Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Simon Taylor R Source Sheet 2015
Simon Taylor R Source Sheet 2015
SHEET
Some reference works and on-line resources, compiled by Simon Taylor
University of Glasgow
[email protected]
READING MATERIAL
Note that a full bibliography, including a section on regional studies, arranged by pre-1975
county, can be
found on the
Scottish Place-Name
Society website:
http://www.spns.org.uk/bibliography09.html
MAIN WORKS
Nicolaisen, W. F. H., 1976, Scottish Place-Names (London; revised edition 1979: new revised
edition, Edinburgh (John Donald) 2001). Paperback.: This is the only full scholarly study of
Scottish place-names in book form. Although in need of revision in various ways, it remains
the best general introduction to the subject.
Watson, William J., 1926, The History of the Celtic Place-Names of Scotland (Edinburgh and
London): for individual names, the best book on the Celtic (British, Pictish and Gaelic) placenames. Although not easy to use in parts, it always repays the effort. Latest edition Birlinn
2004 with introduction, some addenda and corrigenda, and full Watson bibliography, by
Simon Taylor; reprinted Edinburgh (Birlinn) 2011 with Taylors introduction, expanded
addenda & corrigenda and expanded Watson bibliography. Paperback. Some chapters are
available online on the SPNS web-site. It is often abbreviated simply as CPNS.
Good short general introductions are the sections on Scottish place-names in:
Atlas of Scottish History to 1707, ed. Peter McNeill and Hector MacQueen (1996), pp. 50-1,
5870 [though some distribution maps need redoing]. The Atlas is now available online on:
http://www.scotlandsplaces.gov.uk/digital-volumes/published-gazetteers-and-atlases/atlasscottish-history-1707 [with different pagination, namely pp. 72-3 and 8092)]
Celtic Culture: An Encyclopedia, ed. John T. Koch 5 vols (Santa Barbara, USA 2006) (S.
Taylor), pp. 159294.
The Companion to Gaelic Scotland, ed. D.S. Thomson (rev. ed. Glasgow 1994), pp. 22636
(various authors, including K.H. Jackson and W.F.H. Nicolaisen).
The Edinburgh Companion to the Gaelic Language, ed. Moray Watson and Michelle
MacLeod (Edinburgh University Press 2010), pp. 4662 (R. A. V. Cox).
The Edinburgh Companion to Scots, ed. John Corbett et al. (Edinburgh University Press
2003), pp. 1730 (M. Scott).
Oxford Companion to Scottish History, gen. ed. Michael Lynch (Oxford 2001), pp. 47984
(S. Taylor).
Note also Introduction to Uses of Place-Names ed. S. Taylor (Edinburgh 1998): pp. 1-11.
A methodology for the collection and analysis of Scottish place-names has been developed
over the past ten years, and has been adopted by the recently established Survey of Scottish
Place-Names, under the auspices of the Scottish Place-Name Society. It has been deployed in
the 5-volume series The Place-Names of Fife by S. Taylor with G. Mrkus (Donington 200612), as well as in The Place-Names of Bute by G. Mrkus (Donington 2012), and is most fully
described in the Introductions to these volumes.
PLACE-NAME ELEMENTS:
There are OS web-booklets for three of the languages which have made an important
contribution to the place-names of Scotland: Gaelic, Scandinavian (Norse) and Scots. Each
consists of an Introduction, which includes some basic grammar as it relates to place-name
formation, and a Glossary of common place-name elements.
For Gaelic Place-Names (Introduction by Simon Taylor):
The pdf of the 41-page booklet, with Introduction, can be downloaded on:
http://www.ordnancesurvey.co.uk/oswebsite/docs/ebooks/guide-to-gaelic-origins-of-placenames.pdf
For Scandinavian (Norse) Place-Names (Introduction by Anke-Beate Stahl):
The pdf of the 12-page booklet, with Introduction, can be downloaded on:
http://www.ordnancesurvey.co.uk/oswebsite/docs/ebooks/guide-to-scandinavian-origins-ofplace-names.pdf
For Scots Place-Names (Introduction by Simon Taylor):
The pdf of the 22-page booklet, with Introduction, can be downloaded on:
http://www.ordnancesurvey.co.uk/oswebsite/docs/ebooks/guide-to-scots-origins-of-placenames.pdf
There is a fourth such site concerning Welsh Place-Names; see:
http://www.ordnancesurvey.co.uk/oswebsite/support/knowledgebase/place-nameorigins/welsh/index.html
Very helpful to use with Watsons History of the Celtic Place-Names of Scotland (see
READING MATERIAL, above) is the Elements Index (compiled by Eric Basden and Alan
James, with contributions by Angus Watson) to be found on the SPNS web-site:
http://www.spns.org.uk/WatsIndex2.html
For a full discussion of all words found in Fife place-names (Pictish, Gaelic, Scots, Norse,
French), see the Elements Glossary in The Place-Names of Fife 5 (Discussion, Glossaries
and Edited Texts, with Addenda and Corrigenda of Volumes 14), Simon Taylor with
Gilbert Mrkus (Shaun Tyas: Donington 2012), pp. 275-535.This is a useful resource
for many other parts of Scotland which share with Fife a similar linguistic history.
Note also short, well-informed articles by Alison Grant on individual place-name elements
both Gaelic and Scots in each issue of the free e-zine (electronic magazine!) The Bottle Imp
on: http://www.arts.gla.ac.uk/ScotLit/ASLS/SWE/TBI/index.html
full details, as well as pdfs of the accompanying booklets and hand-outs, see under Resources
on:
http://onomastics.co.uk/
This a website set up and managed by post-graduates at the University of Glasgow, and
contains other features immediately relevant to the study of both place- and personal names
(onomastics = the study of names).
SCOTLANDSPLACES: http://www.scotlandsplaces.gov.uk/
This describes itself as: a website that lets users search across different national databases
using geographic location. The user is able to enter a place name or a coordinate to search
across these collections or they can use the maps to both refine and define their search. The
results pages provide the data relevant to the search conducted, from each of the project
partners. These partners currently include: The Royal Commission on the Ancient and
Historical Monuments of Scotland (RCAHMS); The National Records of Scotland (NRS)
[formerly The National Archives of Scotland (NAS)] and The National Library of Scotland
(NLS).
It also contains details of all the county- and parish-boundary changes made in 1891.
It also has a subscription site which allows access to the digital images of all the
Ordnance Survey Name Books, with their descriptions and other notes on all 250,000 or so
place-names which appear on the OS 6 inch 1st edition maps. See under MAPS, Ordnance
Survey, above, for full details.
SCOTS
See the website of Scots Words and Place-names (SWAP)
www.gla.ac.uk/swap
This contains a Glossary of Scots Place-name Elements, as well as the facility for pupils and
teachers to send in examples of place-names which contain these words. (Co-ordinated by Dr
Alison Grant, Scottish Language Dictionaries and Scottish Place-Name Society).
An excellent Scots resource is the online Dictionary of the Scots Language/Dictionar o the
Scots Leid, an electronic edition amalgamating two earlier works, the Dictionary of the Older
Scottish Tongue (Scots up to c.1700) and the Scottish National Dictionary (Scots from
c.1700): http://www.dsl.ac.uk
For Scots in Scottish place-names, see also PLACE-NAME ELEMENTS, above.
SCOTTISH PLACE-NAME SOCIETY: http://www.spns.org.uk
This has a wide range of information on all aspects of Scottish place-names, alongside details
of conferences and other events. This is an important resource, with digital versions of several
PhDs on place-names, as well as extracts from the regularly up-dated bibliography of Scottish
place-name studies, including regional studies.
Warning: Most popular guides and dictionaries are written on the basis of unsound
methodology and information, and are best avoided. This includes almost any small,
one volume work covering the whole of Scotland. Two exceptions to this are: Alison
Grants The Pocket Guide to Scottish Place-Names (2010); and Maggie Scotts
Scottish Place Names (2008). A problematic example is J. B. Johnston, Place-Names
of Scotland (1934). It is often seriously off the mark when dealing with etymologies,
but it does contain early forms of names (though often not sourced). Furthermore
there are books and pamphlets about the place-names of most areas of Scotland.
While some are excellent, others are untrustworthy and misleading, especially the
older ones.
version March 2015