– Ian son of Dougal, etc. – and at the end of their list of ancestors they might or might not add their surname. Ian Mac Dougal
The Scottish Life Archive has rich resources for family historians. Many of its photographs depict named individuals. This picture, taken in Falkland, Co. Fife, in 1905, was taken by Andrew Venters in front of his grocery shop. The boy sucking his thumb was ‘W. Anderson’.
Mac Ewan might be Ian son of Dougal of Clan MacEwan clan, or simply someone who, as in our example above, was the grandson of a man called Ewan.
Worse, some patronymic surnames have come to be spelled in a certain way. The Clan MacKenzie are descended from a fourteenth-century Kenneth (Choinnich), who in turn descended from Gilleon na h-Airde, ancestor of the O’Beolan earls of Ross. Unfortunately, some registrars, knowing this and hearing someone saying that their father happened to be called Kenneth, would put them down as ‘MacKenzie’, when they weren’t of the Clan MacKenzie at all. A man whose father was a carpenter might be recorded as the literal translation, MacIntyre, even though he was not a member of the great Clan MacIntyre.
There is no easy solution, but there are some routes through the mire. In general, it’s sensible to assume that people using what appears to be a surname did so because it actually was their surname, particularly if that surname was common in the area. You just have to be prepared for the possibility that your research may reveal this not to have been the case.
Married surnames
The modern English custom of women automatically adopting their husband’s name on marriage spread into Scotland by the nineteenth century, and was used (or imposed) almost universally in the census returns, but in many other records you’ll find the older custom of women keeping their maiden name. Thus, Robbie Burns’ wife was known as Jean Armour, not Jean Burns. Even when women adopted their husband’s surname, they often reverted to their maiden names if widowed.
The Ragman Rolls
The Ragman Rolls were two lists of nobles and other ‘subjects superior’ forced to swear allegiance to King Edward I of England during his interference in the Scottish succession in 1291 and 1296. The list, published by the Bannatyne Club in 1834, is at www.rampantscotland.com/ragman/blragman_index.htm. Its great use is identifying early (or earliest) bearers of surnames that were often taken from the land families were then holding. Queen Victoria’s prime minister William Ewart Gladstone (1809-98) did much to try to help poor Scots, through the Napier Commission, for example (see pp. 150-1). He was born in Liverpool, but his ancestry lay in Scotland. Hubert de Gledestan appears in the Ragman Roll. From him, a line comes down to the Gladstones of Arthurshiels, who settled in Biggar as maltmen. A branch of these moved to Leith, then Liverpool, producing the prime minister. Another branch ended with the mother of local genealogist Brian Lambie. She was the last Gladstone to be born in Biggar, although many Biggar people are cousins of the great Gladstone. The early Gladstones are buried on the outside wall of the old Libberton Kirk, which was rebuilt in 1810, partly over the old site, with the effect, as Brian says, ‘some Gladstones may now be partly inside with their feet out in the cold!’
Gaelic place names
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.
Anglicization
As Scots and English replaced Gaelic, Gaelic surnames were Anglicized, leading to many changes in spelling, that often disguised true meanings. ‘Mac Gille’, meaning ‘son of the servant of…’ often became ‘McIl…’ or ‘Macel…’ There was also a tendency (on the part of registrars) to change difficult-to-spell Gaelic surnames into more familiar, existing surnames that sounded similar, which is how some MacEahcrans became Cochranes, and some O’Brolachans are now Brodies. Some surnames were subject to (almost) literal translations: some MacIntyres (‘son of the carpenter’) are now called Wright, for wrights crafted things.
Nicknames
Where a surname was very common, families might add an extra nickname or ‘tee name’. In her excellent Scottish Family Tree Detective (Manchester University Press, 2006), Rosemary Bigwood notes some north-east coast families being known by their surname followed by the name of their fishing boat, whilst in the Hebrides Bill Lawson noted extra surnames such as Kelper (kelp harvester), Clachair (mason) and Saighdear (soldier, usually used of an army pensioner). The MacLeod descendants of John MacLeod from Muck, who settled in Harris in 1779 as a gardener, are known locally as MacLeod na Gairneileirean, or just na Gairneileirean, ‘the Gardeners’.
Other nicknames were from characteristics, such as Dubh (black-haired) and Ruadh (redhaired). Red-haired Angus MacDougal might thus be known as Angus Ruadh Mac Dougal, or Angus Mac Dougal Ruadh. In the Lowlands, when the patronymic system died out nicknames could become people’s only surnames, such as Duff (from Duhb) or Cruikshanks (‘crooked legs’). Many people also became known by where they lived – Cairncross, Cairns, Cladcleuch and so on, some with interesting twists: the Caithness family aren’t from Caithness, but from Kettins in the barony of Angus.
The writer Sir Walter Scott (1771-1832). His surname means literally ‘Scot’ and was borne by a great clan on the English-Scots borders.
Speaking