Over the last few weeks, I’ve been delving into the book of place names collected by the very first Ordnance Survey of the 1850s to find out for myself what’s actually there and to work out how much import can be given to the entry that states that the Chessmen were found in Mealista, in the ruins of Taigh nan Cailleachan Dubha. The Place Names book is easily accessible, on microfiche in the Stornoway Library.

I have to say that it’s an example of meticulous paperwork, a colossal amount of painstaking effort must have gone into its compilation but to the 21st century eye, it looks fussy and overdone. It’s handwritten and ruled out in column after column: place name; its correct spelling; any other known variation of the spelling; the location; the English “significance” i.e. translation of the name; the names of the person or persons who were the authorities for the information and of the Ordnance Survey Clerks who wrote it all down and, finally, a column for comments.

We used to be advised as students not to use it as a reliable source as the information was only as good as the knowledge of the informant and also, because its accuracy could have been compromised in translation. There’s a long time since I last looked at it and this time round, I found its main impact, apart from its painstaking “clerkery,” was the sheer volume of place names in the parish of Uig. Going through the pages nearer home, I felt as if I was meeting old friends as place names jumped out at me from the screen, names I used to hear in daily conversation, which are now rarely, if ever, aired.

I was also intrigued by the names of the local informants of the 1850s. I would really like to go back to it and list them all down to see how many can be identified with the help of the census returns. I found my great, great grandfather, Murdo Macleod, Gisla, (Murchadh Ghioslaigh) and his neighbour and brother-in-law, John Macdonald, (Iain Laghach) reeling off names. That pinpoints the collecting of place names to before 1853 and the Gisla clearance, after which all the Laghach family but two ended up in Quebec.

From memory, I was sure that the Chessmen were noted in the pages relating to the Ardroil area although the name Ardroil wasn’t in use in its present form as early as the 1850s. The farm was known initially by variations of Eadar Dha Fhadhail, such as Ederol. The entry about Chessmen is there, under the place name “Bealach Ban.”  It reads, “A glen on the south side of Camus Uig, it is composed of sand. A few years back a number of carved Ivory images of horses, sheep and other animals were found in this glen. Signifies white glen or pass.”

The authorities for the information are named as John Mackay, Donald Murray and, from the Ordnance Survey, John Morrison. There was nobody indigenous left in Ardroil to impart the place names, they had all been forcibly removed over ten years before the survey and are to be found, household by household, in census returns in Swainbost in Ness, including the widow and family of Malcolm Macleod, the finder of the Chessmen. I haven’t been able to identify Donald Murray, not a surname ever found much in Uig, although there was a Murray family in Crowlista in 1851, Kenneth, not Donald, Murray from Borve, married to Catherine Macdonald, nighean Mhurchaidh Bhain. The most likely explanation is that Donald Murray may have been a Gaelic teacher, possibly in Crowlista, which had a school long before the 1850s. I can make more of the John Mackay: he could have been Iain Macaoidh, ancestor of the Crowlista Mackays, who would have been in his late seventies at that time. But again, we can’t be sure as the name John Mackay comes up in the Survey, in other villages, as the Ordnance Survey clerk.

Now to Mealista, which I had never looked at before and which I found, via the parish of Lochs, which is interposed with upper Uig in the Microfiche reels, and after skimming through Islivig and Breanish, both with interesting information, given by the easily recognized names of long term residents, John Macaulay, Islivig, Donald Macleod, Breanish and Malcolm Mackay, schoolmaster in Breanish. The two entries I found among the Mealista names with additional information other than the actual place name were very relevant to what I was looking for, Teampull Mhealastadh and Tigh nan Cailleachan Dubha, information for both given by Christopher Macrae and Alan Ross, with OS clerk, John Mackay this time.

The Teampull Mhealastadh entry reads: “On the seashore in Mealastadh village. This is an old graveyard in the village of Mealasta, at present there are only a few interred in it, as the inhabitants have left this village. There has never been a church or any kind of meeting house in or about this place as far as can be ascertained.” This is nothing short of shoddy information with two place names mixed up. Cladh Mhealastadh is the old graveyard on the sea shore, the teampull, chapel, is quite separate and at a distance from it, and, as for ascertaining whether there ever was a church about the place, there is no room for doubt on that score with the Mealista chapel, down to its very length and breadth, recorded in the Report of Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland corroborating the oral tradition of the parish.

Translation has weakened the strength of the original Gaelic, “dh’fhalbh na daoine as a’ bhaile,” to the bland English, “the inhabitants have left this village.” Leave it they had, over ten years before, under duress, so that when the Ordnance Survey came round, there were only strangers there. Christopher Macrae came from Kintail, and he had lived in Harris as recently as 1846, we know from census information that he had come to Mealista in 1848 , to the farm which was then a part of the large sheep farm of Hushinish. As for Alan Ross, his is a very well-known name in Lewis history. He was from Lochs, a Gaelic teacher, catechist and later Inspector of Poor for the parish of Lochs, with his home in Keose. He’s not listed as working with the Survey, nor was he the teacher in Breanish, so we can only speculate on what he was doing in Mealista at the time. We’ll never know but we can be sure that neither informant had much local knowledge, other than hearsay. Mealista “exiles” living down the road in Breanish would surely have known more but none of them were informants and then again, we have to remember that the OS were collecting place names, not recording history, although it would have been more useful to us now if some of the effort and space taken up by their elaborate columns had been used to do so.

The entry for Tigh nan Cailleachan Dubha from the same source reads: “A nunnery which was occupied by the order of the Black Nuns, and concerning which no information can be obtained, beyond a number of chessmen having been found in its ruins about 70 years ago which were in good preservation. They were sold to a society of antiquaries in Edinburgh and brought a good price. Nothing remains of it but the site.” Don’t both Mealista entries, with their insistence on no further information, have a casual “don’t bother us” air about them? The Bealach Ban entry, although inaccurate in the detail, clearly ties the find spot of the Chessmen to the obscure hollow in Ardroil machair and also, what dyed in the wool Uigeach, either in 1850 or nowadays, would leave sheep out of things?

The evidence for Mealista, in this Mealista v. Ardroil case, is the Place Name book entries and Captain Ryrie’s remark, both from strangers to Uig, who can have had only brief contact here. On the other hand, there’s contemporary evidence for the Bealach Ban: the minister in the vicinity at the actual time of the find, writing his report for the Statistical Account within four years; Donald Morrison, An Cubair Ban, from the Loch Resort area and living in Stornoway, who died in the 1840s and who produced the first written account of the oral tradition of Uig; the known facts concerning Malcolm Macleod, the finder; plus the rich oral Gaelic tradition handed down to us over generations. Doesn’t the case for Mealista close itself with that essentially Scottish verdict: Not Proven.

As for the Place Name book, my verdict on that is the same finishing as it was at the start: it’s not a reliable source for local history, but is a valuable treasury of Gaelic place names. What looking through it has done, is to leave me with a re-awakened sense of the devastating impact clearance had on Uig. These two fertile villages, with their evidence of early civilisation, and many more, were emptied of their people and left with no one but strangers to speak for them.

©Anna Mackinnon

The Island of Lewis offers a remarkably wide field of investigation to ethnologists in view of the marked diversity of types. Dr Beddoe, whose authority will be acknowledged, suggested that one of these types, “a short, thick-set, snub-nosed, dark-haired and even dark-eyed race” was probably aboriginal and probably Finnish. Have we here the descendents of the so-called Pigmies? The Laplanders or true Finns have certainly some physical affinities with the short and dark type of Lewisman (a type which is but sparsely represented on the island); while the gammar or huts of the Lapps, as described by travellers, bear a resemblance to the Luchruban [as the island is also known] structure, as it must have been originally designed. Customs lingered in Lewis as recently as the 18th century, or even the 19th century, which have elsewhere been regarded as peculiar to Lapland. And Professor Sven Nilssen (The Primitive Inhabitants of Scandinavia) shows convincingly I think that the pigmies of tradition and dwarfs of the Sagas belonged to the same race as the Laplanders of the present day. Moreover the well-authenticated traditions in Shetland about Finn-men apparently offer corroboration of the view that the “little men” of this island were of Finnish or Lapponic origin. The Firbolg, the short dark men of Irish tradition who were driven from Ireland to the Hebrides by the Tuatha de Danaan, represent, not improbably, the same race.¹ Dun Fhirbolg in St Kilda may be of some ethnological value.

It is a noteworthy fact that while Highland folklore is full of the Famhairean (the Irish Fomorians) or giants, there is an absence of complimentary Luchrubain or dwarfs. How is this to be accounted for? May it not be that they are represented by our old friends the fairies, who, by the way are sometimes called the Daoine Beaga, the ancient name of the Pigmies Isle?  It is impossible to elaborate this suggestion here, but I may mention one fact concerming the Lewis fairies. One of their names is Muinntir Fhionnlagh, translated as the Finlay people, a title which as applied to fairies baffles Lewis folklorists. I venture to suggest that this name means “the little Finn people” and that it unites the Finnish aborigines with the “good little people” of fairy lore who dwell in the bowels of green hills, like Luchruban, and practice uncanny arts like the Lapland wizards.

Note: 1. It may be observed that in Foley’s Dictionary one of the Irish names for pigmie is Leappacán. [hence Luchrubàn and Leprechaun]

A more recent examination of Eilean nan Luchrubain (with pictures) was carried out by the STAC project, 2003-5.

Place names in Enaclete and the surrounding area, mapped by Finlay and Kenny Maciver.  They did Geshader too and you may like to compare the Ordnance Survey map.

Key placenames and landmarks around the township of Geshader, the inlet to Little Loch Roag (the Sruth, next to #18), and the deserted settlement at Strome, as prepared by Finlay and Kenneth Maciver.  There are many more placenames, which we’ll publish once we’ve worked out how best to present them; meanwhile there’s Enaclete too.  Compare to the Ordnance Survey map.

1. Floday
2. Beinn a’Ghlinne Ruaidh
3. Creagan Gorm
4. Rainacleit
5. Druim Ban Gil an Aon Duine
6. Ollashal
7. Sheaval
8. Orcleit an Iar
9. Orcleit an Ear
10. Cnoc Breac
11. Druim Leathann
12. Tom Domhnuill
13. Sgrithir
14. Ganstotl
15. Stromacleit
16. Aird Orasay
17. Airigh Aird
18. Druim Mor
19. Loch Allagro
20. Carn a Chuilinn
21. Loch an t-Sroim
22. Ben Breaclete
23. Airigh Mhor
24. Aird Chaol
25. Eilean Riseanais
26. Glas Eilean
27. Cliatasay
28. Vuia Beag
29. Gousam
30. Loch Dubh
31. Loch Mor na Muilne
32. Loch Ruadh
33. Loch Croistean
34. Loch Geshader

We look upon the Vikings as seafaring rovers who spent their lives raiding and plundering. However, it is evident from place names that some Vikings settled in Uig where they cultivated the land and tended their sheep and cattle. The following Uig placenames are of interest in this respect.

Ardfenish (ON prob Fe-nes) – sheep promontory
Bastair (bolstadhar) – where cows and people live
Cro (kro) – a small sheep pen
Dirass Beinn (dyr-ass) – deer ridge
Cruim a Mhiasaoid (mjo-seta) – a ridge where cattle are herded between two lochs
Gearraidh/Timsgarry (gerdi) – a walled or fenced piece of land or garth. In Lewis this was often pasture land between the shoreland and the moorland.
Griosamul (grissa-muli) – the hill brow of the ewes
Fiavig (fjar-vik) – sheep bay
Fivikgiaras (fjar-vik-gja) – the cattle grazing ridge of the bay with the rift
Kirraval (kyr-fjall) – a hill where cows graze in summer
Laimrig na siorraid (sjovar-rett) – sheep landing place of the sea bay fank
Leumadair (lembd-aer) – where ewes were put ashore
Lochan an Lumadal (lombadr) – ewes with lambs
Loch Beinnsvat (bein-vatn) – bones loch
Loch Bhuinavat (brynna) – watering cattle loch
Loch Cro-criosdaig (kro-griss-hag) – a crook of land for pig grazing
Loch na Fairf (fiovi) – possessions, such as sheep or cattle
Loch Lomhainn (lodhinn) – ewes with unfleeced lambs
Mol Chuir (kviar) – beach of the fank
Mol Peitag (beit-hag) – beach of the grazing or heather ridge
Morsgail (mos-sgali) – moor shieling; Morsgail was used for summer grazing from Viking times.
Naidaval (nauta-fjall) – cattle hill
Phutharol (buthar-hol) – both at the hill of the summer grazing
Rudha Bhugaire (byggar) – headland of the farmer’s house
Rudha Brataig (brattr-hag) – the point of steep grazing
Siacanis (sja-kaf-nes) – point where the cattle were led to the sea to swim to an island
Traigh Foishader (fjori-setr) – shieling above the ebbing sands
-bost, -shader and -sta (bolstad, setra, sta) – all signify a dwelling, farm or steading