Place name of the week

Calton Hill ~ Creag nan Gall

Calton Hill in Edinburgh would seem on the face of it to be a Scots name, cauld toun ‘cold farm’. It is in fact spelt as Caldtoun in 1773. That it once had a Gaelic name however is not in doubt, as a Latin charter of 1456 refers to it as rupem vulgariter nuncupatam cragingalt ‘the rock commonly called Cragingalt’. Although the first element is creag ‘crag’ the other elements are obscure. It has been proposed that Calton is from calltainn ‘hazel’ which also appears in Cragingalt if interpreted as Creag a’ Chaltainn.

There are, however, hills in Scotland such as Craigengall in West Lothian and Craiggall in Ayrshire which are all in Gaelic Creag nan Gall ‘the crag of the strangers (meaning Scots)’. These may have been names for lookout points upon which Scots speakers kept watch. lfor more information visit www.ainmean-aite.org