune. The Gaelic
chiain signifies meadow land, whether high or
low, in dale or on hill.

Benchar, Bannachar (1603), Beandocher
(1614), and now Beannachar, Irish heannchar
(horns, gables, peaks), Welsh Bangor. It is a
very common place-name. The root is heann
or heinn (a peak).

BeaUid, in 1603 Ballet, in 1637 Ballid, now
Bialakl, so named from being at the mouth of
Glen-banchor — hial (mouth), with a termination
which is explained under Raitts. A
" pendicle " of it, called Corranach, is often
mentioned, which probably means the
" knowey " place.

Cladh Bhnd and Cladh Eadail, Bridget's
and Peter's (?) Kirk-yards, are the one at Ben-
char and the other along from Beallid, the latter
being generally called Cladh Bhiallaid. Chapels
existed there also at one time.

Ovie, in 1603 Owey (and Corealdye, now
Coraldie, corrie of streams or cliffs), Blaeu's
Owie, now Uhhaidh, appears to be a derivative
of uhh, egg : it is a genitive or locative of
uhhach, spelt and pronounced of old as uhhaigh.
Mrs Grant describes Lochan Ovie as beauty in
the lap of terror, thus suggesting the derivation
usually given of the name, viz., uamhaidh,
dreadful. Some lonesome lakes of dread near

ITS HISTOEY AND PLACE NAMES. 271

Ballintian are called Na h-uath Lochan, the
dread lakes.

Cluny, Clovnye (1603), now Cluainidh. The
root is cluain (meadow), and the termination is
doubtless that in A' Chluanach, a cultivated
plateau behind Dunachton, and the dative sin-
gular of this abstract form would give the
modern Cluny from the older cluanaigh.

Balgowan, Pettegovan (1603) now BaiV a
Ghohhainn, the town of the smith.

Gask-heg, Gask-more, Gargask, Drumgask
— all with Gask, and all near one another about
Laggan Bridge. There is an older Gasklone,
Mud-Gask, the Gascoloyne of 1603, Gasklyne
(1644), and Gaskloan (1691). The form Gask
appears in the Huntly rental of 1603. The
name Gask is common; there is Gask parish in
Strathearn, Perthshire, and there is a Gask in
Strathnairn, a Gask Hill in Fife, and Gask House
near Turriff. The name Gaskan appears more
than once, and in one instance applies to a rushy
hollow (Gairloch). We have Fingask in four
counties — Aberdeen, Fife, Inverness (in the
Aird, but the Gaelic is now Fionn-uisg'), and
Perth. Colonel Eobertson, in his " Topo-
graphy of Scotland," refers Gask to gasag,
diminutive of gas, branch; but this hardly suits
either phonetically or otherwise. The word
gasg seems to have slipped out of use : it belongs
only to Scotch Gaelic, and may be a Pictish

272 BADENOCH I

word. The dictionaries render it by " tail,"
following Shaw, and mis-improving the matter
by the additional synonym ' ' appendage , ' '
which is not the meaning ; for the idea is rather
the posterior of an animal, such as that of the
hind, which Duncan Ban refers to in this case
as "white" — " gasganan geala," and which
makes an excellent mark for the deer-stalker.
The dictionaries give gasgan, a puppy;
gasganach, petulant; and gasgara (gasganaf),
posteriors; all which Shaw first gives. There
is also the hving word gasgag, a stride, which no
dictionary gives. These derivations throw very
little hght on the root word gasg, which seems
to signify a nook, gusset, or hollo v;. The
Laggan gasgs are now ' ' rich meadows, bay
shaped," as a native well describes them. it
was at Gaskbeg that the gifted Mrs Grant of
Laggan lived, and here she sang of the beauties
of the Bronnach stream — the Gaehc Bronach,
the "pebbly" (?) — which flows through the
farm.

Blargie, in 1603 Blairovey, in Blaeu Blariki,
and in present Gaehc Blaragaidh. The ter-
mination agaidh appears also in Gallovie, which,
in 1497, is Galoivye, and now Geal-agaidh, the
white agaidh. The word appears as a prefix m
Aviemore and Avielochan, both being agaidh 'n
Gaelic. The old spehing of these words with a
r, as against the present pronunciation with g,

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 273

is very extraordinary. The meaning and
etymology of agaidh are doubtful. Shaw gives
aga as the " bottom of any depth," and there is
a Welsh word ag, a " cleft or opening." The
word may be Pictish.

Coull, in Gaelic Cuil, means the " nook,
corner," which the place is.

Ballmishag means the town of the kid,
mlseag or minnseag.

Crathie, in 1603 Crathe, in Blaeu Crachy,
now in Gaelic Craichidh. The name appears in
the Aberdeenshire parish of Crathie, pro-
nounced by Gaelic natives as Creychie ; Creychin
in 1366. Crathienaird is in 1451, Crachenardy.
[Cray at foot of Glenshee is in Gaelic Crathaigh;
Loch Achray is in Gaelic Loch Ath-chrathaigh :
? Ach-ch.] The form Crathie possibly points
to an older Gaelic Crathigh.

Garvaheg and Garvamore, the Garvey Beige
and Garvey Moir of 1603. The word at pre-
sent sounds as Garhhath, which is usually ex-
plained as garhh-ath, rough ford, a very suitable
meaning and a possibly correct derivation.

Shirramore and Shirraheg, the Waster
Schyroche and Ester Schiroche of 1603.
Sheiro-more, in 1773, is in Gai,e\ic Siorrath Mor.
With these names we must connect the adjoin-
ing glen name, Glenshirra, Gaelic Glenn Sioro,

a name which appears also in Argyleshire, near

18

274 BADENOCH :

Inveraray, as Glenshira, Glenshyro (1572), tra-
versed by the Shira stream. The root word ap-
pears to be sh' or sior, long. Some suggest
siaradh, squinting, obhqueness.

Aherarder, Blaeu's Ahirairdour , Gaelic
Obair-ardur. There is an Aberarder (Aberar-
dor in 1456, and Abirardour in 1G02) in Strath-
nairn, and another in Deeside, and an Auchter-
arder in Strathearn. The Aber is the Pictish
and Welsh prefix for " confluence," Gaelic
inver. The ardour is etymologised in the Ord-
nance map as Ard-dhoire, high grove. The
word may be from ard dhohhar, high water, for
the latter form generally appears in place-names
as dour.

Ardverikie has been explained correctly in
the "Province of Moray," published in 1798,
as ' ' Ard Merigie, the height (for rearing the
standard." The Gaehc is Ard Mheirgidh, from
meirge, a standard.

Gallovie.- — See under Blargie.

Muccoul is from Muc-cuil, Pigs' nook,

Ach-duchil means the field of the black
wood.

Dalchully, Gaelic Dail-chuilidh. The word
cuilidh signifies a press or hollow. It means the
" dale of the hollow or recess."

Tynrich is for Tigh an Fhraoich, house of
the heath.

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 275

Catlodge, in 16U3 Catteleitt, and in 1776
Catleak, is in present Gaelic Caitleag, the Cat's
Hollow; some suggest cat, sheepcote. The
form cait is unusual; we should, by analogy with
Muc-ciiil and other names where an animal's
name comes first in a possessive way, expect
Catlaig rather than Caitleag.

Breakachy, Brackachye (1603), is usually
explained as Breacachaidh, speckled field, which
is correct. " Brecacath " (Monymusk) is ex-
plained in the 16th century as " campus
distinctus coloribus." [Compare Ardochy,
Highfield, in Stratherrick, Strathdearn and
Lome.] We shall now cross the hills into Glen-
truim and up Loch Ericht side. There at Loch
Ericht Lodge we have

Dail an Longairt, in 1773 Rea DeIe7ilongarf,
and on the other side of the ridge is Coire an
Longairt (Cory Longart 1773), while there is ari
Eilean Longart above Garvamore bridge and
'" Sheals of Badenlongart " in Gaick above the
confluence of Bran, according to the 1773 map.
Longart itself means a shealing, the older form
being longphort, a harbour or encampment.

Dalwhinnie, in Gaelic Dail-chuinnidh, is
usually explained as Dail-choin7iimh, Meeting's
Dell; but the phonetics forbid the derivation.
Professor Mackinnon has suggested the alterna-
tive of the " narrow daiL" Dalwhinnie was a
famous station in the old coaching days, and the

27Q BADENOCH :

following verse shows how progress northwar "
might be made : —

Bracbhaist am Baile-chloichridh
Lunch an Dail na Ceardaich
Dinneir an Dhail-chuinnidh
'S a' bhanais ann an Rat.

Presmitckerach, not the Ordnance Pres-
mocachie, is in 1603 Presmukra, that is Preas-
mucraigh, bush of piggery or pigs.

Dalannach, which the Ordnance map etymo-
logises into Dail-gleannach or Glen-dale, was in
1603 Dallandache, and is now Dail-annach. The
old form points to the word lann or land, an
enclosure or glade. The Irish Armagh, for
Eanach, a marsh, will scarcely do, as the name
appears in Loch Ennich in its proper Gaelic
phonetics.

Cruhinmore, Crohine (1603), now Criihinn.
The names Cruheen, Cruhoge, Slievecrooh, &c.,
appear in Ireland, and are referred by Dr Joyce
to cruh, (a paw, hoof), criiihm (a trotter, little
hoof). The Gaelic cruhach (lame), and cruhan
(a crouching), are further forms of the root
word, a locative case from the the latter form
being possibly our Crubin, referring to the two
" much back-bent hills there."

Invernahavon, Invernavine (1603), means
the confluence of the river, that is, of the Truim
witli Spey.

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 277

Ralia, Gaelic Rath-liath, means the grey
rath or dwelling-place.

Nuide, Nuid (1603), Noid (1699), now Noid.
The derivation suggested for the name is nuadh-
id, a topographic noun from the adjective nuadh
or nodha, new; of old, " Noid of Ealia."

Knappach, in Gaelic A' Chnapaich, the hilly
or knobby land. It is a common place-name,
especially in Ireland, appearing there as Knap-
pagh and Nappagh.

Ruthven, which is also the first form the
name appears in in 1370, when the "Wolf"
took possession of the lordship of Badenoch. It
was here he had his castle. In 1380 the name
is Rothven and Ruthan. The name is common
all over Pictland, mostly in the form Ruthven,
but also at various times and places spelt Rutii-
fen, Ruwen, Ruven, Riv(v) en, &c. The
modern Gaelic is Ruadhainn, which simply
means the " red place," from ruadhan, any-
thing red. The v of the English form lacks
historic explanation. Brae-ruthven gives the
phonetically interesting Gaelic Bre-ruadhnach.

Gordon Hall (so in 1773 also) is in Gaelic
Lag an Notair, the Notary's Hollow, for it is a
hollow. The name and its proximity to Ruth-
ven Castle mutually explain one another : Gor-
don Hall was doubtless the seat of the Gordon
lords of Badenoch, when the castle of Ruthven
was changed to barrack purposes. Here the

278 BADENOCH :

rents used to be " lifted ' ' for the Gordon
estates.

KiUiehuntlij, KeiUehuntlye (1603), Blaeu's
Kyllehunteme , in present Gaelic Coille-Chun-
tainn, the wood of Contin. Himtly is in Gaelic
Hundaidh, and M'Firbis, in the 16th century,
has Hundon; hence arises the English form.
The popular mind still connects it with the
Huntlies. Contin is a parish in Ross-shire, and
there was a Contuinn in Ireland, on the borders
of Meath and Cavan, which is mentioned in con-
nection with Fionn's youthful exploits. It has
been explained as the meeting of the waters,
con- (with) and tuinn (waves), but the matter is
doubtful.

Inveruglas, In7ieruglas (1603), in Gaelic
Inhhir-ulais, the inver of Ulas, although no such
stream exists now, receives its explanation from
the old Retours, for in 1691 we have mention of
Inveruslash and its mill-town on the water of
Duglass, which means the stream passing the
present Milton. Hence it means the inver of
Duglass or dark stream, dahh (black), and glais
(stream).

Soillierie, in Gaelic Soileiridh, means the
"bright conspicuous place," on the rising be-
yond the Insh village.

Lynchlaggan stands for the Gaelic Loinn-
Chlaiginn, the Glade of the Skull, possibly refer-
ring to the knoll above it rather than to an

ITS HISTORY AND PLACE NAMES. 279

actual skull there found ; the name is applied in
Ireland to such skull-like hills.

Am Beithigh (not Am Beithe), means the
Bnch-pool; a locative form.

Farletter is the old name for Balnacraig and
Lynchlaggan, and it appears in 1603 as Ferlatt
and Falatrie (1691). It took its name from the
hill above, now called Craig Farleitir. The
word Farleitir contains leitir, a slope or hillside,
and possibly the preposition for (over), though
we must remember the Fodderletter of Strath-
avon with its Pictish Fotter, or Fetter, or
Father (?).

Forr is situated on a knolly ridge overlook-
ing Loch Insh, and evidently contains the pre-
position for (over), as in orra for forr a, on them.
The last r or ra is more doubtful. Farr, in
Strathnairn and Sutherland, is to be compared
with it.

DaJnavert, in 1338 and 1440 Dalnafert, in
1603 Dallavertt, now in Gaelic Dail-a'-hheirt,
which is for Dail na hhfeart, the dale of the
graves or trenches, from feart, a grave, which
gives many place-names in Ireland, such as
Clonfert, Moyarty, &c.

Cromaran is possibly for Crom-raon, the
crooked field.

Balnain is for BeaJ an athain, the ford
mouth.

280 BAUENOCH

Ballintian, the town of the fairy knoll, was
called of old Countelawe (1603) and Cuntelait
(1691), remembered still vaguely as the name
of the stretch up the river from Ballintian, and
caplained as Cunntadh-laid, the counting (place)
of the loads ! Perhaps, like Contin, it is for
Con-tuil-aid, the meeting of the waters, that is,
of Feshie and Fernsdale, which takes place
here.

Balanscrittan, the town of the sgriodan or
running gravel.

Bulroy, for Bhuaile-ruaidh, the red fold.

Tolvah, the hole of drowning.

Achlean, for Achadh-leathainn, is broad
field. Beside it is Achlum, for Achadh-leum,
the field of the leap.

Ruigh-aiteachain may possibly be a corrup-
tion for Ruigh Aitneachain, the Stretch of the
Junipers.

Ruigh-fionntaig , the Reach of the Fair-
stream.

In the Dulnan valley is Caggan, the Gaelic
of which is An Caiginn, and there is " a stony
hill face " in Glen-Feshie of like name.

AxNNAT

AN NAT

Much mystery is made to attach to this name,
though, as a matter of fact, the word is simple
enough as to meaning. It is obsolete both m
Scotch and Irish Gaelic, and it is usually glossed
by eacilais (church) simply. There was, how-
ever, a dilference between the general term
eaglais and the restricted word ayinoid. The
annoid church was that in which the patron saint
(of the monastery or monastic district) was edu-
cated 01 in which his relics were kept (i mhi
taisi in erloma). The first time we meet with it
in literature is in the Book of Armagh (circa 800
A.D.), and there Iserninus, or larnan, is left at a
certain spot by St Patric to found his monastery
(rnanche) and his patron saint's church (andooit).
The Old Irish form is andoit, with the last vowel
long; and its derivation is disputed. Dr Whitley
Stokes suggests antitas, antiquity (" ancient
church "), as its origin, a late Latin term, the

284 ANN AT.

phonetics being the same very much as in
Trianaid, O.I. Trmdoit. Unfortunately antitas
is a figment of the philological brain to explam
a7itas (G. antatis), which is glossed by
" senatus " or senate, its meaning bemg practi-
cally that of ecclesia, which became the Gaelic
eaglais. The phonetics here are exactly those
of Trianaid. We may take it that mediaeval
Latin antas, from ante, before, and really mean-
ing " council of ancients," is the ancestor of
annaid.

The relation of the anndid to other churchea
in the district was one of superiority and
antiquity. It is especially contrasted with the
dalta church (cf . Kildalton), founded by a mem-
ber of the same community as the founder of
the original church and monastery, and the word
may be translated as " sister " or " fosterling "
church. A further church, another step below
it, was the conpairche (co-parishioner) church
under the tutelage of the original founder. Two
words are general, eaglais and ceall or cell, now
known only by its locative cill (Kil-), the latter
meaning a smaller church than the other usually,
being from Lat. cella, a cell. Other church
names meet us having shghtly different mean-
ings : — teampull, church, originally ' ' temple ' ' ;
clachan, church, Irish clochdn, a stone bee-hive
monastic hut; seipeal, Middle Irish sepell, a late
word from chapel; neimheadh, glebe, Old Irish

ANNAT. 285

nemed, chapel, Gaulish nemeton. This last is
the original Celtic name for a temple, and comes
from the same root as neamh. It appears rarely
— Eosneath (old Neveth), Navity once or twice,
and especially m Eoskeen, where Mr Watson in
his " Eoss-shire Place-Names" has shown the
word to exist in Nonakil (neimh' na cill'), Dal-
navie, Knocknavie, Inshnavie, and Newmore
(neimh' mhor). Annoin or Andoin (church) is
another name that only appears in the glosses.

Annaid is therefore not a native word. Its
chanee resemblance to the eastern goddess
Anaitis has been responsible for much '' Druid-
ism," and bad speculation on Celtic religion
generally. In this connection we may mention
two other interesting ecclesiastical words. The
first is Manachainn or Monastery, the Gaelic
name of Beauly. The other is the early Irish
apdaine or ahthaine, abbacy, or " abbey land "
also, whence our two or three Appins, about
which also much nonsense is usually written.
As ahthane, a supposed title, the word puzzled
the historians for many centuries, until Skene,
himself first a victim, discovered the mistake.
In proof of the above facts in regard to annaid,
the many glossaries of early Irish published with
Irish texts must be consulted, but a fair account
of the matter can be got from the third volume
of the published Senchus Mor.

GAELIC "AIRIGH,"SHEIL1NG,

iw

NORSE PLACE-NAMES

GAELIC AIRIGH/'SHEILING,
•IN NORSE PLACE-NAMES

The new Saga book of the Viking Club discusses
the origin of ark and erg in the place-names of
northern England, and tries to overturn the
theory that they are from Norse horgr {Horg)^
and Anglo-Saxon hearg, a sacrificial " grove "
of heathen times. The new theory regards them
as being from Norse or Danish erg or cerjj, a
shieling or dairy farm, a word undoubtedly bor-
rowed by the Norse as the Orkney Saga fully
proves, and as several place-names in the High-
lands and Isles still prove. Dr Colley-March
was the originator of the new theory in a paper
printed in 1890 in a Liverpool antiquarian
society's transactions — and I have not seen it;
but as Dr Isaac Taylor in his excellent work on
" Names and their Histories " (1896), holds by

19

290 GAELIC " AIRIGU," SHIELING.

the horg theory, Dr March's view is either im-
known to or rejected by the Enghsh experts on
place-names. The difficulties in both theoiies
are great : horg can hardly be used with other
than a god's' name outside epithets; of course it
is used alone in Harrow. It is difficult to equate
Grims-argh in Preston with a deity. Again the
borrowed arg of the Norse cannot without great
difficulty be connected historically with northern
England. In the Highlands the termination ary
in place names is common, less so is sary; the
latter nearly always comes from the possessive s
before arj/, and in the Norse drg ; the former
may belong to other endings, especially -gcLTvy
(N. gerdi, G. gearraidh, outland beyond town-
ship ploughed land). The only literary refer-
ence in Norse to arg or erg is in the Orkney Saga,
where we have the place called by them Asgrims-
^rgin practically glossed by the expression
'■ erg, which we call setr (sheihng)." Asgrims-
serg is now called Askary or Assary, at the north
end of Loch Calder in Caithness. When one
compares the original form Asgrims-serg with
the present Askary or Assary, one is compelled
to tremble (metaphorically) for the etymologist
of Western Isles names of Norse origin. Pr
Anderson points out that many places in Caith-
ness present this termination — Halsary, (Hall,
or. perhaps, Hallvard !), Dorrery, Shurrery,

GAELIC AIRIGH, SHIELING. 291

Blingery, &c. Sutherland presents at least
three — Gearnsary, Modsary, and Gradsary, but
with Asgnms-£erg before our eyes, we refuse at
present to consider them, though Mr Mackay of
Hereford has made a decent attempt to etymolo-
gise them in Vols. XVII . and XVIII. of Inverness
Gaelic Society Transactions. To regain con-
fidence, we must go to the happy shelling
grounds of -sary and -ary in the Uists. In North
Uist we have two distinct districts given over to
Aulasary, which, of course, is Olafs-arge {arge
must have been the oldest form, as we shall see),
and which means " Olave's Shelling." In the
same island is Obisary, which stands for Hops-
arge, " Sheihng in the Bay." There, too, we
have Langary from lang, long; Eisary, from
Hris, copse; Horisary (horgs, "grove"?),
Dusary, Vanisary, and Honary. In South Uist
are Vaccasary and Trasary, in Barra is Ersary
(Eric's-arge?). Ardnamurchan seems to con-
tain, some: Brunery {brannr, spring), Smirisar-
ary (" smear or butter " ?), Ahsary and Assary,
in Glenelg Skiary. But these last five I do not
know the pronunciation of, and may not be
rightly included. Perhaps some native may
oblige on this point. The Gaelic airigh, mis-
spelt airidh, is in early Irish airge, dairy or a
place where cows are, which in old Irish would
be arge, at which stage the Norse borrowed it

292 GAELIC AIRIGH, SHIELING.

from the Scots. Personally I believe that it was
adopted only in the Highlands by them. ^^
the bye, its initial use has been suggested ror
Arkle in Sutherland, that is Arg-fell, " Sheil-
ing's Fell " ; if so, the difficult ar or ark of Arbol,
in Easter Ross, might so be explained. The
English forms from ar^ • generally show ark, if
the root is initial in the word. In future it is
hoped that any Gaelic writer who reads the above
will write airigh, not airidh, for " shelling."

QLENSHIEL

GLENSHIEL

The glen is, as usual in such cases, named after
the river Shiel. There is another river Shiel
and Loch Shiel forming the southern boundary
of Moidart. It is mentioned by the Dean of
Lismore, who gives the bounds of the Clanranald
as —

Eddir selli is sowyrrni.
" Between Shiel and Loch-hourn (Sorn)."

Fortunately, we can go back eight hundred years
further than the Dean's time, and we find the
southern Shiel in Adamnan twice under the form
of Sale. The phonetics here are all right, for
Old Irish saile, sahva, is in modern Gaelic sile.
The old Celtic form of the river's name would be
Salia, the root being sal, sea, salt, sahva. The
root s-val, swell, is also possible. The name
hkely is Pictish, and therefore we are forced to
fall back on original Celtic roots for an explana-
tion.

TOM N AH U RICH

TOM NAHU RICH

Your correspondent, " Clach," has forgotten
the late " Clach's " (Alex. Mackenzie) deriva-
tion of Tomnahuirich ; this was Tom-na-Fiodhr-
aich, " Hill of the Wood." In favour of this
he quoted Thomas Mackenzie, headmaster of
Eaining's School, and after 1843 connected with
the High School. Old Thomas declared the
" f " was dropped within the memory of people
living in his time, and the old cailleachs of the
town used to go out to get firewood there, speak-
ing of it as " dol an fhiodhrach." But this is
fanciful. The word fiodhrach does not mean
wood " in the sense of trees, but of logs for
ehipbuilding ; even so it is rare. Again, we have
the Gaehc pronunciation of Tomnahurich re-
corded in the Fernaig MS. (1690) in the " Pro-
phesie about Inverness." "There will be
battle —

i dig McPehaig i mach

Lea layn agus lea luhrich

Tuitti ni Ghayle ma saigh

Ma voirlumb toim ni hurich

300 TOMNAHURICH.

— ill wliich Macbeth will come forth with sword
and armour, and the Gael will fall over other on
the Bordland of Tom-na-hurich." Mr Thomas
Mackenzie's derivation is simply impossible, and
it is grammatically bad. Ballifeary no doubt
means " Town of the Watch," but I know no
Gaelic words that could make Tomnahurich into
"Watchman's Hill." A very usual derivation
has been the "Boat Hill," from its turned up
boat shape, and with this fancy the cemetery at
the top seems to have been made into a sort of
ship's shape. The name iuhhrach for boat is
poetical, and derived from the name of the fatal
mythic vessel that conveyed Clan Uisneach back .
to Ireland. The name simply means the " Yew
Ship." For, after all wanderings, we must fall
back on the manifest meaning. Tom-iia-
h-Iubhraich means simply " Hill of the Yew
Wood"; iuhhrach means a yew wood, from
iuhhar, yew, just as giuthsach means " Pine-
wood " (Kin-gussie is Cinn-ghiuthsaich, older
ghiusaigh); beitheach, birch-wood, and so on.
The old Irish for iuhhar was ihar and the Gaulish
etem is ehuro, common in place names and even
tribal names. York was called Eburacum,
which is much the same form as iuhhrach, which
stands for Celtic Ehurdkon.

PLACE-NAMES

OF

ROSS AND CROMARTY

Place-Names of Ross and Cromarty. By W.
J. Watson, M.A. (Aberd.), B A. (Ox.ou ).
Inverness : Northern Counties Printing and
Publishino- Co. 1904. 10s 6d.

Mr Watson's book on the place-names of Ross
and Cromarty holds a unique position : it is the
first attempt by a Gaehc-speaking Celt, trained
in modern philologic ways, to give in book-form
the results of a thorough investigation into the
names of a large county, and, incidentally, to
give a practical epitome of Scottish place-names.
Many years ago — in 1887 — -Professor Mac-
kinnon published in the Scotsman a series of
articles on " Place and Personal Names in
Argyle," marked 'by that modern scholarship
which native Gaelic speakers so abundantly lack
in dealing with such matters, but, unfor-
tunately for the public, he has never gathered
them into book-form. There have also been
several other competent, and, at the same time,
Gaelic-speaking philologists who dealt with the
place-names of different localities in papers and
articles more or less fugitive. Mr Watson,
however, is really the first Gael in the field with
a work which can be honestly called scientific,
which systematises its results in a way helpful

304 PLACE NAMES OF ROSS AND CROMARTY.

for investigators in this diflicult subject. It has
only been too painfully evident of late years that
only a learned native Gael — or a German ! — can
really deal with the Celtic names of Scotland.
Hitherto the authors of works on Scottish place-
names have not taken the trouble to learn the
Gaelic language — and that, too, a language
which possesses a double set of inflections,
initial, and, as usual, final, not to mention the
fact of its difficult Continental pronunciation.
It is no wonder that one Sassenach writer on
the subject, on getting from a Highlander the
correct Gaelic form of a certain combination
which he meant for the explanation (by appear-
ance) of a certain place-name, rejected this
correct form of spoiling his derivation, and kept
his own original wrong combination ! Such a
scientist as the late James Macdonald of Huntly,
who honestly tried to acquire the language,
never attained complete correctness in repro-
ducing Gaelic names pronounced to him by the
natives. What with the Gaelic article causing
aspiration and eclipsis, bewildering to a non-
Celt, and the other phonetic and syntactic finesse
of a language which has undergone more than
ordinary philologic change, Gaelic is a lan-
guage which only a very well trained outsider
can have anything to do with. This training
our place-name philogists as yet refuse to under-
go. And there are also the history of the Ian-

PLACE NAMES OF ROSS AND CROMARTY. 305

guage — its changes through hundreds of years
— and the history of the country during the
same time, all to be taken into account. It may
truly be said that the writer who undertakes to
deal with the Celtic place-names of Scotland
must undergo no ordinary linguistic and historic
training.

Mr Watson fulfils all the requirements of the
philologist we need to elucidate our Celtic place-
names. His Introduction of some hundred
pages is a mine of practical information, thor-
oughly systematised. In dealing with Gaelic
names, the student will be first struck with th^
large place which he gives to suffixes To the
ordinary philologist every ending in ach is for
achadh, " field "; Mr Watson shows this suffix
to be old Celtic -cicum, denoting " pla^.e of,'*
such as Carn-ach, " place of cairns," or Dorn-
och, " place of hand-stones." He shows with
clearness how suffixes combine : Muc-ar-n-aich,
" place of pigs," where we have three suffixes
{ar, an, ach). One important point which he
brings out is the undoubted existence of a
diminutive -aidh or-idh, at least in old Pictland.
He adduces lochaidh, badaidh, and lagaidh as
outstanding examples. These suffixes seem to
be the old Celtic ending in -io-s, or fern, -ia, the
latter very common in river names. The diffi-
culty here, however, is the modern Gaelic pro-

20

306 PLACE NAMES OF ROSS AND CROMARTY.

nunciation in final -idh, not -e as in usual GaeJi<^
The Welsh, however, pronounce, or rather
spell, this ending {-io-s) in its modera form ns
-ydd. It would seem that in this diiuinutive
ending -aidh we have distinctive, traces of Pictish
or Brittonic pronunciation of these place-names.
We have such diminutives m old Gaelic in cer-
tain personal names, such as -Ba-^i e (St Barr) for
Barrio-s, and this again for Barro-vindos or
Barrfhind, which we know to be the fuli name
of the Saint. Those acquainted with the old
charter forms of place-names know that -ie, the
Scottish form of G. -aidh, is continually inter-
changed with -in. This last, which does not
usually exist in a Gaelic form, must be the old
Pictish stem-ending (from -id, gen. -inos) in n,
known well in Scottish Gaelic, and giving rise
to the modern Gaelic plural, just like the weak
stems in the Teutonic languages. Material for
pursuing this and kindred points will be found
in abundance in Mr Watson's volume. We
may also note his excellent tabulation of Norse
vowels and consonants in Gaelic; it should be
very useful to students of Northern names. But
does not Homer nod in explaining Saraig as
Saur-Vik (Mud-bay), the phonetics of which by
the table result in Soraig? Compare Soroba^
Sorby, and English Sowerby.

The main body of the work deals seriatim.
with the twenty-nine mainland parishes of Ross

PLACE NAMES OF ROSS AND CROMARTY. 307

and with Lewis in general. Each parish forms,
as it were, a chapter by itself; the place-names
are dealt with in separate articles, vocabulary-
wise, but not in alphabetical order. The
' ' English ' ' or map-name is given first ; then the
old forms from charters, documents, or his-
tories; then the Gaelic form, where such is
existent; and, lastly, the meaning or derivation.
Mr Watson has heard all the pronunciations per-
sonally, and he has visited practically every
corner of the county. On this head th'-3 work
is most thoroughly done, and the derivation
offered suits the characteristics of the place, if
it be named after any characteristics. The
county name Boss he is inclined to derive from
Brittonic or Pictish sources, corresponding to
Welsh rhos, " a wold," rather than from Gaelic
ros, " a promontory," but the words are no
doubt ultimately the same. Cromarty contains
the adjective crom, " bent," but the old forms
are puzzling, and the modern Gaelic Cromba'
points only to crom-hath, "curved sea." Mr
Watson restores the old name as Crom-b-ach-
dan, the h being a development (of Pictish
times?) and the rest mere suffixes, the total
meaning " Bay Place." Pictish, Norse, and
Gaelic names jog one another all over the
county, but, as the author well shows, there is
a marked difference between Easter Eoss names
and those of Wester Eoss, the latter being more

308 PLACE NAMES OF ROSS AND CROMARTY.

Gaelic and more modern really. The Norse
element stops at the Beauly and Tarradale and
Eskadale (Ash-dale, lately explained as Uisge-
daill). Pictish names are common in East
Eoss. One of these we have in Bal-keith,
doubtless for older Pit-keith; Gaehc, Baile-na-
Coille, a translation which, as Mr Watson points
out, seems to prove that Keith means " wood,"
from a word aUied to Welsh coed, "wood";
Gauhsh ceto-, allied to Enghsh heath. Dal-
keith is therefore Brittonic in both elements,
" Plateau of the wood " (Welsh dol, Pictish dul,
dal). Space does not allow us to follow Mr
Watson further in quoting his interesting deriva-
tions, but we must mention some old or peculiar
words which he has been enabled to recognise
or rescue. Strikingly happy is his derivation of
the place-names Nonakil (" church-land "),
Newmore, Dalnavie, and Navity, from the old
Gaelic nemed {neimhidh now), " a sacred
place," which we have also in Rosneath.
Eirhhe or airbhe, '" a wall," is found in Altna-
harrie, etc. ; rahhmi, a kind of bulrush; saothair,
a neck that joins a " dry-island " to the shore,
a promontory covered at high tide; faithir, the
steep face of an old raised beach; feodhail, a
side form of faodhail, " a ford," from Norse
vadhilL ''shallow water"; sleaghach, a rifted
or gullied slope or hill, from the same root as
sl'ujhe, "path," literally "a cutting" (root

PLACE NAMES OF ROSS AND CROMARTY. 309

sleg, "hit," "cut"). On the west coast
cathair means a " fahy knoll," while sithean
means a considerable hill with no notions of
fairies attached thereto. Mr Watson rightly
queries druineach as Druid; the meaning is
artist, artificer, sculptor (Mr Carmichael's
draoineach). Irish druine means " art," even
"needlework." We demur to Mr Watson's
derivation of Killearnan. True the Gaelic is
Cill-Iurnain, which might point to a St Iturnan,
only the name Iturnan is a misreading for
Itarnan, a true Pictish name and a saint's name
also. Ernin or Ferreolus was a favourite saint
and a favourite saint's name, and to a root-
inflected form of Ernin or larnan we must refer
lurnan.

Mr Watson has added a valuable index to his
work, containing over three thousand words,
and showing by a device with the full stop where
the main accent rests. Many of these words
naturally Ijelong to districts outside Eoss. In-
deed the volume, as already said, is a microcosm
of Scottish place-names, the Anghc Lothians and
the Merse being left out of account. It lays a
sound basis for the further study of Scottish
place-nafnes on modern philologic lines.

PLACE NAMES

OF

ELGINSHIRE

The Place Names of Elginshire. By D.
Matheson, F.E.I.S. Stirling : Eneas Mac-
kay. 1905.

Mr D. Matheson, lately head of an educational
institution in Elgin, and now editor of the
Northern Times, is the latest recruit to the slowly
increasing authors on place names. His work
on the " Place Names of Elginshire " is a hand-
some volume of over two hundred pages, pub-
lished by Eneas Mackay, Stirling, and dedicated
to Mr Carnegie. Works on place names have
steadily been getting more scientific as their
authors have studied the science of language and
the possibilities which the history, the physical
features, and the languages of the localities dealt
with afford. The authors have also profited by
reading what has recently been done by others
in the same line. Mr Matheson, however,
stands by himself, and is a law to himself on
language and history. He has consulted Skeat's
Etymological Dictionary, but not with profit; he
does not know that there is a corresponding
Gaelic Etymological Dictionary, considered of

314 THE PLACE-NAMES OF ELGINSHIRE.

equal authority according to leading Celtic
scholars. The latter

' ' Wad from many a blunder free him
And foolish notion,"

No doubt Mr Watson's book on the " Place
Names of Ross-shire " came out too late to be
of use to him; this is a pity, if Mr Matheson
would have utilised the methods and results
attained there — which is doubtful. Mr John-
ston, of Falkirk, he does quote; it is a pity that
he did not use even this indifferent work to
better purpose. In short, Mr Matheson belongs
to the old school of etymologists. He has no
compunction to refer a Moray name to a Ger-
man, Dutch, or Scandinavian origin straight
away, without considering the question of how
the Germans, for example, could ever have
planted a name in Moray. Thus, for Knock-
granish, near Aviemore, he gives: "from the
Gaelic * Cnoc,' a hill, and the Teutonic ' Gran '
or ' Grense,' a boundary," the latter being a
German word. How could he get his Germans
up to the heights of Craigellachie several cen-
turies ago? Besides, Granish is famous in works
on Druid lore, as our author should have known.
Again, Balvatton, in Cromdale, is taken from
Gaelic ' baile ' and Norse ' vatn,' water. Were
the Vikings anytime about Grantown? Of
course, the name means ' Town of the clump

THE PLACE-NAMES OF ELGINSHIRE. 315

(badan).' In his Scandinavian eagerness, he
antedates them by 600 years. Lossie, Ptolemy's
Loxa, dates to 120 a.d. at least; the Vikmgs
came in 800 a.d.; yet our author calmly asserts
that Loxa is Laxa of Norse, ' salmon river ' ! It
means ' winding river ' (Old Gaelic lose). In
matters Gaelic, Mr Matheson belongs to the
school of the late Colonel Eobertson, famed for
his " Topography of Scotland." We thought
that Mr Matheson knew Gaehc; we are now
doubtful.

In history Mr Matheson's work is " second
hand of second hand," and his introduction is an
extraordinary jumble. Lollius Urbicus, about
whom only a few words exist recording the fact
of his building the thirty-two mile wall, is repre-
sented as conquering to the Beauly Firth, calling
the district southward Vespasiana ! Where in
the world did Mr Matheson get this utteiiy
absurd statement? His confusion in regard to
Ptolemy is quite inexcusable, as excellent edi-
tions of that author's Geography of Scotland can
be easily got at (Gaelic Society's Trans. XVIII. ;
Proc. Society of Antiquaries, XL, by Captain
Thomas). There he could see that Burghead
was in Ptolemy's original ' Greek ' (not Latin)
Pteroton Stratopedon, or ' winged camp,' and
that such ' fool ' work as Tor-an-duin, founded
on Ptolemy's word Pteroton, was beneath notice.
Mr Matheson has the Scandinavians on the brain.

31G THE PLACE-NAMES OF ELGINSHIRE.

One third of his Moray names, speaking roughly,
he refers to Scandinavian sources ; now it is safe
to say that not one name in Moray is due directly
to the Scandinavians. They never colonised
there, and the only recorded battle fought by
them in Moray was that of Torfnes, in which
they defeated King Duncan (probably). The
assertions of the Saga, when examined judicially,
show that the Norse made a ' ' blood-red ' ' foray
through Moray to Fife. Undoubtedly they held
part of the old province of Moray — the Ross
portion — and this is the foundation for the Saga
statements. From place names we know they
stopped at Beauly river, the old limit of the pro-
vince of Ross. All Mr Matheson's Norse deri-
vations may be unmercifully excised, but with
what a result to the book ! That there are Norse
and Dutch names in Moray we do not doubt ; but
these were brought in by the English and Nor-
man-French planted in the district in the 12th
century to replace the transported natives. This
is historical, and if Mr Matheson had studied the
Teutonic names in Moray with these facts of the
12th century in his mind, he would certainly
have added to our know^ledge both of place
names and history. A few of the names brought
in by these colonists from Lothian, Danish Cum-
berland, and, even, Flanders, may be pointed
out. Hatton is in Moray three times — ' heath-
ton ' (Taylor) ; common in England ; Overton,

THE PLACE-NAMES OF ELGINSHIRE. 317

Harestanes, Middleton, Whiterigs, Unthank
(useless land), Oakenhead or Aikenhead (Blaeu),
Orton, Ogston, Coleburn (compare Cold-beck of
Cumberland), Ormiston, Mundale (Mundwell or
' Inlet-field ' over the borders, whence the Bor-
der surname Mundel — Norse in origin), and
several others. This would have been a fertile
field of research; but Mr Matheson's Scandi-
navian wet blanket is over it all.

Mr Matheson wastes much space by giving
the derivation not only of the place name, but
the derivation also of the constituent words.
Thug, if a place is called ' Hill-head,' surely for
ordinary purposes it is sufficient to say " from
Eng. ' hill ' and ' head.' " No ! Mr Matheson
must etymologise both ' hill ' and ' head ' —
thus : —

" HiUhead. — Middle English hil, hul, Anglo-
Saxon hylJ, Dutch hil, Latin collis, Lituanian
[sic.'] Kalnas, a hill, and head from the Middle
English hed, heed, heued, Anglo-Saxon heafod,
Dutch hoofd, Icelandic hofud, Latin caput,
Greek Kephale [sic' really alhed toEng. <ja6/e],
Sanskrit Kapala, literally a skull, and by usage
n head, or end."

Such is the passage, with all its imperfections of
typing (not due to the printer) and derivation.
If Mr Matheson had dropped these useless addi-
tions to simple hill and head, he would have re-
duced his book by about one half. But the

318 THE PLACE-NAMES OF ELGINSHIRE.

worst of it is that he iterates these Usts every
time the respective words turn up, and if the
derivations are all awry, as they are usually in
Gaelic, the constant repetition is doubly irritat-
ing. The Gaelic word lag, with its derivatives
lagan and logie, occui' very often, but nearly
every time we have this piece of atrocity
attached : —

" Gaelic lag, lug, German lucke, and cognate
with the Latin Lacus, and Greek Lakkos, a
hollow or lake."

Now it is just possible that ' lag ' may be allied
to German ' lucke,' gap (Kluge is doubtful about
its derivation), but certainly it is not allied to
either of the Latin or Greek words, which agree
with Gaelic ' loch.' Mr Matheson has been very
unwise to touch Gaelic derivation, considering
his knowledge of the subject, and the further
fact that his particular derivation work is already
competently done and placed before the public
in dictionary form.

Some other leading errors must be pointed
out. The termination '-as,' '-us,' '-ais' is
common in Moray, as it is in all Pictland. Mr
Matheson, in an evil moment following old Shaw,
made this to be ' eas,' waterfall, though Shaw
adds the idea of ' water ' generally. The num-
ber of waterfalls in Moray would have been
counted by scores were this derivation true.
The sufRx denotes 'place,' ' station,' and is no

THE PLACE-NAMES OF ELGINSHIRE. 319

doubt derived from the root ' ves,' ' vos,' dwell,
be, allied to Greek ' astu,' a city, Sanskrit
' vastu,' a place, and perhaps to Gaelic ' fois.'
Dallas means ' plane place,' from old ' dul,' now
' dail ' ; Eothes, ' place of raths or granges ' ;
Duffus, 'dark place'; Forres, 'lower place,'
Pictish ' voter,' ' fother,' ' for,' ' far ' ; Forres,
Mr Matheson says, appears in Ptolemy as Varris
— which is not the case ; Granish, ' rough place '
(gran), not ' grense ' of German (Mr M.), nor
' grian' of the Druidists; and here add " gourish,'
of Ach-gourish, etc., ' place of goats.' Simi-
larly Pityoulish is for Pit-geldais, the root ' geld '
(Geldie, etc.) denoting ' water,' as in old Eng.
' child ' (Chillam), a spring, Norse ' kelda,'
spring, whence St Kilda. The prefix ' lyne '
appears very often in the Strathspey portion of
Moray. Mr Matheson derives this from ' linne,'
pool. It is safe to say, but with one exception,
not one of the many names so prefixed comes
from 'linne.' The word is 'loinn,' locative of
' lann,' a land, a glade, Welsh 'llan,' of which
our author speaks so often. Here Mr Matheson
has failed in his duty towards Gaelic and local
pronunciation : ' loinn ' is very different in pro-
nunciation from ' linne,' and the mistake is inex-
cusable. Besides, there are no pools near most
of the places so named; here Mr Matheson fails
in his facts. As a matter of fact, he does not
know the County from a linguistic standpoint.

320 THE PLACE-NAMES OF ELGINSHIRE.

His Gaelic derivations are naturally best
tested by the Highland border parishes— Aber-
nehy, Duthil, Cromdale, and Edinkillie. The
' abpT ' of Abernethy is from ' od-' or ' ad-ber,'
Lat. ' af-fer,' root 'fer,' 'ber,' bear; "there
never has been any doubt " about this among
m«)de¥n philologists till Mr Matheson has cast it.
Aiiernethy is derived by Mr Matheson from Aber
n-aitionn, ' confluence of the broom ' ; we can-
not characterise this piece of ineptitude. The
rivers Lochy and Lochty come from Loch-dae^
' Black ' (loch) and ' dae ' (goddess), not from
Lochdubh, as Mr Matheson says; for Adamnan
distinctly speaks of ' Nigra dea ' as the transla-
tion oi the Lochaber Lochy. ' Tobar/ well, is
not the same as ' dobhar,' water, nor as ' tiobar,'
well, though the first and last are both from the
root * bhru,' spring. Auchtercheper, in Duthil,
is for Achadh-da-tiobar, 'field of the two wells,'
not My M.'s *uachdar-ceap-tir,' which is impos-
sible in view of the Gaelic sounds. Ry-voan, m
Abernethy, is ' Bothie-reach,' not 'peat-reach.'
Mr Matheson spells this common word Ry very
badly as ' reidh ' ; it is ' ruigh,' a stretch or piece
of land at the base of a hill, also ' a fore arm.'
Causor, in Abernethy, is Cabhsair (causeway),
not ' Casair.' The Desher of Duthil is not from
Lat. * disertum,' but from Gaelic ' deisear,'
south side, Loch-tay Disher, where also is old
Toyer, still 'tuathair.' Seemingly Duthil is an

THE TLACE-NAMES OF ELGINSHIRE. 321

assimilation of Tuathail (north side), to Desher
on the south side of the same hill. Carr-Bridge,
Drochaid Charra, is from ' cartha,' a pillar stone,
old Irish ' coirthe.' The pillar stone or stones
are there. Slochd surely is from Gaelic ' sloe,'
a pit, gully. Gallovie, as in Laggan, is a deri-
vative of ' geal/ ' White-land.' Lochneiian,
Loch-an-ellan, is ' Loch with Isle.' It is curi-
ous what a penchant the amateur philologist has
for ' ailean,' green spot, which is really rare in
place names. So is ' aite,' place; it scarcely
occurs, yet according to the amateur it is every-
where. Inverallan is from Allan river; this
river-name is common in Pictland and Welsh-
land, and is possibly from the root ' pal,' Lat.
' palus,' marsh. Anyway, it is not from ' ailean,'
a green. The derivation given for Kriockando
— ' Cnocan-dubh ' — shows that Mr Matheson
never heard the Gaelic of the name, which is
Cnoc-cheannachd, 'Market knoll.' Even the
Sassenach etymologists know this, and use it as
a warning name ! Dalchapple is derived by Mr
M. from ' caibeal,' a chapel, which in Scotch
Gaelic is ' seipeal.' Of course the name means
here and elsewhere ' Dell of the horses (capull).'
Fionnlarig is ' White pass,' from ' laraig,' a
pass, ' learg,' hill-side.

Mr Matheson, of course, gives himself un-
bridled license in regard to hybrids; Gaelic,

21

322 THE PLACE-NAMES OF ELGINSHIRE.

English, and other Teutonic roots are welded
together indifferently. The worst case is that
of Ptolemy's Tvesis, now known to be Spey
(Scotch ' spate ' allied). This Mr Matheson
writes Teussis, and derives from the Greek
Teukrion; on what principles, we wot not.
Where a word begins as Gaelic, Mr Matheson
should remember, it will end in Gaelic. A
funny hybrid is recorded in Pit-airlie; this is
Pictish ' pet ' and Eng. ' early ' ! He shows a
preference for the out-of-the-way rather than
the evident etymology. Cummingston is from
St Cummein, not from the Cummings. Is this
likely? Blinkbonny appears thrice, each time
with a nevr derivation; first, French 'blanc,'
white, Gaelic 'ban,' hill [sic]; second, Fr.
'blanc,' G. 'ban,' white ('White-white'!);
third, as ' blink ' of Eng. and ' bonny ' of Sc,
which, of course, it really is. Rev. Mr John-
ston gives several other places so named, and
translates it ' Belle-vue.' The Pictish ' pett '
or ' pit ' is not allied to English ' pit ' (p. 150),
as the modern discussions on the Pictish ques-
tion should have taught Mr Matheson. The
places called Bauds seem to be from the plural
of G. ' bad,' a clump — ' place of clumps.' Very
many other mistakes could be pointed out in the
names of the Laigh of Moray, apart from the
Highland parishes. Elgin, as a name, cannot
be separated from Glen-elg ; the word ' elg ' in

THE PLACE-NAMES OF ELGINSHIRE. 32S

ancient Gaelic means ' noble.' As for Moray,
its oldest forms are Mureb, Norse Masrh^fi, now
Morro or Mortho. The whole points to a Pictisli
Moriti, dative pi. Moritobis, whence Murref of
early documents and Norse Magrh^eli. It would
aspirate into Morthaibh, ace. Morthu (Pictish
Moritos), admirably suiting the modern phon-
etics. The root is ' mor ' of ' muir,' sea, and
the (jraulish tribal name Morini is its exact
parellel. The meaning is ' Sea-side folk.' The
exact value of Mr Matheson's book we care not
to assess. Of course, every one interested in
place names should have it. If he had given
the old forms of the names with dates, this in
itself would be of great value ; if he had indi-
cated the pronunciation with accented syllable,
this also would be, pace Mr Matheson, of great
importance. But his references to old forms
are vague and sometimes misleading, as when
he means by old or primary form what he con-
ceives to have been the old form. As a work-
ing list of names, with some historic facts, the
book will do.

PLACE-NAMES

OF

SCOTLAND

A Review of " Place-Names of Scotland "•
by the Rev. James B. Johnston, B.D.,
Falkirk. Pubhshed by Mr David Douglas,
Edinburgh, 1884.

*' Place-Names of Scotland " is the name of
a book by the Rev. James B. Johnston, B.D.,
Falkirk, publislied by Mr David Douglas, Edin-
burgh. The proper title of the book should
have been something like that of Colonel
Robertson's work on the Gaelic Topography of
Scotland. Both books deal mainly with the
Gaelic names of Scotland, real or supposed, and
both are equal in philologic value. Indeed, Mr
Johnston's work is distinctly worse than his pre-
decessor's on many points, despite his having
the advantage of several works that have
appeared since Colonel Robertson's pioneer
book of over twenty years ago. Mr Johnston
has at least a nodding acquaintance with Pro-
fessors Mackinnon and Rhys, and, really, from
the state of philologic knowledge in Scotland at
present, we should have expected much better
results. He confesses to only an amateur's

328 THE PLACE-NAMES OF SCOTLAND.

knowledge of- Gaelic, but he might have saved
himself the trouble of the confession. His work
too }3lainly reveals the fact. And w'e need not
wonder at his saying in regard to Gaelic spelling,
" that there is probably no language in the
world in which the eye can give less help to the
tongue." This is simply nonsense. Few lan-
guages are written more strictly according to
rule, and, if Mr Johnston had only taken the
trouble to master these rules, he would have
saved himself from any amount of bad etymolo-
gising.

Gaelic is only one portion — though the
largest — of the equipment necessary for one
that is to tackle the place-names of Scotland.
A knowledge of the principles and practice of
philology is absolutely necessary; and, though
Mr Johnston knows some philologists like Pro-
fessors Ehys and Mackinnon, and quotes them,
yet personally he knows nothing of philology.
When he has to trust to his own unaided re-
sources, the result is philologically lamentable.
Again, a clear conception of the history of
Scotland is necessary for the place-name ety-
mologist. Were the Gaels really the first
inhabitants of Scotland? and is one justified in
looking for Gaelic place-names in South-Eastern
Scotland? Is it not the case that Gaelic did not
penetrate south of the Forth until the Macalpine
dynasty (844-1033)? We omit Galloway, and

THE PLACE-NAMES OF SCOTLAND. 329

the western coast as far as the Clyde. The
Gaehc place-names that occur in the Edinburgh
district clearly belong to Gaelic that had already
borrowed deeply of the Norse. The prefix dal,
a dale, is a Gaelic word borrowed from the
Norse; and the Dalkeiths and Dalrys sOuth of
the Forth prove that they were so named much
later than the year 800, when the Norsemen
came first. Another point is the Pictish ques-
tion. Were the Picts also Gaels? Skene, of
course, says they were : they spoke a low Gaelic
dialect, he says — whatever that may mean. But
Mr Johnston, who accepts Skene's views, does
him a real injustice by supposing that he ever
maintained the absurd idea that the Cornish was
a Gaelic language. That language is Brythomc
of the Brythonic. Could Mr Johnston not
decide that point himself by testing the language
philologically, instead of pitting Skene against
Rhys?

Further, Mr Johnston has not made himself
acquainted with all the literature of his subject.
Professor Mackinnon's articles on Argyllshire
Place-Names he knows, and also Sir Herbert
Maxwell's Topography of Galloway. It is
doubtful if he has consulted Captain Thomas's
two contributions on the Place-Names of the
Hebrides and of Islay, in the Society of Anti-
quaries' Transactions. They are, outside Pro-

330 THE PLACE-NAMES OF -SCOTLAND.

fessor Mackinnon's articles — and he owes much
to Captain Thomas — the best thing done in
Scottish topography. Mr Johnston has over-
looked many of Captain Thomas's derivations,
which are correct, while his own are not.
Further, many papers have appeared m the
Transactions of the Inverness Gaelic Society on
this subject, all of them being good, some being
excellent. Dr Cameron's paper on Arran
Place-Names appeared in Volume XV. It would
have saved Mr Johnston from etymologising
Lamlash as Lan-Maol-Iosa, for it was the island
that was called Lamlash, that is, Eilean-Molais,
the Isle of Molas, a well-known Irish saint. We
may mention Mr Mackay's excellent series of
papers on Sutherland Place-Names in the same
Transactions, Mr Macbain's Badenoch Place-
Names, and Mr Maclean's papers on Alness and
Kiltearn. Besides, Dr Whitley Stokes passed
in review the old Pictish names in the Philo-
logical Society's Transactions last year. He
clearly showed that aher and pet or pit, as pre-
fixes, are Pictish, and that Pictish belongs to
the Welsh group. Besides, Pictland extended
from the Forth to the Orkneys, and Pets and
Abers can be traced as far north as Sutherland
and as far west as Drumalban.

Mr Johnston opens with some chapters on
general principles, where he passes in review
the characteristic of Celtic, Gaelic, Norse, and

THE PLACE-NAMES OF SCOTLAND. 331

Other place designations. We need not speak \
of his philology. Suffice it to say that he equates i
the Welsh pen with Gaelic hen, and concludes,
like Skene, that Welsh p may. appear as Gaelic
b. Now, Gaelic heann has a very good Welsh
equivalent in Welsh ban, of like meaning and
use; while pen is the corresponding form to
Gaelic ceann or Kin-. Gaelic final r is never
lost like the Norse r ; so Geldie cannot be Gelder,
nor Orciiy be iirchar, a cast. Aher is not
strengthened either to ar or ah, but a syllable is
left out, if it repeats the same sound as the
previous one, or there is a metathesis of the r
as in Arbroath. Hence the Aberbreachy of
1334 loses one of its hers and now appears as
Ahriachan, which Mr Johnston absurdly etymo-
logises into Ahhriabhach, grey watei . And
here we say something of Mr Johnston's abh and
an for water. They are mere figments of his
oion and other etymologists' imagination. No
such words exist or have existed in the Gaelic
language, and yet several scores of Mr John-
ston's derivations depend upon these words !
The an which terminates several river names is
a mere adjective termination seen to advantage
in the Gaulish river-names Sequana or Matrona.
The word aoi, isthmus, is a Norse word, and
cannot form the root of lona, nor can i, island,
Wiiich again is the ey of Norse borrowed. Mr
Johnston's lack of knowledge of Gaelic makes

\

332 THE PLACE-NAMES OF SCOTLAND.

him use the absurdest of GaeHc words, so long
as the sound suits. Some of the words he offers
are obsolete, some rare, and some are, as
already said, mere figments of the dictionary-
maker. The Gaelic uisg, water, has nothing to
do with the Pictish Esk, Ptolemy's Iska. Mr
Johnston's theory about Hybrids is ridiculous,
and both his examples are demonstrably wrong.
Newtonmore, where he regards more as Gaelic
mor, big, is really Newton-muir, the Muir's
Newton — Baile-iir-an-t-sleibh in Gaelic ! His
Garrabost is explained by Captain Thomas as
Geirabost or Geirr's Bost or Farm, and not
Garbh Bost, the rough farm. If Mr Johnston
wants a proper hybrid he must look for forms
where the sense of the older word has been
forgotten. Such a case occurs in a name like
Strath-halladale, where the idea of dale is re-
peated twice, the Gaels not recognising that the
terminal dal meant a dale.

We may now take a few specimens of Mr
Johnston's derivations, beginning at Inverness.
He suggests that Ness may be from nios, from
below; but nios has the long i sound and the i
of the Gaelic for Ness is short. We need not
speak here or elsewhere of how inapplicable the
sense of the Gaelic words offered is to the river
or place-name. Clachnacuddin is etymologised
as Clachcudachan or St Cuthbert's stone, not
Clach nan cidainn, the tubs' stone. Clachna-

THE PLACE-NAMES OF SCOTLAND. 333

harry fares equally badly : the root is given as
carraid, strife, instead or aire, watching. Nairn
is for an am, the flank, where the word am is a
figment of the lexicographer. Ross means really
a wood or moor, not a promontory. Moray is
of course Mor ahh, big water! Yet it is clear
that the root is mor, sea, for the vowel is short.
Aberdeen may represent the confluence of either
Dee or Don, it seems. The Dee he takes
from the Gaelic Deahhadh, draining, though
Ptolemy's Deva makes it clear that it and his
Devana or Divona, now Don, both mean " god-
dess," and indicate the existence of river
worship, of which we hear from Gildas.

' ' Philology founded on sound is not sound
philology," and when Mr Johnston etymologises
Knockando as Cnocan-dubh, black hillock, he
commits two blunders : he should attend to the
place of the accent on words ; that shows where
the main root of the word lies, the accent being
in this case on the and; and he should know that
the real Gaelic name of the place is Cnoc-
cheannachd or Market hill, as old Shaw carefully
explained over six score years ago. The Gaelic
accent is of course on the first part of Ceann-
achd. Aviemore is abh mor, big water; but the
Gaelic pronunciation is Agaidh mhor, the big
agie, whatever that may be. Balintore is given
as Baile an Deoraidh, the Dewar's town, but the
name really means the town of the Bleaching.

334 THE PLACE-NAMES OF SCOTLAND.

Balfour, and the other words in four, is a glar-
ing example of bad etymologising. In tiiese
words, the accent is on the four, which clearly
shows that this is the main root. But Mr John-
ston explains four as for fuar, cold. Yet Dal-
four, if for cold dale, would undoubtedly m
Gaelic be Dailfhuar, that is Dal-uar, with the
accent on the Dal and the / entirely gone. The
four of these words must stand for pour, a
Pictish word denoting pasture land — if we may
guess from the Breton peur, Welsh paivr. This
etymology, suggested in " Badenoch Place-
Names," has been accepted by Dr Whitley
Stokes in his revised edition of his Pictish voca-
bulary. Curiously the prefix both, habitation,
which is so common in Gaelic Place-Names,
finds scarcely a place in our author's work. Yet
Boleskine, Balquidder, and several others show
this prefix.

Mr Johnston is not satisfied with one or tvro
root words, in explaining a name of any length,
and he generally manages to stick on an extra
abh, an, or ach (for achacUi, held). Cabrach is
for cabar-achadh, deer field, whereas the ach
here and elsewhere is the adjective termination.
Conan is for con-an, or caoin abhuinn, gentle
river, which, as a matter of fact, it is not.
(dencoe is variously derived from cu, cow, dog,
or from coill, wood, or from cornair, confluence.
Yet the Gaelic name is Gleann-comhann, or

THE PLACE-NAMES OF SCOTLAND. 33&

narrow glen. Mr Johnston's alternative deri-
vations are always irritating, and the fact of his
giving them shows how utterly unreliable and
unscientific his work is, Culloden is given as
Cul-lodan, back of the pool; but the Gaelic is
Cuilodair. Culross is anciently Culenross, or
Holly- wood. Dalarossie is not the field of the
ros or promontory, but Dail-fhearghuis, or
Fergus' dale. Dalnavert is not Dal-na-bhaird,
Bard's dale, but Dail-nan-feart, dale of the
graves. The word dahhach, four ploughgates,
is not from damh-ach (sic !), ox field, but from
dahhach, a tub or corn measure. Dulnan is not
Dail an an, river dale, but Tuilnean, from tuil,
flood. The Earn is not Ear an, east flowing,
for the Gaelic is Eire, with long e, and its geni-
tive is Eireann, the same name as Ireland.
Auldearn is in Gaelic Allt-Eire or Earn Stream.
Feshie cannot be from fdsach, desert; it is a
river name, and the root vowel is short e, not
long a. Garry cannot be from garhh, rough;
the Gaelic is Garadh. The Gaelic garradh is
merely the English garden borrowed. Gask is
not for crosg, a crossing. Urquhart is absurdly
explained by Ard-a'-cheaird, smith's height.
Nov;, Adamnan, about 700, gives this name as
Airchartdan, where the air is clearly the pre-
position, and the root word is cartd or card.
With this name we must connect Kincardine,
which seems a half Pictish word for ' ' end of the

386 THE PLACE-NAMES OF SCOTLAND.

rowan wood"; not cinn gairdein, head of the
arm, as Mr Johnston has it. We might deal
thus with over a third of Mr Johnston's some
three thousand words. The work is a mass of
guess-work, slavishly following the spelling, and
forgetting too often the history of the word or its
present sound. Indeed, without indicating the
modern sound of the word and the place of the
accent, such books as this are worthless. Mr
Johnston ^ives from the Origines Parochiales,
the oldest forms of many names, and we must
say that this is the most valuable contribution
he has made to the elucidation of the Place-
Names of Scotland.

THE PLACE-NAMES

OF

ARGYLL

22

The Place-Names of Argyll. By H. C.
Gillies, M.D. London: D. Nutt. 1906.

Dr Gillies' work lias been received with a
universal chorus of praise by the press, from the
London " Tribune " to the Ohayi Times. The
reviews were commendably short, for they
showed no marks of familiarity with Gaelic
place-names. There has been, therefore, no
expert opinion offered as yet to our knowledge;
and as Ian Maclaren has just said, ' ' the present
day is a day of experts; the day of amateurs is
past," adding that in any subject we seek expert
advice when we wish to know. There are very
few experts in Celtic scholarship or in Gaelic
scholarship to-day in Scotland, but their number
is increasing with fair rapidity, thanks to our
Celtic Chair. In this work on Argyll Place-
Names, Dr Gillies comes forward on his own
credentials as an expert in Gaelic philology in
its most difficult aspect, that of elucidating place-
names. He says : — " I am quite aware that the
work is far from perfect. No person could make
it perfect; and certainly no one in my position,
with my poor scraps of available time, could do
it better. I believe it is as nearly correct as any

340 THE PLACE-NAMES OP ARGYLL.

one could make it." Now here Dr Gillies gets a
little mixed in his climax. First, he can do it as
well as any man in his position as regards time ,
second, the work is as good as any man can do,
time or not! Really the Doctor protests too
much. The book, however, takes the same Sir
Oracle tone throughout. The work of previous
writers he ignores or overlooks, except in one
or two cases. For instance, a careful study of
Mr Watson's work on the Place-Names of Ross-
shire, which, by its excellent introduction is at
once a text book and an example book for the
study of Scoto-Celtic place-names, would have
saved Dr Gillies many absurdities in his Norse
etymologies; for Dr Gillies has quite a craze for
explaining names as of Norse origin. A feature
of the work is ils perversity; long established
etymologies are thrust aside for something
new or bizarre (as in the case of the
county name), or the obvious derivation is
overlooked, generally for a Norse one. Again,
the format of the book is bad. What is
wanted is to give first the map or post-official
name; then the modern Gaelic pronunciation;
thirdly (if the word is difficult) its oldest forms
and changes; lastly, its derivation, with proof
adduced, such as the suitability of the explana-
tion to the character of the place. Then the
etymologist should, if possible, see the place and
hear the name pronounced, or at least he should

THE PLACE-NAMES OF ARGYLL. 341

get a description of the place and hear the pro-
nunciation. As regards the ancient forms, Dr
Gillies takes up the monstrous position that they
are not necessary, and that, too, when he is
professedly dealing with Norse words and diffi-
cult Gaelic words. He certainly saves himself
much research, but at what risk? Who would
for a moment think that modern Askary stands
for Norse Asgrims-erg, the " airigh" of Asgrim?
Or Scrabster for Skara-bolstadhr ? Then again
Dr Gillies has clearly trusted for his form of the
name to the ordnance map m too many cases;
this is evident, and he admits it in some cases.
The motto with the expert in place-names is to
accept no ordnance map name unless it is veri-
fied. Dr Gillies has had some predecessors m
the field of Argyll Place-names. Piofessor Mac-
kinnon wrote a series of eighteen articles in the
Scotsman on the "Place and Personal Names
of Argyle " in 1887-8, when he showed
the sound, sane scholarship and literary exposi-
tive power that ever since has marked his work.
And in place-names, sanity and scholarship must
conjoin ; running after the bizarre or fanciful is
fatal. Rev. Mr MacNeil's "Guide to Islay "
contains mostly expert-produced derivations, the
late Hector Maclean, Captain Thomas, and Dr
Macbain having helped. Drs Reeves and Skene
went over the names of lona and Tiree, making
valuable lists and exhuming old church names.

342 THE PLACE-NAMES OF ARGYLL.

So much for preface. I he name Argyll is in
G., Earraghaidheal ; early Gaelic, Airer-gaidhel
(Annals of Ulster), i n-airiur Gaoidheol (Three
Fragments), etc. The word here is " oirear,"
district, coastland; Irish, oirear, early Irish,
airer. M'Vurich speaks of Argyll as being
divided into two districts — " Oirer a deas,"
Argyll proper; " oirer a tuath," North Argyll to
Lochbroom. The name means the " Coastland
of the Gael," or, as the 12th century writer puts
it in Latin, " Margo Scottorum." The Gael in
Ireland and in Scotland bore one or two names,
Scot and Gaidheal being the favourites among
the people themselves. The present view of
Celtic scholars accords with the old annals, not
with Skene and later writers. Professor Kuno
Meyer writes " that no Gael ever set foot on
British soil save from a vessel that first put out
from Ireland." The annals put the first invasion
of the Scots about 160 a.d., the leader being
Cairbre Eiada, son of Conaire II., King of Ire-
land. Other invasions followed, and the Scots
and Picts joined to attack Roman Britain.
Indeed, about 360 a.d., King Crimthann ruled
both Britain or Alba and Ireland. The most
important colony came in 501 with the sons of
Ere. The Scots latterly extended their con-
quests south and north, so that when the Norse
came in 794 they called the Minch the Scotland
Fjord and the Pentland Firth the Pictland Fjord.

THE PLACE-NAMES OF ARGYLL. 343

Soon thereafter the Scots took supreme rule.
The above are not Dr GiUies' views. Firstly, as
to Argyll. He has created a new Irish word for
the occasion; this is " oir-thir," East-land, from
" air" or " oir," before, on, and tir, land.
Now there is an old and a modern Irish word
like this — " airther," the east, front part; it
comes, as Dr Whitley Stokes points out, from
the comparative of air — comparative in ter,
Greek tero-s. He gives the old Celtic as
(p)areitero-s, allied to Latin per, pro. Like
English prepositional comparatives, it is used as
a noun. It will be seen that Dr Gillies creates
a new word in oir-thir, for tir has nothing to do
with the Irish word. Besides the tir would pre-
serve its long sound in the compound oir-thir.
This argument topples one of the Doctor's card
houses. Then as to his history. In Argyll, he
says, Gaelic ' ' has been there from the begin-
ning." Getting more poetical, after the Biblical
manner — but somewhat after, he adds : — ' ' It is
written in the rock." Now this same patriotic
Gael allows that Eachairn, and especially Echdach
(nominative Echaid), are the Gaelic descendants
of Ptolemy's Epidii, the inhabitants of Kintyre,
the p of which proves it Pictish or Brittonic !
Gaelic " each " is Welsh " ep," " eb." As a
matter of fact the Gael did not visit the Epidii for
at least forty years later. Argyll was then m
the hands of the Picts, who spoke a Brittonic

344 THE PLACE-NAMES OF ARGYLL.

tongue. It is scarcely worth while noticing that
he deduces Fergus Mac Erc's pedigree from
Conn Ceudchathach, and not from his son-in-
law, Conaire II., descended from Conaire Mor;
but such are the unfailing facts according to tiie
annals. He jvill antedate the coming of the
Norse by two hundred years; why, one cannot
see. 8ome harum-scarum youth lately an-
nounced that a German professor held this
belief; but when proof was asked in face of the
overwhelming evidence on the other side, it was
discovered that the ' ' Norsemen ' ' were the
hired men that slew St Donnan and his 52 fol-
lowers in Eigg or in Sutherland ; the annals call
them "pirates," using the Latin term piraiti.
The " Saint's Life " is responsible for a queer
story of a queen taking vengeance on Donnan
through hired pirates. The evidence that the
Norse first came in 793 to the East Coast and
burnt the great Monastery of Lindisfarne is
firstly contemporary, and, secondly, Dr Gillies
ought to know that what affects the Church for
good or bad is sacredly recorded. " The Norse-
men made a bee-line for the monasteries," once
they discovered their wealth. The Norse ap-
peared in Scotland Fjord in 794, and visited
lona according to one account; in 795 they
appeared on the Irish coasts ; in 802 they sacked
lona; in 806 they slew the whole familia, 68
souls. Dr Gilhes, of course, calls the pirates

THE PLACE-NAMES OP ARGYLL. 345

who killed Donnan "Norsemen" — no mistake
about it.

Other little foibles are there. The Scots are
felt in modern Argyll as Easterlings, or Alban-
aich even. He is unaware that Alba meant
Great Britain till the 10th century (see for
instance Cormac's Gloss, " Mug-eime"). The
Druids, too, appear. Innis Drynich— he hesi-
tates between " droighneach," thorn-wood, and
" Druidhnich," Druids. The meaning of this
last word, for it is genuine, " druineach," is
artist or artificer, ornamentator. The name
appears in Cladh nan Druineach (lona). Cnoc
Druidean he corrects to Cnoc Druidhean, but
Bishop Eeeves, who was there, makes it " Knock
of Starlings " ! The Church part of the book
is fairly done. St Finlagan he has missed;
his chapel was in Island Finlagan, where tlie
Lord of the Isles afterwards held high festival.
This is all the more remarkable as Mr MacNeill's
" Guide " tells all about " Sanctt Finlagane at
p. 74. The name was used in a patronymic;
Archibald M'Linlagan was at Stremnish in 1686;
this is M'Gill Fhinnlagan. The name is a double
diminutive of Finding, which the Scottish Gael
corrupted into Findlaoch, whence Finlay. The
funniest mistake is about isle Davaar. It is
called the Island of " Sanct Barre," 1449-1508;
the form Davaar is for older Do-Bharre, " thy
St Barre," on the same principle as Mo-Barre,

346 THE PLACE-NAMES OF ARGYLL.

or Mo-luoc, etc. Dr Gillies devotes a paragraph
to Davaar, and seems to accept the popular deri-
vation "Double-pointed" isle. At anyrate, his
history is at fault. Another saint with " do "
has put him wrong; this is in Kildavie, which he
renders as St David's. It is really dedicated to
Do-Bhi, whom he knows as Mo-Bhi. There is
another such in Skye, which the present writer
also rescued from other saints. Mundu, as from
Mo-fhindu, is good enough phonetics for Dr
Whitley Stokes, and Dr Gillies need not boggle
at it. Brannan is not from " bran," raven; the
saint's name is really Brenaind, the Brianult of
Martin. Maoldoraidh is a good name in itself,
it is not Maoldeoradh. Maolrubha means
" slave, or king of the promontory." Dr Beeves
hesitates between " rubha," patience, or pro-
montory. For examples of such names as Maol,
with abstract, material or place-names, see
Gaelic Society Trans. XX. There is a St Finan
apart from the Findans ; he is in Ardnamurchan,
Glengarry, and Abriachan. The root is " fin,"
shining, which appears in Glen Finain, or Glen-
finnan; not fionn, as Dr Gillies has it. Where
is Kilmodan explained?

Looking at the district and island names we
first find Dr Gillies shaking his head over the too
easy derivations of Cowal and Lorn, from the
names of the grandson and son of Ere. For the
former he suggests, after much thought, the

THE PLACE-NAMES OF ARGYLL. 347

" feckless " idea of " comhdhail, " a meeting!
Had he looked at Irish names like Fer-managh,
Kinel-ea, or Iv-erk, he would see that these Vv^ere
personal names originally. Men of Monach, Kin
of Aodh, and O'Ercs, used now as land names.
The ' ' Chronicles of the Picts and Scots ' ' makes
it clear that these two names were originally
Cinel Loairnd and Cinel Comgaill. The " Cinel"
simply was dropped in course of time. The
tract on the Scots of Dalriada shows other such
" Cinel " names, and it is worth while examin-
ing it to see if more district names might not be
unravelled. Gigha isle, M'Vurich's Giodhaigh,
he derives from Norse " gja," a chasm, bay,
borrowed into Gaelic as " geodh," creek, and
" ey," island, the whole being equal to Gja-ey,
" rift island." The Norse called it Gudhey,
God's isle. Dr Gillies knows better than the
Norse themselves. Kilmaillie he renders into
Gaelic as Cill A' Mhailuibh ; there is deep reason
for the Gaehc article. Dr Gillies has evolved
from his inner consciousness a set of " black
friars" before ''friar" times, and calls them
"mael," tonsured one, " dubh," black. The
worst of it is that " mael," devotee, is never
qualified by an adjective. When it is, the word
is a confusion for " m41," prince, as Mael-
mordha for Mal-mordha, "great prince," the
name of some thirty kings and lords recorded m
the ' ' Four Masters. ' ' Maeldub is ' ' Dark lord, ' '

348 THE PLACE-NAMES OF ARGYLL.

and is the name of four saints. But Maeldub
could never produce the phonetics of " Maili ''
of KihuaUie. If Dr GiUies could assure us that
Maldubh preserved its a, though changed to ao
elsewhere, then we should allow his derivation
from Maeldub, meaning " Black Prince." The
Kvlmalduff cited bv Dr Gillies as the first form of

*■' •/

Kilmaillie belongs really to Inveraray; the mis-
take is quite inexcusable. Dalmaillie and Inver-
maillie contain river names. It is a common
word possibly from a Celtic " Madlios," root
mad, wet, as practically the Doctor says, wilh-
out, however, giving the root forms.

Our author (Dr Gillies) thinks he has made a
distinct hit in his derivation of ilrdnamurchan.
The word appears in Adamnan (704) in the nom.
pi. and dat. pi., thus: — Artda-muirchol and
Artdaib-muirchol. The first part means
'■'heights," not height (Dr G.); Reeves made
murchol into ^' sea-hazels," and Bodlev's lib-
rarian lately made it into " heights of the sea of
Coll," which is not so bad. Our author at anv-
rate accounts for the modern h ; he makes it to
be Ard na mur(dh)ucan, "height of the sea
nymphs"; the word murduchand means syren
in early Irish, from muir, and duchand, singing
(K. Meyer). The length of the u, we fear, spoils
Dr GiUies' beautiful derivation; it won't leave
the word in its most modern form. In Gaelic it
gives three syllables. Besides, it does not a bit

THE PLACE-NAMES OP ARGYLL. 349

suit Adamnan's phonetics; he was most accurate,
and the MS. was written only a few years after
his death. He cannot be trifled with even over
the / at the end. Rum seems to appear in con-
nection with St Began, called "of Eumm" (676),
Norse " rymr " won't do (Dr G.). Eigg is also
in Adamnan, but the Doctor has no hesitation m
taking it from Norse "egg," edge, which is
absurd, as Euclid has it. Adamnan calls it
Egea, possibly from " eag," cleft. It is so.
Canna isle he deduces from " kunnu," know — a
very poor " look-out " indeed, especially as to
vowels. The word " cana " means porpoise in
older Gaelic. Mull appears as Malaeus m
Ptolemy, and so the Norse Miili, a point, is out
of the question; Adamnan has Malea. The
modern phoneftics are correct — liquid a short
becoming ii (ball, buill). This really should be
a lesson in rash etymologising, for even other-
wise Muile, with its short vowel, could not come
from Muli with long u. But Dr Gillies calls
it the ' ' manifest derivation ' ' ! Truly with him
" vowels count for nothing." Of course Colt
(G. Colla) comes incontinently from the Norse
— here from " Kolla," a hind. The minister of
the island, who has made a most capable survey
of the place-names, and who gave the results to
the Inverness Gaelic Society, says he has found
plenty hazel in the north of the isle, at the
nearest landing point to the mainland. The

350 THE PLACE-NAMES OF ARGYLL.

name comes, as does Colonsay, from " Coll,"
hazel. Colonsay appears in Adamnan as Colosus
— no n — and is pre-Norse. Our author lakes it
from Norse " kollr," hilltop, another "feckless"
derivation. lona and Islay possibly belong to
the same root ; here we deal with ' ' funda-
mentals." The root seems to be Celtic
" (p)i," Aryan pi, pi, water, drink. We know
it in the Esk rivers, Ptolemy's Iska. lona might
be Aryan Pi-va, Pi-vi (locative); Islay, Pi-lia.
Islay appears in Adamnan as Ilea, yet Dr Gillies
thinks the termination is Norse " ey," island,
and yet the Norse called it nothing but II, not
Il-ey ! Such is the philology of imagination.
Dr Gillies does not etymologise the roots of lona
or Islay. We may add the Awe river, Adam-
nan's Aba, which of course contains the root of
" abhainn," nearly "naked"; the same root,
with double stem, is in Avich. Dr Gillies was
to explain it by a note to p. 58, but in this, as m
other cases, there is no note.

Some words our author has strangely missed
the form and force of are these : — " Aoirinn,"
mass, the offerendum, whence Inchaffray, m
1190 Inchaffren. It occurs in Rhu na h-aoirinn,
Eilean na h-aoirinn, and Erin, Iring (Ardna-
murchan). They are places where mass was
held outside. The Doctor here suggests that
very much over-worked Norse word " eyrr," a
beach. The n he does not explain, for the word

THE PLACE-NAMES OF ARGYLL. 351

was never adopted into Gaelic, and the n cannot
be the Norse article, which the Doctor does not
seem to know about. " Longart," shielin£(,
encampment, comes from longphort, originally
meaning " harbourage"— "ship" — port. Tay-
lor, the water poet, speaks of the hunting booths
in the Grampians as Lonquhards (1618). Dr
Gillies cannot explain it, since ' ' the supreme
scholar of our time, not only of Gaelic, but of
all languages, has failed with the word." The
scholar meant we do not know; perhaps the
Doctor speaks " sarcastic," but the word was
explained in Inverness Gaelic Society Trans,
fifteen years ago. " Lochay" is an unfortunate
miss; Professor Mackinnon in 1887 explained
the word as the translation of Adamnan's
"Nigra dea," his Loch-dae in the index of
chapters. The ending is the gen. of the old
Gaelic word for " goddess." There are several
rivers of this name all over Pictland. River
worship was rife among the Celts as Gildas so
tragically tells us. " Feoirlinn" is another word
over which he hesitates, and at last he lands
wrongly regarding " hnn" as pool, and " feoir"
as fjara, ebb, of Norse. The word means
' ' f orthing' ' or farthing — farthing land ; it is
common all over the West Coast; its phonetics
(N. fjordhungr) are represented by " birhnn,"
Norse "byrdhingr." " Doirlinn " is surely
native. Elerig, lolairig, etc., of which some

352 THE PLACE-NAMES OF ARGYLL.

two Inindred or more occur, usually as Elrig or
even Eldrig, is for " eileirig," an obsolete word
meaning the place where the deer were driven
into, a cul-de-sac, generally beside a hillock or
hill, where the deer-slayers took their place.
The word is in the " Book of Deer " (ind-elerc),
now Elrig. This explanation has been public
property for ten years. Glen Amamd should
be compared to the famous Glen Almond; the
river name Almond is good Celtic "Ambona,"
root amb, ab. " Leth-allt" is a burn with one
high bank, for the word originally meant " cliff,
height" (Lat. altus), and its Scotch use is due
doubtless to Pictish. " Laimbrig," a landing
place, has been explained as Norse " Hladh-
hamarr," pier or landing rock, plus the word
"vik," a bay (Gaehc Society Trans., XXI.,
317). " Corpach " is rightly explained first,
but why fly to Norse " Korpr," raven? Are
there really Norse words in Lochaber at all?
We think not — at least not east of the Linnhe.
"Corran" means a point, the fern, is " corrag,"
finger; it is common in the Isles; what has
corran, a sickle, to do with it? The root of
corran, sickle, is " kerp, korp," to cut (Stokes).
Dr Gillies follows good company in etymologising
Nant (better Neannt). It is an Englified form
of the native rapid pronunciation 'n-ann-da for
'n abhainn dubh, " Black river." With Coille

THE PLACE-NAMES OF ARGYLL. 353

or Drochaid prefixed the word is wonderfully
" crashed " together.

Dr Gillies has not done well in trusting to the
ordnance maps. The gem of the book is p. 59 ;
here on the Awe near its junction with the loch
the map has "Conflicts," and below "1300-
1308," referring, of course, to the feud between
MacDougail and Bruce. The Doctor thinks the
place is called " Conflicts," and gives a Gaelic
" Coingheal " ! The map has Clenamachrie,
Dr Gillies corrects to Gleann na machrach, but
the true name is Cladh na Macraidh (Churchyard
of the Young Men). The name Cormac on the
same page is mismanaged; while another Cladh
on page 58 is given as Cleugh and derived from
Scots. Cluniter (51) is rendered Claon-leitir,
whereas it is a sand-bank — Claon-oitir; Drum-
synie, on page 52, is Drum-sineidh, not from
sian. To take a place or two in Coll, for ex-
ample— Airivirig is locally and by fact Airigli-
mhaoraich, not from N. borg; Airinabost has no
" har" in the name (shiehng-ton) ; Ascaoineach
* is for Asknish (ash or ship ness) ; Clabhach stands
foi' A' Chlabaich, and comes from clab — it has
nothing to do with the words for ' ' kite ' ' ; Foill
is not "treachery," but N. Fjall, hill; Gallan-
ach is so named from a water plant of yellow
colour growing there, and called by the natives
gallan. The most extraordinary miss of all is

23

354 THE PLACE-NAMES OF ARGYLL.

in tlie case of Pharspig, Skerray — " I can make
nothing of it " (Dr G.), but the local people know
it to be from a very usual name for the sea-gull
— " farspag." Loch Ghille-Caluim is really L.
Cille-Chainnigh, from Kil-Kenneth, St Kenneth,
where the church is. Glen Brander is from
" Brandradh," ravens (abstract pi.). Tiretig-
ean (p. 36) cannot be from Aodhagain or Egan.
That he has trusted to these maps is also -proved
by such remarks as at p. 72 — " I do not know
the local history."

As regards the Norse names, Dr Gillies gets
more in love with Norse derivations as the book
progresses.

Proaig he will not have as Norse Broadbay,
but it is pronounced like the Gaelic of Brodick
save for the initial p, which is not likely to be
Norse anyway. Gaelic often interchanges h and
p in borrowed words; the dictionary amply
pioves that. Crosprig and Librig show final
" brekka," bank, or possibly "berg," hill, in
the form ' ' brg . ' ' Melf ort is surely N . mela-f j ord ,
'■' bent firth," from the common word " melr,"
bent grass. Seil Isle is no doubt Norse; the
Gaelic Saoil is phonetically the ideal form of
Norse " seil." Soroba is the common Norse
place-name " Saur-baer," mud or swamp or
sour-ton. It appears as Sowerby in Yorkshire,
Sorbie in Galloway, and two or three times in
the Highlands. Gleann Fhreasdail and Loch

THE PLACE-NAMES OF AEGYLL. 355

Eestill are surely from ' Risdal," copse-dale,
and not from " providence." Raoiceadal might
be from " reykr," reek; Geodha an t-sil rather
refers to N. sil, herring; Leodamus is Leod's
moss (compare Skye, Strolamus, Skulamus, from
Sturli and Skuh). Mi-mheall is possibly " mjo-
fjall," narrow hill. Ernach is certainly not from
" eyrr " ; the termination is Gaelic. Beinn
Thuncairidh is likely Tunga-gerdhi, not sunna.
There are many words, however, where Dr
Gillies goes against the phonetic laws which
govern the passing of words from Norse into
Gaelic. Thus final or intervocalic kk, pp, tt,
become simply k, t, p; k, t, p become g, d, b ; g,
d, b get aspirated and disappear practically.
Trodigal cannot be from trodhi; bodhi (sunken
rock) is bodha; Lagal garve cannot come from
lagr; this would be " lagh," as it is. Final rdh
at the end of a second word becomes rd, rt, as in
Suain-eart; " nd " also similarly becomes d, as
in " miosad," narrow sound. Troternish is no
exception, for the n of Throndar-nes is still heard
and is preserved in old documents (M'Vurich,
Trontarnis); we do not know if Trudernish is
allied. Suaineart is given correctly derived
from Sveinn-fjord, but at p. 11 Norse " jordii,"
our " earth," is introduced very unnecessarily.
The word is not allied to Gaelic aird, pomt, which
is alhed to Greek " ardis," of hke meaning. A
bad blunder is taking Saddel from sand-dale ; the

856 THE PLACE-NAMES OF ARGYLL.

old form of the word would here save such non-
seusp — Sagadull (15th cent.), M'Vurich's Sagli-
adal. " Faodhail," a ford, is missed; it is from
Norse " vadhill," a ford, a shallow between isles
wliere horses pass (Miss Freer, " Outei- Isles").
Terminal -aidh in river names is Pictish; it
is for -in, from -ios, -ia. Welsh represents this
by -ydd; Pictish by -aidh or -idh, and Gaelic by
-e. Terminal -an in river names has nothing to
do with " abhainn " ; it stands foi' Gaulish -ona
(Mairona, Divona — our Don), -ana. "Ard" is
the Irish for " height," but Scotch GaeHc allows
a locative according to locality. " Aoineadh "
is a good Gaelic word, and cannot be from N.
"enni." " Leac " is also a good word for
'cheek," its locative being "leacainn," so
commonly used for hill-sides. The Doctor says
— " Leac, a check, a word with which I am not
famihar " — just like his " leac " in making him-
self arbiter of what is Gaelic, old or new (for its
use in a school book see " Higher Gaelic Eead-
ings," p. 78). Gleann-a-Comhann : the Doctor
regards this a as the article; it is simply a glide
vowel following n, and doing duty for the Irish
eclipsis. Loch Sween and the old name Syiliii
is from old Suibhne, a well-known name in Ire-
land. Sweyn Mac Sweyn is also found in char-
ters and documents (Coll register in Dr Johnson's
tiiue; he spoke to Mrs M'Sweyn). There are
three or four confusing surnames of this kind- —

THE PLACE-NAMES OF ARGYLL. 357

MacShui'ne (Argyll, M' Queen), M'Suain (Skve,
M'Sveinii), M'Swan, M'Aoidhean (M'Quien,
Skye) ; possibly MacCuinn from Conn ; but this
last name is not found in Highland documents.
It belongs to early history. Tormoid is from
Thormund (final nd to d); Ivarr, lomhar, is for
Ingvarr. Clan Ean Murguenich is surely the
famous or infamous Maclans of Ardnamurchan.
Dermot, son of Fergus Cerrbel, was the good
King whom Ruadan cursed. Gometra stands for
Godmundar-ey, " Godmund's Isle"; Hermitra
for Hermund's. The name Oighrig or Eftric is
not from oigh; the Abbess of Kildare had this
name in 738, and it was spelled Aithbhric, later
Africa. These are some of the errors which we
find in Dr GiUies' Place-Names of Argyll. They
are not all that we, or better still, one more
acquainted with the county, could point out, but,
as Mercutio says, " 'Tis enough."

INDEX

INDEX

XoTB. — Tlie fstress acceut is indicated by a full fstop placed bet'ure ihe
stressed syllable— e.gf., Aber.arder is stressed ou ihe third
syllable ; .Ab( rscaig is streused on the first.

abar, aber^ 43, 138, 331
Aber.arder, 138, 208, 274
Aber.ckalder, 43, 138
Aber.deen, 43, 138
Aber.feldy, 138
Aber.geldie, 181
Aber.nethy, 139, 320
.Aberscajg, 8
.Aberscross, 8, ix.
Aber.tarf, 138
abh, 331, xsvii.
Aboua, 7

Ab.riachan, 125, 138, 331
-ach, 334

Aclia.cliouleicli, 58
Acliadli-da-tearnaidh, 58, 59
Aclia.derry, 49
Aclia.drom, 43
Aolian.darroch,, 58
Ach.bae, 60
Ach..ducliie, 274
Acli.eachfi, 60
Ach.gourish, 319, xxTii.
Acliiche, 60
Ach. lean, 280
Ach. loch, 24
Aci.lum, 280
Ach.luachrach, 49
A oh. more, 58
Achna.beachin, 265
Achna.cloick, 60
Achna.oochine, 181
Aciina.coichen, 181
Achna.hannet, 162
Aohna.hiuich, 58
Achtay.toralan, 59
Adamrian, 33, 4?, ^7, 07
Adru, 150
Aebudae, 67
Aedui, 2Q

.Affric, Glen, 185

-aidh, diminutive, 305

.Aignish, 101

ailean, 321

.Ainort, liooh, 37

Air, 107

Airchartdan (.v. Ux-quhart),

145, 152, 335
Aird, 163
airigh, 292
Airina.bost, 353
Airi.virig, 353
.Airnemul, 170
Airtkrago, 68
.Aiadale, 91
aite, 321
Aith, 90
Aithbhric, 35?
Alasdair Car rich, 44
Alba, 5
.Alderney, 15
Ald.larie, 269
Ald.oairie, 140
.Alisary, 291
.Allan, 321
allt, 140

Allt a' Bhataich, 367
Allt Buidhe, 244
Allt Diiinne 'Ghoire Bkiu*, B»0
A lit .Phearnagan, 245
Allt .Gabhlach, 245
Allt .Lairig, 243
Allt .Lorgaidh, 245
Allt .Lowrag, 244
Allt .Mhadagain, 352
Allt Ruaidh, 244
Allt-saidh, 183
Altana.bhraidh, 59
Alta E-ipa, 7
.Altavik, 36
Altna.karrie, 308

362

INDEX.

.Alter wall, 14

.AltreboU, 14

.Alvali, 156

.Alvee, 156

.Alvie, 156, 192, 235, 245

.Alyth, 156

an, 331, xxvii.

Angii«, Eail of, 19

Angus of the ielesi, 43

Angus-Bone, 24

.Anuat, 50, 162, 283

Antiquities, 27

Aoiueaclh, 356

.Apavatn, 16

.apdaint>, abthaiu^, 285

.Apigill, 16

apor, 43

Aporioum Stagnuni. 42,

151
.Appiu, 285
.jVppIecrcss, 54
.Ajrbol, 292
.Ardacli, 59
Ard.brylacli, 204
Ard.elve, 60
Ard.elester, 108
Arder.sier, 127, 155
.Ardincbe, 200
Ardma.reo, 160
Axd.meanagh, 22
Ardna.imu'chau, 70, 145,

348
Ard.narff, 58
.Ardnish, 38
Ard .Thuirinisb, 38
Ard.verikie, 274
Ard.Troilach, 269
Ar.gyle, 64, 342
.Arkaig, 180
Arkle, 292
.Arkkt, 180
.Armadale, 14, 38, 179
.Arnaboll, 11, 13
.Arnamul, 171
.Arnaval, 38, 171
.Arnol, 98
.Aruish, 38, 101
.Arnisort, 101
.Aros, 38, 104, 170
.Arran, 70, 78
Artbrananus, 32
Artdamuirohol, 145
-OB, 318

146,

151,

Ascaoiiieacb, 353

.Ascrib leles, 3G, xiv.

i'^iiigrims-erg, 172

.Ashore, 13, x.

.Askary, 173, 290

Asleif's Bay, Aeleifar-vik, 13

.Asmigarry, 96

Ash, 81

.Assary, 290, 291

.Assynt, 3, 6, 10, 11, 21, ix.

Astle, 14

Athole (Ath-Fhodhla), 5

Auch. alter, 242

Auchin. tore-beg, 48

Auchter.chepar, 320

Aiichtertyre, 59, 60

.Aulafiary, 173, 291

.Aulavaig, 37

Auld.earn, 148, 331

Aiiltna.sou, 62

.Avernish, 57, xvi.

Avie.lochan, 182, 272

Avie.more, 182, 272, 331

Avin.lochan, 182

Awe, 350

.Awloche, 24

Ayre, 179

Ayre Point, 38

B.

.Baccaskill, 82

Bachd, 82

Back, 82

Bacca or Backa, 82

.Backies, 13

Bad Each, 251

Bad Earbag, 250

Baden, lougart, 175

.Badenoch, 164, 186, 233, 259

Badi.caiil, 61

Bad na Deimheis, 256

Baile-.chloichridh, 276

Bail-in-tian, 175

Baillie of DooMour, 205

Bakka, 82

Bakki, 13, 82

Bala.chroan, 204, 269

Balan.scrittan, 280

Bal.chroan, 204

Bal.dow, 264

Bal.four, 125, 263, 334

Bal.gowan, 271

INDEX.

363

.Baiigiil, 16, xii.
Balin.tore, 333
Bali.viiilin, 262
Bal.keith, 308
Balla.cJuilia]i, 48
Ballaii.truplial, 112
Balleua.g.ulleich, 163
Balli.feary, 123
Balliii.luig-, 261
Balliol, King Ed.,ard, 34
Ball.misliag, 273
.Balloch, Glen. 252
Balma.carra, 54, 59
Balnia.glaeter, ir^T
Bal. moral, 182
Balua.craig, 279
Bal.naifl, 279
Bal.nesjjick, 163, 205
Bal.vamch, 163
Bal.vatton, 314
Imu (Welsh), 331
.Banavie. 180
Banba. 180
Banff, 180
Bamiockbu I'n , 25
Bauquo, 43

Barony of Gruids, 4, 8
Barra, 74
.Bajrapoll. 95
Bari-c. 306
Barro-vindo6, 306
Barvaf^, 104, xxi.
Bata.bog, 262
Baude, 322
.Beagram, 170
Beallacli .Colluscard, 179
Beallaoh na Sgaiide. 179
.Beallid, 270
.Beariaraig, 37
Beauly, 10, 128, 1G3
Beauly Firth, 6, 9
Beinn, beann, 95. 331
Beinu a" Sgatli, 38
Beinue Bhuidhe ua Sroiue,
Beiuu .Eibhinn, 254
Beinu .Loyal, 16, 61
Beinn Stack, 10
Beinn Thuncairidli, 355
Beinn .Valaman, 61, 255
am Beitliigh, 279
Bel.faet, 180
Belle.ville, 265
Ben Alder, 255

252

Ben Arkle, 16

Ben .Armin, 13

Ben.becula, 75, 169, xix.

.Benchar, 204, 205, 270

Ben .Edair, 150

Ben Griam, 13

Ben .Eayaval, 16

Ben Mac.dni, 59, 190

Ben .Nevis, 47

Benuie, 238

Ben Eatk, 11

Ben Storr, 38

Ben Strome, 17

Ben Tee, 176

.Beolary, 173

.Bernera, 74, 92, 168

a' .Bhuidheanaich, 250

.Biacbna-begg. 262

.Bialaid, 158, 266, 270

.Bigeary, 39

.Biggary, 172

.Bighonse, 18, xiii.

Bigswall, 114

.Birkisco, 38, 170

.Blairgie. 182, 272

blar, 140

.Blarach, 205

Blare.garwe, 60

.Blargie, 182, 272

Blar-na-leine, 54. 140

Blar-na-cleireacli, 48

Blar.onr, 49, 140, xxiii.

.Blaven, 169

Blingery, 291

Blinkbonny, 322

Boar, The, 255

Bo.chrubin, 141

Boece, Hector, 67

beer, 88

.Bogie, 238

Bchnntin, 49, 141, xvi.

.Boisdale, 178, xxvi.

bol, 13, 14

Bo.leskine, 141

Bo.lin, 141

Bolstadhr, 12, 79, 82, 84, 94

.Bona, 126, 153, xxii.

.Bonar, 7

Book of Deer, 26

.Boreraig, 37

.Boreray, 74, 79

borg, 86

.Borgarey, 87

oo4

INDEX.

BoTgie, 18
.Borlum. 177
Borna.ekitaig', 37
.Borrobale, 14
.Borrowston, 111
.Borsam, 98
Borve, Borr, 18, 85
.Bosset, 17
bost, 12, 37
.Bosta, 83
both, 141

Bothwell, Morays of, 19
.Boursa, 15
.Boiiata, 82
.Bowaett, 17

.Bracadale, 34, 35, 155, xiv.
Brae-ctat, 4
Braeia.tra, 58
Brae Locli.aber, 44
Brae.i'iach, 190
.Braga, 88
.Braijor, 88, xx.
Bran, E., 257, 258
.BrRnderecraig, 37
Brana.hiiie, 91
Brannan, 346
Brass, 218

.Breabost, 39, 99, 171
.Breaclet, 99
.Breakachie, 205, 275
.Breakness, 88
.Breaquoy, 99
.Breasclet, 99
Brecacatli, 275
.Brecbiu, 202
Breck. Brekk, 38
Breidharhlidh, 99

Breidbhat, 117
.Breinish, 102
Brin, 213

Broadford, ll9, xv.
Broch.nain, 184
.Brodick, 37
.Brogaig, 37
.Brogar. 88
.Bronnacli, 27?
.Brora, 17
Brougli, 85
Brough of Biri^a. SG
Brow, 88
Bn'i, 88

Bruce, David, 34
Bruce, Eob©rt. 34. 43

Brue, 88

Brugarth, 88

.Brunary, 173, 291

Bruthach uan Spardau. 2S8

Bught, 36, 123

Bul.roy, 280

Bu.nachton, 141

Burg or Borve, 39

Burghead, 315

Biirns, 81

.Burra, 86

BurroAV Head, 35

.Burwick, 86

.Biista, 82

Buster or Bister, 12

Bute, 78, XX.

C.

Cabraoh, 334

Cadha an Fheidh L<>chain

Ubhaidh, 252
Caereni, 6
.Oaggan, 280
.Caiplich, 259
Cairn. gorm, 140
Cait, 5

.Caitliness, 3, 9
.Calavie, L., 57
.Callwst, 83
.Calder, 138, 241
Caledonia, 142
Calf of Mull, 77
.Callart, 48, xvi.
.Callater, 241
.Callernish, 103, xxi.
Call Ghaig, 258
.Oilligarry, 172
.Calva, 15
.Calvie, Glen, 57
.Camalaig, 37
.Camas .Longart, 62
Camerous, 25, 44
Cameron-Campbell of .Monzie,

45
.Campbeltown, 48
C-amua-.Killean, 343
.Canan, 214
.Canna, 76, 349
Can. tyre, 71

Caochan a' Chaplioli. 259
Cape Wrath, 6, 18. 68
.Carbost, 171

INDEX.

365

.Caiiehader, 108

.Caxloway, 116

cam, 140

.Cariiaeh, 144, 305

Cam ail Fhidlileir Lrorgaidh,

246
Cam Dnbk Mhii au Deoir. 249
.Cam«e«j 103
.Garnish, 102
Caimonacae; 6
Carr.bridge, 321
.Carrol, 17
.CarroD, 144
Castle Heather, 184
Cat, 5, fl, 9
.Cataool, 87
Cataneeia. 4. 6, 19
.Cataobh. 4. 5, viii.
oathftii. .302
.Catlodt'e, 275
.Cattan. 208
.CattanachB. 211
Oatti, 5. 6
Oausor. 320
.Cawdor. 241
C6. 6

Cealiaii, 162
ceantt, 3.-1
CeaBn-i>i: -Oba, 67
.Cearbbaig, 17

Cfeleetine of Loohalah, 44, 6.3
Cerones. 144
.Cbaligaig, Port. 17
Cbap«l-parfe, 267
.Charlenton 117
Cbattan, CJlan, 906, 224
Chatti, 6, 7
A' Chftoimich, 258
Cheehohne, 24
Chewil, 224
A' Ohlabaich, 353

ChlBanach, a'. 175
Chrona. 16
Oill-chro, 161
rSlI 'DoTii'>nii!. 154
CHlJ-DiMiin. 154
Cill-Fliii.li. 154
Oirig, 6

Oiffte .Mhearad, 260
Clach an Tniiseil, 112, xxii.
Clacb Mh-;. Cailin, 261
Clachna.cauiin, 122, 332
Oach »a h-Annaid, 162

Claclina.liarry, 210, xxii.
Cladh .Bhiallaid, 270
Cladh Bhrighde, 270
Cladh .Eadail, 270
Clan.chamron, 224
Clan.donochie, 224
Clan Ean Murgiie ich. 367
Clan-Guin, 21
Clann Mhuirich. 226
Clark, Alex., 24
Clark, John, 259
Clash.jiieil, 100
.Clayside, 17
Cleit, 10, 38
Clena.machrie, 353
Cleit, Ben, Loch, 38
Clett. 99
Cleiigh, 353
clochan, 284
Clon'.tarl, 70

.CHiiainidh, 271

Olune, 204, 205, 270

Clunes, 24

Clunie, Cluny, 175, 205, 271
ClTiniter, 353

Cluny Mao('hersoi)c>, i2f)

.Clurie, 193

Clyue, 11, ix.

Cnoc Druideau, 345

Cnoc .Prangach, 250

Cnoc Praing, 249

Cnoo nan Ajugeal, 61

.Cnoideart, 79

Coal, 99

Cobhsamul, 80

C^vilin.Uiie, 265

(iciile.inore, 61

.CoiLsay, 74, xix.

.Coinnmheal, 95

ooire, 140

Coii-^-an-.Longairt, 175

Coire Bhein, 254

Coire Bhoite, 253

Coire Bhran, 258

Cfire Bog, 2.50

Ooi re . Fhe a r u agan , 260

Coire na Stoma, 62, 164

Coire .Neachdradh, 251

Coire .Phitridh, 254

Coire .Seasgach, 57

C-oire .Siiileagach, 255

Coire .Yairack, 253

.Colaboll, 14

366

INDEX.

.OoUxwt, 171

.Coldbackie, 13, x.

.Colivick, 118

Coll, 77, 99, 349

.Colonsay, 68, 69, 78, 350, xviii.

.Colsettr, 99

Cohimba, 160

.Cojiihraig, 245

Ooinyn, 195, 196, 197

.Conamheall, 15, xi.

.Oouan, 334

.Conchra, 60, xvi.

.Consesaid, 17, xii.

Conilicts, 353

.Couista, 39

.ooupairche, 284

.Contin, 49, 280

.Copeval, 96

Oop-na-Hoe, 38

.Ooraldie, 270

Cor.arnstil-beg, 244

-more, 244

Cormac, 353

Oornavii, 6

Cornwall, 6

.Corpach, 50, 180, 352

.Corran, 46, 49, 173, 352

.Corranaoh, 205, 270

CJorry .Mhadagain, 140

Corse, 100

.Oorsopoll, 95

Oor.iianan, 48

Coulin.liun, 269

Coull, 273

Cowal, 346

.Coylum Bridge, 181, xxvii.

.Cracaig. 37

Craig, 58

Craig.ellachie, 182, 189. 249

Craig Righ Harailt, 194, 232,

25i
Craig Ruadh, 255
.Crakavick, 171
.Crathie, 273
Crathy, 205
.Cravodale, 98
Oreag an Abhaig ;>.' Bhail'-

shioe, 252
Creag an Loin, 262
Crea.garry, 172, xxvi.
Creag Bheag Chimi-a' ghiubh-

saioh, 252
Creag Chrooau, 256

Creag Dkubli Bliiallaid, 253

Oreag .Fhiaolach, 261

Creag .Follais, 261

Creag .GlnubhsaoLau, 260

Oreag Lcathain(n), 260

Qreia^ Liafch, a' Bliail'-shuari,

252
Oi"eag .M.higeaohaid/1, 260
Creag Mhor Bhail' *' olirotb-

ain, 252
Creed Rivei-, 8, 81, viii.
Creicli, 11, x.
(.'reouee, 144
Cricli Cliat, 6
.Crisigill, 97, xxi.
Croft. carnocb, 265
riroft.gowaji, 263
.Orogary, 172
.Ci'oigarry, 96
(iroit-nio-Cliroetaii. 101
.Ci'omaran, 279
.Cromai-ty, 307
CVose, 100
Crosprig, 354
Cross, 100
.Crossapoll, 96, 100
.Cros8l>ost, 83, 100
.Cro^tsbreck, 38
.Croesiix)!!, 95
.Crossnish, 38

Crossphiiil, L., 13

Crowlista, 111
Croy, 128, xxiii.
•Oroyla, 259
.Crubiu-more, 27*!
.Oriiely, 118
.Oniitlme, 6
.Cruithuig, 6
.Cruuuachau, L., 248
.Cubbin, 29
Cu.chulinn, 33
Ciiid, 7

Oiiidh.raug, 107
Cuig.s of Strathdenr., 1«3
Ouilc, an, 257
Cml.chenna, 49
Ouil-chuiuneig, 184
Ouldees, 93
Ciil.loden, 184, 335
Cul.malY, 153
.Culroes', 43, 335
Culthnok, 60
.Cumbraes, 78

INDEX.

367

Oiimmin, Cuimiu, St., 128, lUi
Cumuli nga, 43
Ourr, 193
.Ciirsetter, 107
Cyder, hall, 13

Dail au .Longaixt, 175, 275

Dail ua Ceardaich, 276

dal, 329

-dal, 38

Dal.aunacli, 276

Da,.arossie, 127, 158, 335, xxv.

Dal.chapple, 321

Dal.cliully, 274

.Dalcross, 156

Dale.beg, 90

Dale.more, 90

Dales of Caitliness, 3, 9

Dal. four, 174

.Dalginrose, 166

Dal Haxald, 12

DaLkeith, 301

Dal-.Langal, 17

.Dallas, 319

Dal.mally, 153

Dal.migavie, 260

Dal.moire, 109

Dalna.vert, 203, 204, 279, ;^.:5

Dal.navie, 308

dalx, 13, 14, 15, 89, 109

Dal.raddy, 205, 262

Dal.uar, 334, xxvii.

Dal.whlnnie, 275

Da.vaar, 345

.davach, 335

Davidsons, 211, 226

.Daviot, 127, 156

Dean of Liemore, 33, 63

Dean Munro, 72

Dearc Beinne Bigfe, 254

Deoantae, 5, 6

Dee, 122, 147, 333

.Deernese, 99

Del. four, 125, 204, 205, 263

.Deeher, 320

.Deverott, 148

Dicksone, 24

.Diebek, 82, xx.

Digg, 180

diminutive -»idh, 306

.Dingwall, 9. 82, 129

Dingwall of Kilduu, 54

.Diraclet, 99

Dirie-Cliat, 4

Divona, 122, 147

.dobhar, 140

Docli.four, 125, 174, 263

Dooh.garroch, 174

Don, 122, 147

Donald Ba.lloch, 44

Donald Dubh, 44

Donnan, 344
j .Dor&s, 126, 157. xxv.
! .Dorlin, 178, 351

.Doruocli, 9, 10, 23, 306, ix.

.Dorrery, 173, 290

Dorsum Britanuiee, 146

.Dourag, 140

.Drocliaid Charra, 321

Dronside, 12

Drostau, 161

Druie, 238

druineacli, 300

Drum. ar bin, 49

Drum.buie, 61

Drum.cliardine, 152

Drum.gask, 271

.Drummond, 123, 175

Drum.ochter, 255, 257

Drum.synie, 353

.Duaircl, 61

.Dubec, 82

Dubh-Ghiubliaie, 192

Duf, 24

.Duffue, 19, 319

.Duible, 14, x.

Duirinish, 34, 35. 56, 78, 99,
156

dul 139

Dull, 139

.Dulnan, 239, 335

Dun.achton, 194, 26^

Dun Borgh, 86

.Duncansburgh, 48, W-i

.DuncauBbay Head, 7

Dun.oraig, 58

Dun-dearduil, 49, xvi.

Dungeness, 100

Dun.keld, 142. 176
Dun.lichity, 158
Dun .oily Caetle, 32
Dun.robin, 29
Diin-Scathaich, 33, xiv.
Dun.stafnage, 180

368

INDEX.

Dun.iuim, 36, 180
Dun.vorrerick, 74
.Diun^^B, 3, 6. 8, 10. 11, 21,56,
78, 156

Durria, 126. 157

[hwarv. 173. 291

Duthii, 167, 320, xxv.
Dyksouit, Dickson. 26
Dyx, 99
.Dyrjk-kVttT. 99

E.

.Eabt**, 171
Earn. 148, 335
.BaarBhadei, 107
Easga iui Lochain, 250
EaMer Hoes, 10
Elxmdae, Ebiidae. 145
Eb\ida. 14A
Etl»T. 91

Eddra.ehille6, 10, 11, 15, 21
Ediubnrcrh MS.. 54
Edin *»tr 267
Egea. 68. 145. 150
.EidaTt. 246
Eidird. 267
Eidb. 90

Eigg. 7e. 145. 150. :349. xxIy.
Ei1(^, L.. 47
Eilean an Rigli, 247
Eileai) Bwigram, 170
Eilenn H«ist, 179
Eilefttj Han Oon, 247
Eitean Tioram, 62
.Eing-an#«j 99
eirbhf, 308

.ELsbort, Locb, 37. xv.
Eist 179

Ekkjalbakki, 9, 13
Elans hoga, 15
Elane.neyfe, 15
Elane.qnothra, 15
Elane.Ton*, 15
Elan.ga-wne, 15
Elan.gelye, 15
Elaji.nmnne, 46
Elan.T?illijrh«>. 15
.Eldrabk. 14, xi.
Elena. 68
.Eljrin, 322

Elg^Kf•hire, Place Names of,
313

.Ellishader, lUt!

.Elliater, 108

.Elrick, 176, 253, 351. ixvi.

.Embo, 11, 13, X.

-Enaclete, 99

.Enard, 93

Endi, 91

.Ensay, 78, 92, 168

.Eoradale, 90

.Eoropie, 88

Epidii, 69, 343

Epidium, 67, 69

.Eport, 93

.Erbusaig, 56

.Ercliless, 185

.Erebie, 107

.Ereboll, 11, 95

.Erichdie W Peter, 248

.Ericht, Loch, 248

Erin, 350

.Eriskay, 74, 169

.Erisort, 93

.Erista, 112

Ernach, 355

.Erraid, 77

.Erribol, 13

.Errocht, 50

.Ersaiy, 291

Esk, 332

.Efekadale, 10, 167, 306

.Essich, 183

Esain.tiillich, 181

.Eswick, 90

.Etteridge. .Ettridge. 181, 20.5

Ey, 15, 91

Eye, 91

.Eynort, Locb. 37

Eyre, 38, 179

F.

Fadauiine, 60

faithir, 308

.FaLside, 17, xii.

Faodliail. 356

.Farigag. 126, 173

.Farleitir, Farletter. 163. 279

.Farmheall, 16

Parniia, 157

Parqulxai-.sons, 206, 211

Farr, 11, 279

.Farraline, 163

.Fan'ar, 143

INDEX.

369

Fassi.feru, 50, 180

•Fearna, 240

Fea.vorar, 262

.Feithlinu, 3S0

fell, 79

Fell, 95

feodhail, 308

Feoirliun, 351

.Fercliard, 215 et seqq.

.Ferchard Leche, 15

.Ferchar Fota, 208

Fergus mac Ere, 344

.Fernaig, 58

Feruaig-beg, 60

.Fernsdale, 244

.Fersit, 49, 180

.Feshie, 190, 208, 237, 238, 257,

335
.Fia.ray, 75
Fib, 5
Fidach, 5
Fiddes, 24
Fife, 5, 20
Finan, 161
.Findliorn, 148
Findlaoch, Fiulay, 345
.Fingask, 271
.Finnbar, 154
.Finnlarig, 176, 321
.Fintag, 47
Fionnlarig, 321
.Fiskavaig, 37
Fivepenny Ness, 101
Fjall, 15, 95
Fjordhr, 15, 79, 93
.Fladda, 71, 76, 168
Flannen Islands, 74
Fleet, 8
• Flicliity, 156
.Flodeway, 117
.Flodigarry, 172
Foill, 353
Forbeses, 25
.Fordun, 54
Forfarshire, 21
Forr, 279
.Forre», 21d
FoTS, 38
.Forsan, 38
Forse, 38
Forsin.ard, 18
Fort-Augustiis, 128, 183
Fort-George, 183

Poi-tr«un, 5

Fort-Williaiu, 48, 183

Fotla, 5

Foula, Fula, 75

-four, 334

Fowlis, Lord Gray of. 21

.Foyers, 128, 183

.Fresgill, 16, xii.

Preskin, 19

.Fre.ucliy, 54

.Puday, 75

Fuidhaidh, 75, xix.

G.

Gaick, 256, 257

.Gailval, 14

Gairidli-Ghiumaig. 172

Gallanach, 353

.Gallaobk, 4, viii.

.Gallovie, 182, 272, 321

.Galloway, 25

Gal-neap, 97

.Galtrigill, 97

Gar, 24

Garbh-Ghriochan, 151

Garbh-Gtaig, 258

.Garbost, .Garrabost, 83, 332,

XX.

Gardhr, 96
.Gargask, 271
. Garni orau, 135, TSl, 165
Garra.fau, 172
.Garragarth, 83
.Garraquoy, 83
-garry, 39, xv., xx
Garry, 166, 238, 335
Garry. more, 172
.Garten, 175
Gartnait, 32
.Garva-beg, 27?
.Garva-more, 273
Gask, 204, 205, 271, 335
Gask-beg, 271
Gask-lyne, 205
Gaslv-more, 271
Gaudie, 23S
.Gaulisli, 6
.Gealcliarn, 140
Geara-du, 172
.Gearnsary, 291
gearrairth, 287
Geary, 172

24

370

INDKX.

Qeirabolstadbr, 83

.Geldie, 181, 238. 331, xxvii.

.Gellovie, 206

Geodha, 10

Geodha an t-Sil, 355

• Gesbader, 108
.Gheallaidh, Allt, 181
Ghoibhuidh, Allt, 241
Gibbon, 29

.Gigha, 78, 347

Gil, 16, 38, 97

Gilbert, Bishop of Caitliness,

19
Gill.anders, 54, 211
Giol, 97
Girsa, 98
.Girsigarth, 98

• Gisofill, 16
Gisl. 97
Gja, 16

Glac an t-Sueacbdaidh, 251

.Glastor, 50

Gleann Fhreasdail, 354

Gleu Amaind, 352

Glen Brander, 354

Glen .Calvie, 57

Gleu.carnie, 193

Olen.coe, 334, 356

Gleu-Couvinth, 185

Glen.dessary, 48

Glen.elg, 157, 322

Glen.fesbie, 190, 257

Glen. finnan, 178, 346, xxvi.

Glen.fintaig, 47

Glen.garry, 54, 96, 166

Gleu-geoullie, 181

Glen.gloy, 48

Gleu.kingie, 48

Glen.luy, 44, 48. xvi.

Glen .Moriston. 54. 163. 1«6

Gleu-ose, 37, 170

Glen-pean, 48

Glen-quoich, 180, xxvi.

Glen.roy, 48

Glen..shiel. 294

Glen-sbirra. 273

Glen-sulag, 48

Gleu.tilt,''217

Glen.truim, 205

Glen .Udalan, 61

Glen .Urqnhart, 54, 152. 186

.Gnipa, 97

Goatfell, 95

.Golspie, 10, 24, 46
Golspie Stone, 27, 28
.Golvall, 17, xiii.
G^metra, 74, 357
Gordon, 20, 21, 48
Gordon, Sir Robert, 4, 13. 20,

21, 22
Gordons, 202
Gordonsburgh, 48, 183
Gordons' Hall, 277
Gordouston, 20
Gortincrief, 263
Gow, Dnncan, 257
.Gradsary, 291
Graff nose, 98
■ Grafirdale, 98
Grampians, 189
.Granish, 182, 314
Grant, Mrs. of Laggan, 272
Grants, 54, 204
Gras, 98
.Grasabbaig, 98
.Grasgo, 170
.Grassfield, 08
.Grassholm, 98
Graupins, 142
.Graveland, 98
.Graven, 98
.Gravir, 98
Grawine, 98
Gray, 21
.Greenwall, 114
Greepe, 97
.Gremiston, 110
.Gresbornish, 38, 104, 180
.Gresmark, 98
Gress, 98
Greta, 8
Griam, Ben, 13
.Griamacbarry. 13
.Grimagarry, 172
.Grimisay, 74
Grimr, 13
Grims-argb, 290
.Grimsbader, 106
.Grinez, 100
.Griomabbal, 108
.Grisbernisb, 38, 104. 180
.Gi'odsary, 18
Grof, 98

.Grudie, River, 8
Gniids, Barony of, 4, 8
.Gruinard, 93, 94

INDEX.

371

G rum-beg, 18
Grumb-more, 18
.Guinag, 240
• Giilbin, Locla, 47
.Gunna, 77
Gunns, 21, 22
.Gurshader, 108

Ha or Hay, 225
.Habost, 84, xx.
.Hacklete, 99
Haco, 12, 13, 33
.Hacoin, Lochan, 12
.Halikeld, 177
.Halladale, 14, xi.
.Halsary, 173, 290
.Hamara, 38
.Hamarr, 38
.Handa, 15
Harestanes, 317
.Harport, 37
.Harrapool, 95
.Harris, 73, 159, xviii.
.Harrow, 290
.Hasker, 75, 109, xix.
Hatti, 5, 7
Hatton, 316
Haiigh, 122
Haversay, 76
Heast, 37

Hebrides, 9, 32, 67, 145
Hebudes, Haebudes, 145
Hecla, 169
Heimr, 98

.Heisker, 75, 178, xix,
.Heistamul, 170
.Helaval, 38, 169
.Hellipoll, 95
.Hellisay, 75
-Helmsdale, 12, 14
Helmsdale River, 7
Herishader, 171
-Hermetray, 74, 92. 357
.Herries, 73
Hesse, 5
Hestam, 170
Hig-h Bank, 7, J2
Hillam, 18, xiii.
Hinba, 68
Hirt, 73, xviii.
Hoe. 38

.Hogi^etter, 84

Holl, 98

Holland, Hallandi, etc., 84

Holme, 122

Holm Isle, 36

Homildou Hill, 203

.Hoiiary, 291

Hojie, Ben and Loch, 18, 57

.Horgibost, 84

.Horisary, 173, 291

.Horneval, 38, 169

Horse Isle, 77

.Hon by, 84

.Hougheary, 172

.Houllaud, 84

Hourn, Loch, 62, 164

.Housay, 104

.Hcusby, 104

.Howbister, 84

How. more, 170

.Hoxa, 91

Hoy, 74

.Himish, 38

.Huutly, 202

Huntly, Earl of, 20, 44, 45, 49

.Husabost, 39, 104, 171

.Hushiuish, 104

Huxter, 84

hybrids, 332

.Hysbackie, 13, x.

Tarlraig, 253
I Cataib, 6
.Idrigill, 38, 179
Ila fliimen, 7
.Ilidh, 7
.Inaclete, 99
.Inchard, 15
luch.fuir, 174
Inch.nairn, 58
.lugasteu, 99
.lugyebiister, 99
Inner. geldie, 181
Inner. gelly, 181
Inner. roy, 49
Innes, Cosmo, 9, 22
Innes or Inch, 49
Innes, Sir Hugh, 55
Innis Drynich, 345
Insh, 204, 236
Insh.navie, 285

372

INDEX.

lnver.aro&, 38, 178

Inver.eshie, 205

Inver.lochy Castle. 43

laver.markie, 203

Inverna.havou, 200, 205, 27G

Inver.uess, 9, 122, xxii.

luverness. Place Names of, 133

Inver.tromie, 205

Inver.iiglas, 175, 278

lona, 67, 68, 69. 350

Ireland, 9

Iring, 350

Irland, 107

Irt, 177

.Isay, 36, 76, 168

Iska, 332

Isla R. 7

Islay, 68, 71

Isle-Colm, 15

Iturnau, Itarnan, 309

.iubhrach, 300

James IV., 34
Jolin of Isla, 43, 44
Jolin of the Isles, 218
Jiira, 15, 78

K.

.Kallin, 162
Kata, or Katar, 5
Keanin.tachair, 262
.Keoldale, 14, x.
Keose, 99
Keotha, 99
.Keppoch, 44, 49
Keppoclimuir, 265
.Kerrera, 77, xix.
.Kerriwiek, 118
.Kcrrow, 268
.Kerwick, 17
.Eessoc, 161
.Kessock, 161
Kil.aulay, 161
Kil. bride, 160
Kil. coalman, 161
Kil.chattan, 210
Kil.choan, 160
KiLchiximen, 181
Kil. Christ, 161
Kilda.vie, 346
Kil.donan, 11, ix.

.Kildwick, 177
.Kilham, 177
Kill.eainan, 21, 309
.Killegray, 75, 168
Kill.ianan, 161, 178
Killie.huntly, 278
Kill.iu, 154
Killochir, 58

Kil.malie, 24, 46, 15-!, 317.
Kilma.luok, 155
Kilma.ree, 160
Kil. martin, 161
Kilmol.ruy, 160
Kil.michael, 161

Kilmo.nivaig, 46,

154

Kil.morack, 154

Kil. more, 154

Kil.miiir, 35, 155, 160

Kil.pheder, 161

Kl.ravock, 158

Kil.tarlity, 155

Kil.vaxter, 154

Kil.vean, 124

Kin.cardine, 127, 192, 335

Kin.cliyle, 261

^<va crai^, 204, 264

King.iLssie, 157, 190. 192, 236,

268
Kinloch.more, 48
Kin.mylies, 123
Kinna.moine, 62

Kn.rara, 203, 204, 205, 261

Kin.tail, 53

Kin.tyre, 48

.Kirkaig, 17

.Kirkapool, 94

Kirk.hill, 157

.KirkiboU, 14, 94

.Kirkibost, 162

.Kirkton, 61

.Kirvig. 118

.Kirkwall, 114

Kjos, 99

KM.tr, 38, 99

.Knappacli, 277

Knock. ando, 321, 333

Knock. sfranisb, 314

Knock. navie, 285

Knocknin.galliac'h, 262

.Knoydart, 93, 166

.Kolgrave, 98

Kollr, 99

.Kraiknish, 38

IIN^DEX.

373

Kroas, 100
Kyleakiu, 13, 3*
Kyle of Lochalsh, 61
Kyle-strome, 17
.Kyllachy, 182

Lachan.dhu, 266

.Lacsabhat, 117

las, 318

•Laggan, 158, 204, 237, 247, 268

Laimbrig, 352

Lairg, 3, 8, 11, ix.

Lairig-dhru, 176

•Laival, 169

.Lamalum, 170

.Lamigo, 16

.Lampay, 37

.Langaig, Loch, 37

•Langary, 291

.Langavat, 117

.Langdale, 14

.Langwell, 17

.Larbert, 140

Largs, 34

•Laufafell, IG

.Lawman, 82

.Laxa, 81, 90

.Laxdale, 89

.Laxfirths, 90

.Laxford, 15

.Layaval, 169

Leac, 356

.Leachtin, 123, 175

.Leanachau, 49

•Leault, 264

.Lecropt, 154

Lee, 178

.Leiphen, 174

.Leirable, 14, x.

•Lentran, 152

Leodamus, 355

.Lerwick, 14

.Leslie, 24

Lethallt, 352

Letter.four, 125, 263

Leum na Feinne, 256

Leum na Laracli, 257

.Leurbost, 83, xx.

Leven, Loch, 47, xv.

Lewis, 8, 10, 48

Lews, 70, 73

.Liaiiimul, 170

Li brig, 354

Lillingston, 55

.Linshader, 108, xxi.

Ling, E., 62

.Lingay, 75, 169

.Linmul, 80

.Linshader, 107

.Linside, 17

.Lionel, 98

Lis.more, 77

.Liuravaig, 37

Loch.aber, 42, 43, 48, 146, 151

Loch.alsh, 53

Loch an Diiin, 246

Loch an Eilein, 245

Loch an Laoigh, 57

Lochan na h-Earba, 248

Loch an t-Seilich, 246

Loch Arkaig, 44, 47

.Lochay, 147, 351

Loch Broom, 54

Loch .Calavie, 57, xvi.

Loch .Carron, 6

Loch Cille Chainnigh, 344

Loch .Crunachan, 248

Lochdae, 42, 147, 194

Loch Eilde, 47

Loch.gelly, 181

Loch .Gulbin, 47

Loch Hoiiru, 63, 164, xvii.

Loch.iel, 44, 45, 46, 213

Loch Insh, 194, 245

.Lochlaun, 190

Loch Leven, 47

Loch Linnhe, 46

Loch Long, 62

Loch.maddy, 178, xxvi.

i.och Ma.ree, 160

Loch .Monar, 62

Loch na h-Onaich, 62

Loch.nellau, 321

Loch Ness, 47

Loch Oich, 180, xxvi.

Loch Eestill, 354

Loch .Sandwood, 117

Loch Stornua, 116

Loch Sween, 356

Loch Tr6ig, 47

.Lochty, 320

.Lochy, 42, 46, 147, 3'JO

Logachnacheny, 200

Logi, Lougoi, 7

374

INDEX.

ujgie-tevi, 140

IjoiliUd Urbicus, 315

Lon-biiidhe, 61

Loudon, 56

.Lionga, 68

.Lougart, 275, 351

Liong Island, 70

Long, Loch, 62

Loogdae, L., 194

Lord of the Isles, 43, 44, 45

Lorn, 346

Lossie, 238, 315

Loth, 7, 11

Lovat, 185

.Loyal, Ben, 169, xii., xxv.

Loyninriach, 262

L;ib Mhairi, 232

Luga, 7

Liigi or Lou^i, 6, 7

Liiing, 68, 77

.Lunasting, 28

Liinda.vra, 49

.Liindie, 56

.Lunga, 68, 77

.Lusta, 39

Lyn.chat, 267

Lyn.chlaggr,u, 278, 279

Lyne, 319

Lyn.wilg, 205, 261

M.

Macbeans, 207, 211
Macbeth, 9
McCraithe, 24
McCulloch, 24
Macduff, 215
McGhie, 25
McGille.mor, 24
McGill.espy, 2^?
MacGillivrays, 211
Macgill.ony, 225
Mclvers, 25
Mackay, Mr John, 18
Mackays, 3, 21, 22. 25
MacKays of Kintyre, 26
MncKciizios, 2"!. 54, 55
Mnckic, 25
Mackintash, It.
Mackiutoshcs, 206, 211, 214
Maclvintoshes, 25
MacKostie, 161
M:;ckphail, 24

McKraith, 24
McKwatt, 24
Maclean of Coll and Luchbuy,

44, 45
Maclean of Duart, 45
Macleans of Dochgarroch, 211
MacLeod, 8, 34
MacLeods, 25
McLinlagan, 345
MacMahon, 23
MacMurquhe, 25
Macphails, 211
McPhails, 22
Macpherson, 25
Macpherson, 262
Macpherson, Lachlau, 242
Macphersons, 211, 225, et sr(jq.
Macqiieens, 211
McKaithe, 24

McSuaiu, McSwan, &c., 357
MacVnrich, 11, 33
.Maehall, 38
Magh.rath, 11
Magnus Barefoot, 32, 70, 71
.MaTikel, 18
.Maillie, 153
Malaeos, 67
Malag, 37

Malmoran of Glencarnie, 203
Malbrigd Bucktooth, 13
Ma Luac, 267
.Manachainn, 285
Man and the Isles, 33
.Mangarsta, 110
.Mangaster, 110
.Manish, 38, 103
Manxmen, 71
Maol.doraidh, 346
Mao-rubha, 160, 346
.Maraig, 117, 171
.Marishader, 39, 171
.Markie, 237, 243
Markinch, 122
.Marrel, 17, xiii.
Martin, 72
.Marwick, 117

Mnryburgh, 48, 183

Mashie, 237, 242
Maw. more, 45
Mathan, 23

Mnthoson. 23, 54, 62, 209
Ma.thesoii, Sir Keiinelh, 55
Maxwell, Sir Herbert, 29

INDEX.

375

.Meadak, 38

Meadowside, 2G5

.Mealista, 110

Meall Aillig, 258

Meall an .Dubh-chadha, 260

Meall .Dubhag, 260

Meall Horn, 16

Meall na b-Uinneig, 253

Meall .Rinidb, 16 xi.

.Meanisb, 38

.Meavig, Meavag, 118

Mela, 67

•Melbost, 83, 111

.Melby, 111

Melfort, 354

.Melness, 16, sii.

.Melsettr, 111

.Melvich, 17, xii.

Mbeall, 95

Micbin, 29

Middleton, 308

.Migdale, 14, x.

Mi-mbeall, 355

Mincb, 177

.Mingarry, 166, 172

.Mingay, 36, 166

.Minginisb, 34, 35, 36, 166

.Mingulay, 75, 166

.Minigaig, 258

.Modsary, 18, 291

.Moidart, 14, 93, 165

.Moireacb, a' .Mbormlioich, k',;.;)

Mol.inginisb, 104

-Monadh, 140

Monadli Caiplicb, 259

Mouadh-liatb, 140, 189, 249

.Mouar, L., 62, xvii.

Monitcarno, 193

Mouivaird, 217

.Monkstadt, 110, 154, 163

-Morar, 166

Morav, Murray, 18. 19. 20, 21,

24, "43, 322, 333
Morgan, 26, 214
Morile, 182
Moriui, 322

Mormaer of .Moyra. 11
Morrisons, 25
.Morsaig, 37

.Morvern, 151, 165, xxiv.
.Mosgaraidb. 172
Mos-send, 91
Mowate, 24

Mowatt, 25
•loy, 50, 127, 158
Moyra, 11
.Mucarnaicb, 30b
.Muccoul, 274
Muck, 76, 159
.Mucracb, 180
.Mudale, 14, xi.
Mudy, 24
.Mugeary, 172
Mull, 100, 349, xxi.
Mull. 68, 71, 77, 100
Mul.roy, 44, 229
.Mundale, 317
.Mundwell, 317
.Musal, 17, xiii.

N.

Nairn, 128, 164, 333, xxiii

Nant, 352

.Naver (Nabarus fl-am^ny. 4

.Navidale, 15, si.

.Navity, 285, 308

Neave, 15

Nebis, 149

Neep, 97

.neimbeadb, 284

nes, 16, 100

Nesa, 145, 146

.iSlesbustar, 84

Ness, 4, 122, 185, 332

Nessa, 122, 146

NessiutuUich, 181

Nestos, 122, 146

Nevis, 47, 149

New.more, 308

Newton. more, 269, 332

Nicbolson, 27

Nicolsons, 54

Nigra Dea, 42, 146

Nipa, 97

.Nisabost, 84

Nitb, 139

.Nonach, 62

Nona.kil, 285. 308

Norse, 6, 7, 8, 10, 11, 32, 5G

Norse-Gaelic pbouetics, :155

Norsemen, 9, 69, 79

Norse names, extent of, 70,

167
Norse terms, 168
Norway, 33

376

FNDEX.

.Nostie, 59
.Nunton, 163

0.

Oakculiead, 317

Ob, 18, 57

Obau, 18, 57

Ob-an-Duinc, 57

Obbc, 57

.Obisary, 173, 291

.Ochil Hills, 9

.Ochiltree, 9

Og-ham letters, 27

Og-ston, 317

Oich, L., 180, XXVI.

Oidecha, 68

Oighreag, 357

Oikel (v. Oykel)

Oirir Gliaidlieal, 43

Oiseval, 79

.Oisgill, 37, 97

Olave, 18, xiii.

.Oldaney, 15

Oldney, 15

.Oldshores, 13

Ommou, 68

.Onicb, 49, 62

.Oransav, Orousa, etc., 36, 78,

89, 169
.Orbost, 171
.Orchy, 331
Ord, 3, 7
Ord Bain, 182
.Oreval, 171
Orkas, 7
Orkney, Orcades. 7, 9, 32. 68,

69
.Ormiston, 317
.Orton, 317
.Osdal, 37
.Osdale, 15, xv.
Ose, 37, 107
.Oshmigarry, Osruig-arry. 96,

172
.Oskaig-, 37, xv.
.Osmnnd^vall, 114
.O.siiaTrall, 9P
.Osi3isdale, J
Oss; 104
.O.stai.g-, 37
.Overton, 31J

.:;,ic'. 1!7U
.Oykfil, 3, H,

.Pabay, .Pabbay, 36, 74, 93,

169
Paible, 163

Pairc-au-t-seipeil, 162
.Palascaig, 61, xvii.
.Papa, 93
.Papadill, 105
.Papal Burra, 105
.Papa Little, 105
.Papal Tell, 105
.Papa StoTU', 105
.Papa Stronsay, 105
.Papay, 105
.Papdale, 105
.Papi, 104
.Papley, 105
.Papyli, 105
.Partick, 140, xxiii.
Paton, 29
Patt, 62
.Pattack, 243
Paul Mac Tire, 22
Payble, 105
Pean, 43

.Peffer, 129, xxiii.
Peina.ha, 174
Peiua.vaila, 174
Peiu.chorran, 173
Peiu.ess, 174
Pein.gown, 174
Pein.more, 174
Peni.filler, 174
Penin.erin, 174
Pen.soraig, 37, 174
.Pentland Firtb, 5
Perth, 140
Pet, 7

Pethgnidie, 8
Pettakarsie, 8
Pettland, 5
Petty, 126, 138. 215
Petty. vaich. 137
Phar.spig- Skerray, 354
Phoine.«i, 181. xxvi.
Plir>ne.s, 205
P Irtish . 137
Picts, 5, 7, 27. 43, 56, 207-8, 3J9

INDEX.

377

Pit.airlie, 322

Pit.almit, 137

Pit.chalman, 137

Pit.chirn, 137, 205, 208

Pit.cliuTn, 263

Pit.four, 8, 126, 174, 263

Pit.fur, 174

Pit.grudie, 8

Pit.kerrald, 137, 161

Pitma. glassy, 43

Pitma.glaster, 137

Pit.maiu, 269

Pitmean, Paitmayne, Pet-

mayue, 8, 208
Pit.ourie, 208, 263
Pitten. trail, 8, ix.
Pitt.owrie, 137
Pit.youlish, 137, 181, 31!)
Place Names of Elginshire, 313
Plare Names of Ross and

Cromarty, 303
Place Names of Scotland, 327
.Pladaig, 56
Pliny, 67
.Plocktou, 61
.Pluscarden, 127
Poll-an-Tarie, 62
Pol.maly, 153
Poisons, 22
.Porin, 174
Port-a-Chullin, 61
Port .Chaligaig, 17
Poi't-Eorna, 61
Port na.cloiclie, 61
Port.rec, 34, 35, 156, xxv.
Powrie, 174
preas, 140

Preas-.niucracli, 140, 276
Priory of Kingussie, 203
Proaig, 354
.Pronsy, 18

Pteroton Stratopedon , 315
Ptolemv, 5, 6, 7, 32, 53, 67, 68.

315
.Purin, 174
Pyble, 105

Qiieys, 107
.Quidiuish, 105
.Quiness, 107
.Quinigh, 107

.Quishftdcr, 107
Qwbewy], Clan, 215

R.

.Raasay, 36, 75, 102, 169, xiv„

xix.
rabhan, 308
.Raernisli, 102
Raig.beg, 158
Raig.more, 158
.Raisaburg, 39
Rait, 204, 205
Raitts, 265, 266
Ra.lia, 277
.Ramasaig, 37, 171
Ramsden, Sir John, 205
.Ranigdale, 90
Rankin, 29
Raoiceadal. 355
.Rarnish, 102
rat, 141, 158
.Rater, 24
.Ratter, 24
Rauueyjar, 75
Reay, 10, 11, 25, x.
-Redigill, 16
Reef, 106
Reilig, 162
.Reisgill, 16, xi.
.Reiveal, 38
.Reraig, 57
.Resort, 93, xx.
Rhys, Professor, 27
•RiabhaoTian, 62
.RibigHl, 14
Ricina, 67
Rickin, 29
Rif, 106
Rigg, 180
.Rimisdale, 15, xi.
Riochnabegg, 262
Risary, 173. 291
.Rispond, 17
Robert III., 15
Robin, 29
Robson, 22
Rodel, 90, 177, xx
.Roeness, 90
.Rogart, 7, 10, ix.
Ro.hallion, 176
.Roineval, 38
.Roishader, 171

378

INDEX,

.Roua, 16, 36, 75

Ro-^nierta, 6

Roe.neath, 285

Boss, 129, 307

Ross & Cromarty, Place Names

of, 303
Ross, Earl of, 33, 34, 53
.Rossal, 17, xiii.
.Rossay, 169
Rosses, 54
.Rothes, 319
Rothie-, 141

Rothie.moon, 181, xxvii.
Rothie. murchus, 158, 190, 193
Roweardmale, 15
Rowestoreuastynghe, 15
Rudha ua h-Aoirinn, 350
Rue. more, 61
Ruigh-.Aiteachain, 280
Ruigh an Roig, 251
Ruigh-da-ros, 156
Ruigh-liouiitaig, 280
Ruigh na h-Eag, 250
Rum, 76, 159, 349
.Rusigarry, 96, xxi.
.Ruthven, 277
Ry-.voau, 320

S.

.Saasaig, 37

.Saddel, 353

Sail-riabhach, 62

St. Cattail, 4

Saint Columba, 5, 32, 42

St. Drostan's Chapel, 264

— Pindlagau, 345

— Finnan, 46

— Kilda, 73, 79, 177

— Munn'.s Isle, 46
.Sallachy, 60
.Sanda, 15
.Sandray, 75, 169
.Saraig, 306

.Sandwood, Loch, 18, 117
.Sandsair, 107
.Sandwick, 117
.Sango-beg, 16

• Sandaide, 17
saothair, 308

— -more, 16
Sauchie-burn, 60

.Scaftigill, 97

.Scaloway, 113

.6calpa, Scaipaidh, Soalpay,

36, 57, 92, 169
.Scauiport, 183, xxvii.
.Scapa, 91
.Scaravay, 75
.fcscarba, 75
.Scarista, 111
Scarp, 73, 92
Scathach, 33
.Scavaig, R., 37, xv.
Schie.hallion, 176
.Sc-iberscross, 18
Sco, 38

Score, Sguvr, 38
. Scorrybreck, 38
Scotland Fjord, 342
.Scourie, 18, xiii.
.Scoval, 38
.Scrabster, 12
Scyuend, 10
.Seadair, 171
.Seaforth, L., 83
Seaforth, Lord, 55
.Seauchreag, 61
Seil, 77, 354
Seil-Phaill, 21, 22
Seil-Thomas, 21, 22
Seil-Wohan, 21
.seipeal, 284
•Selback, 32
Seth, 225
Setr, 17, 79, 106
setter, 106
Sgath, Skagi, 38
Sgeir, 10, 38, 109
Sgor Gaoithe, 261
.Sguabach, 249
-shader, 39, 171
.Shadir, 106
.Shageary, 172
Shaw, 4
.Shawbost, 83
Shaws, 211

— of Rothiemurchus. 206
Shelibost, 84
..Shellay, 74, 92
.Shesgnau, 254
.Sheshader, 108
Shetland, 69
.Shigra, 18
.Shiuness, 16, 23,

INDEX.

379

Shirra-beg, 273

Shirra.more, 273

.Siiisken, 254

.Shiunaj 77

.Shona, 7T

.Shulishader, 39. 108

.Siulista, 39

.Shuna, 68, xviii.

.Shurrery, 173, 290

Sigurd of Orkney, 9, 13

Siuciaii, 21

Siol-Mliatliaiy, 23

.sitheau, 309

Sitbean Mor Dhail a' Caor-

uiun, 252
.Skaravat, 117
.Skeabost, 171
.Skegirsta, 110
.Skelbo, 8, 13, 19
.Skelbustar, 84
Skene, Dr, 42
Sker, 109
Skericha, 18
.Skernisb, 38
.Skerra, Port, 18
.Skerray, 18
Skerri.-more, 109
Sketis, Skitis, 68, 143
.Skiary, 173, 291
.Skibo, 11, 13, 21, 95
Skinashiuk, L., 11, ix.
.Skinid of Tongiie, 11
.Skinuastadr, 11
Skinner, 10
.Skiport, 93
.Skudiburg, 39
.Skulamufi, 179
-Skullomie, 18
Skye, 32, 68. 71. 143, 145
sleaghacli, 308
Sleat, 34, 35, 155, xiv.
Sletdale, 15
.Sletell, 17
Sliabh, An. 269
Sliabli Loi-gach. 49
Slochd, 321
Smertae, 6
.Smigel, 16, xii.
.Smirisary. 173, 291
Smiths, 211
Smoo, 17

.Sneachdach .Slinnean, 253
.Snizort, 35, 37, 79, 93, 156

Soa, 76, 79
.Soarary, 173
.Soay, 37, 168
.Sodhulum, 170
.Soillierie, 278
Somerled, 70, 218
.Sorby, 306
.Soroba, 306, 354
.S'Owerby, 306
.Soyea, 15

Spean, 43, 47, 143, 244
Spey, 47, 143, 189, 238
.Spiuuingdale, 14
srath, 141

Sron au loiair, 248
Sron-na-Baruinn, 191
-sta, 39
Stac, 10

Stack or Stakkv, 38
Stadhr, 110
Saffa, 77, 180
.Staffin, 36, 180
Stagiium Aporicuni, 151
.Steallag, 250
.St^^inisb, 101
.Stelligarry, 172
.Steunis, 101
.Stimaravay, 117
.Stockiuish, 103
.Stockval, 38
Stoer, 17

Stokes, Dr. 7, 28. 69
Stoneybridge, 178
Stor-ass, 17
Stornoway, 48, 116
.Storniia. Locli. 116
Storr. Ben, 38
Strandabliat, 112
Strath, 35, 155
Strath. asgaig, 57, xvi.
Strath. bogie, 202
Strath. errick, 126. 163
Strath. g-lass, 175
.Strathie, 61, xvii.
Strath.mashie, 242
Strath. nairn. 11. 164
Strath. naver, 3. 21, 25
•'.-:^th p-efff>r, 129
J'trath. sword ale. Strath.oidil.

34. 156
Strath. iiridale, 14
.Strolanuis, 179
Stroineferry, 56

380

INDEX,

StTbnd, 112
Strone, 204, 205, 369
Suidhe, An, 251
.Suileag, R., 48
.Suilven, 15, 108
.Suiagil, 16, xii.
.Suisniah, 38
Sule Skerry, 86
.Sulishader, 171
.Sulisker, 108
.Suiiart, 166, 355
Sutherland, Earl of, 3
.Swaniboat, 84
.Swordale, 14, 89, 109, ziv.
.Swyuasetter, 84

T.

.Tabost, 80

.Tahay, 74

.Talisker, 109, 179

Tarlogan, Tarlagau, 161

Talyour, 24

.Taransay, 74, 168, xx.

.Tarbert, 175

.Tarradale, 10, 167

.Tarskavaig, 37

Tarvediiin or Tarvedrum, Cape

of, 6
Teampull ua h-Annaid, 162
Teangue, 113, xxii.
Temple-House, 162
Terra Ethica, 68
Teutons, 70
.Thamnabbaidh, L., 80
.Tbealasbhaidh, L., 80
Thomas, Captain, 13, 73. 80,

86, 95, 96, 98, 103
Thor, 12
Tborfin, 9
Thori, 12
Thorir, 12
Thoretein the Red, 9
.Thuncairidh, Beinu, 355
Thurso Bay, 6
.Tiauavaig, 37
Tigh-au-Teanipuill, 162
Tillie Sow. 267
Tilli.fonr, 174
Tilli.foiirie, 174. 263
Tilli.pourie, 125, 263
.Timsgarry, 96

.liiig\()ld, 82

-liugwall, 114

tiobar, 320

Tir an.drish, 49

Tir.ee, 68. 69, 71, 77, xviii.

Tir-etigean, 354

tobar, 320

Tobar na h-Annaid, 162

Tobar-naBi-buadh, 177

toft, 113

.Tolsta, 111

Tol.vah, 230

Tom Euuau, 161, 236

Tomin, 29

Tomna.hurich, 124, 184, 299.

xxii.
Tong, 113
Tongue, 9, 10
.Torboll, 12, 13
Tore, An, 255
Torfnes, 316
.Torgabost, 170
Tor.gulbin, 47
Torran-dow, 21
.Torrisdale, 12
.Torroboll, 12, 13
.Torvaig, 37
Tor.vean, 124
Tot or Tobhta, 39
.Totaichean Aulaidh, 113
.Totaig, 37
Tot.score, 113
Totta, 113
Touug, 113

.Tralagill, 16, 97, xii., xxi.
Trantle, 12
.Trasary. 173, 291
Treig, L., 47
.Treshinish, 77
Trina.four, 174, 263
.Ti-odday, 36, 76, xiv., xix.
Troll, 112
Trollness, 76
.Trommie, 237, 239. 259
.Trotternish, 34, 35, 76. 166
Truim, 240
.Trumsgarry, 97, 172
Tulli.bardine. Morays of, 19
Tullich, 213
.TuUoch, 49
Tiilloch.gorum, 193
.Tulnen, 239

INDEX.

381

tiiuga, 113

Tresis, 143, 238, 322

Tyn.rich, 274

U.

[Jaimli Mhor, Au, 267
.Uath lochau, Na t', 27]
.Udalan, Glen, 61
.Udlaman, Ben, 6]
.Udrigill, 97
-TTdrinfle, 179
Uig, 118
.Uignish, 38
.Uigshaaer, 108, 171
Uinneag Coire an Eich, etc.

253
.Uisgeval, 171
• Uisgneval. 171
Uist, 67; 76
Uiy, 91
.Ulbster, 12
.Ulhava (see Ulva), 56
.Ulladale, 12
.Ullapool, 12, 95
.Ulliuish, 38
.Ullipsdale, 12, 15
.Ulva, 56, 77, xvi.
.Unabol, 13
.Unapool, 12
.Unes, 16
.Ungshader, 108
Uni, 12
.Unish, 38
TJntliank, 317
Uppat, 17
Urie, 238
.Urigil, 16
-Urquhart, 185, .325
.Urray, 185

V.

.Vaccasary, 173, 291
Vacomagi, 143
vagr, 113, 115
Vail, .38
.Vallay, 75
.Valtos, 81
Vanisary, 173, 291
.Vanisli, 103

Varar, 143
.Varkasaig, 37
Yarragill, 97
.Vassipoll, 95
•Vatersay, 75
.Vatisker, 109, xxi.
Veir, 24
Vernacular Inscriptions of tlie

Ancient Kingdom of Albnn,

27
Verubium, 7
Vestmann-hafn, 105
.Vidigill, 38
vik, 13, 17, 117
.Vikisgill, 38, 97
Vinegar Hill, 181, 258
Virvedrura, Cape, 7
Volcae, 72
Vollr, 17
.Volovig, 37
Volsas, 53
Vomanivs, 47

W.

• Waldbrek, 81

.Walgarth, 81

-wall, 114

Walls, 114

Wardlaw, 157

. Water nish, .34, 35, 166

.Wattin, 29

Welsh, 72

Western Isles. 68, 69

Whitby, 10

Whiterigs, 317

Wiay, 36, 75. xiv.

Wiciv, 117

Widewall. 114

Wilkin, 29

William, King, 19

Windhouse, 81

Wolf of Badeuoch, 34. 197-8-9,

200
Worgan, 26
Wyvij?, 130

Yarrow, 166
York, 134, 300

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By ALEXANDER MACKENZIE, F.S.A., Scot.
With a New Introduction by IAN MACPHERSON, M.P.

dvo. Wrapper, 2s; Postage, 2d.

Songs of the Gael.

By LACHLAN MACBEAN.

Highland Second Sight ^/^

WITH

Prophecies of Coinneach Odhar and the Petty Seer.

By ALEXANDER MACKENZIE.

A New Issue, Demy Svo., 3s 6d.

Highland Superstitions.

By ALEXANDER MACGREGOR.

With an Introductory Chapter upon Superstitions and their Origin
by ISABEL CAMERON.

JBNEAS MACKAY, PUBLISHER, STIRLING.

DA 869 .IVI12

1922

SMC

Macbain, Alt

Bxander ,

1855-1907.

Place names

, Highland

Is

&

islands of

Scot land

/

AZK-5953 (awih)