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The name of Ailsa Craig, an island in the Firth of Clyde, contains the Gaelic creag, meaning ‘rock’.

Some places with Gaelic names were given new names by English-speakers – Cill Rìmhinn (‘church of the king’s hill’) is now called St Andrew’s. However, whilst some names survive with their old spellings, many, as with surnames, have half-survived through Anglicization (such as Bowmore for Bogha Mòr, ‘great rock submerged in the sea’) or through direct translation, sometimes of only part of the name. Lochgilphead was Ceann Loch Gilb (where Ceann means ‘head’), for example. Known changes of parish names up to the 1790s are detailed in volume 20 of the First Statistical Account (see p. 32).

This becomes very relevant to genealogists when an ancestor gave a place of origin in a form that is no longer used. If a Gaelic place name is given, and you cannot find it, find out what it means and see if it now exists in an English translation.

Modern Ordnance Survey maps show many places in their Gaelic form, as authentically as possible. The commonest elements of place names are:

 Achadh = field, such as Achiltibuie

 Bad = place

 Baile = township, such as Ballygrant

 Caol = strait, such as Kylesku

 Ceann – head, such as Kinloch

 Cill = church or (monastic) cell, such as Kilbride

 Creag = rock, such as Craiglarach

 Druim = ridge, such as Drumpellier

 Dùn = fort, such as Dunblane

 Inbhir = mouth of river, such as Inverary

 Na = of the

 Rubha = promontory, such as Rhu

 Srath = valley, such as Strathnaver

 Taigh = house, such as Tighnabruaich

Badnaban meant ‘place of the women’; Cnocaneach ‘hill of the horses’ and Badnahachlais ‘place of the armpit’, presumably because it was in a narrow valley that does look rather like one.