Place-names/Toponomy

The issues considered in this paper arise from an ongoing study of place-names in and around the Fleet Valley in the south-west Stewartry, brought into focus by the recent excavations on Trusty’s Hill and the timely publication of the very thorough and thoughtprovoking report on the findings (Toolis and Bowles 2017). I shall address in particular some questions concerning what can and cannot reasonably be inferred from the evidence of names regarding the linguistic, and by implication ethnic and political, history of this corner of Galloway during the second half of the first millennium AD, as well as drawing attention to some intriguing possibilities which may add some complexity to the picture.

In this case-study of the parish of Lochmaben (Dumfriesshire), the author follows a twofold approach: first, the early medieval (c. AD 600–1000) settlement pattern within the parish boundaries is identified through the use of place-name evidence. The analysis includes eighteen place-names which are ascribed with a rough chronology based on their etymology and comparative place-name types. In cases of uncertainty, archaeological evidence is added, where possible, to aid the dating process. Seven place-names have been found to point to early medieval settlement activity, and another four are considered possible indicators of human occupation in the study period. As a second part of the study, place-name analysis is used to determine the potential age of the parish boundaries. Based on a detailed study of þveit type place-names, the parish boundaries are roughly dated to the period before AD 1000, and may go back to British or Anglian territorial or estate units. It is argued that the parish boundaries, as they are seen on nineteenth-century maps, only received their ecclesiastical function during the twelfth century, when David I of Scots and his successors implemented a structured parochial system. In the course of the casestudy, a particular focus has been placed on locating the now lost settlement of ‘Ouseby’. The suggestion is made that this settlement became deserted in the fourteenth century, and was re-settled under the name of either Greenhill or Heck, both of which survive to the present day.

This paper reviews the evidence for the important Brittonic/Cumbric place-name element trev as it exists within south-west Scotland, and suggests how it might be interpreted in the light of current thinking on the development of landholdings during the first millennium AD and the central middle ages.

Archaeology is making the ‘Picts of Galloway’ famous: in contrast are historians and philologists, who denounce them as mythical, fictitious, non-existent, and (in short) being for Galloway what Monsters are for Loch Ness. However, since the supposed Picts of Galloway refuse to vanish from journalism and popular culture, what follows gives accounts of them over the years. Readers can then put the evidence of archaeology besides that of history and linguistics, and decide for themselves.

The meeting of Dumfriesshire and Galloway Natural History and Antiquarian Society on 2 December 2011 was a very special occasion. The topic for the evening was ‘The Names of Rheged’ and the speaker, Dr. Andrew Breeze. It was the James Williams Memorial Lecture, held in memory of the Society’s much-revered and long-serving editor. During James Williams’ editorship of the Transactions, Dr. Breeze has published several significant research papers on the place-names of Dumfries and Galloway and he willingly agreed to travel from the University of Navarra in Pamplona, Spain, to deliver the memorial lecture. This article is taken from a transcript of the lecture which he has generously offered for publication.