Background Information Scottish Surnames Permanent surnames began to be used in Scotland around the 12th century, but were initially mainly the preserve of the upper echelons of Scottish society. However, it gradually became necessary to distinguish ordinary people one from the other by more than just the given name and the use of Scottish surnames spread. In some Highland areas, though, fixed surnames did not become the norm until the 18th century and in parts of the Northern Isles until the 19th century. The influences on Scottish surnames are many and varied and often more than one has resulted in the surname that we know today. Surnames today are used to indicate family relationships; however this has not always been the case. Surnames in the past have been based on many factors such as occupation, location, the patronymic (the adding of 'son' or 'Mac' to the father's first name), physical characteristics, localised spelling conventions and employer's names. In many cases similar, or in some cases identical, surnames have been derived from entirely different sources and different areas of Scotland. Thus the modern 'consistency' in naming conventions has been based on a possibly 'inconsistent' starting point. It was only in 1855 that the compulsory registration of births deaths and marriages started in Scotland and registrars started to insist that individuals should use the same surname as their father. The first surname survey, covering registrations during the years 1855, 1856 and 1858, was published by the Registrar General in 1860. The examples which follow illustrate the variety of derivations which can underlie surnames in Scotland.

Place names The first people in Scotland to acquire fixed surnames were the nobles and landowners who called themselves, or were called by others, after the land they owned. This was then taken up by others who used the region or district from which their family originated. Examples of this are Johnstone, Leith and Calder. Throughout Scotland, there were many places with the same or similar names, and hence 'families' with the same (or similar) names emerged. This was further taken up in towns, where families sometimes even used street names as surnames. Thus in many cases, both proprietors and tenants used the same names.

Trade names Smith, the most common name in all our (General Register Office for Scotland) surveys, is a good example of a surname derived from a craft or occupation. Other examples are Shepherd, Mason, Fletcher, etc.

To-names or nicknames Sometimes, the prevalence of certain surnames, particularly in small communities led to people being given 'alternative' names. These names often described a characteristic of the person. Examples of this are Little, White and Meikle (big). One of the most common surnames in Scotland, Campbell, is derived from the Gaelic word for crooked-mouthed (caimbeul). This sometimes led to the person taking on this name as their surname. In the north-east fishing communities, some people even added the name of their fishing boat as additional identification. Patronymic names Sometimes a son would take his father's forename and add a suffix (son) or prefix (Mac), to form his surname. Thus for example, John Duncan's son may be Andrew Johnson, whose son might be Robert Anderson. This process resulted in surnames changing every generation. The use of the 'Mac' prefix had even more complexity, in that it was not only first names that were added to, but also in many cases occupations. Even daughters were sometimes given the 'son' suffix. Miscellaneous names and name changes Some people, if they moved from one estate to another, changed their name accordingly. Others possibly did not like their name and hence changed it. In the past, the spoken word was the predominant communication, few people could read or write and spelling was often inconsistent. In the middle ages, knowledge of writing was confined largely to churchmen. They would often interpret names phonetically, and much of their writing was in Latin or Norman-French.

Foreign influences on Scottish surnames External influences have played a crucial role in the shaping of surnames in Scotland. The migration of the Scots from Ireland into the Southwest in the 5th century, nurturing the spread of Gaelic language and culture, the influence of the resident Picts, the establishment of the Britons in Strathclyde, and Anglian immigrants in Lothian and the Borders, all contributed to the melting pot of surnames that we have today. The Norsemen, through their seasonal raiding and subsequent colonisation of the Western and Northern Isles, left behind aspects of their heritage and language that endure not least in the surnames of these areas, e.g. Gunn is originally derived from the Norse and appears in significant numbers in the North of Scotland. Scandinavian influence can be seen in other parts of Scotland too, e.g. Thorburn is an old Norse name found in the Scottish borders and around Edinburgh. Norman influence filtered into Scotland after their invasion of England, and was actively encouraged by Scottish kings. Anglo-Norman nobles acquired grants of land around Scotland and introduced the feudal system of land tenure. For example, Robert the Bruce was a descendant of Robert de Brus who fought with William the Conqueror at the Battle of Hastings. Bissett, Boyle, Colville, Corbett, Gifford, Hay, Kinnear and Fraser are all originally Norman names, which first appeared in Scotland in the 12th century. Menzies and Graham are recognised Anglo-Norman surnames also first seen in Scotland at this time. Continuing into more recent times, the effect of Irish immigration during the 19th century can be seen in the surnames now in use in Scotland, e.g. Daly or Dailly is an Irish name derived from O’Dalaigh and concentrations can be found in areas where Irish immigrants settled, around Glasgow and Dundee. Names like Docherty and Gallacher, now quite common in Scotland, are also relatively recent additions.

Given Names and Bynames A given name is the name ‘given’ to a person by their parents when they are born. A byname is an additional name (used with a person's given name) to distinguish exactly which person with that given name they are. There are two general classes of bynames: personal bynames and fixed, inherited family surnames. A personal byname is a byname that pertains to and describes that specific individual for whom it is used — for example, by describing their appearance or where they come from or which individual was their father, etc. A fixed, inherited family surname is a byname that is passed down from parent to child generation after generation so that the surname a child uses is the same surname used by their father, their father's father, their father's father's father, and so on

Personal Bynames There are various general categories or types of personal bynames, and different Scottish cultures had preferences for using different ones, as indeed did different classes of people. Bynames were variously:  Locative — involving locations or places. There are two types of locative bynames: o Territorial — indicating places held/owned by the person or their family. o Topographic — involving descriptions of places rather than place names.  Relational — indicating relatives of the person. Types of relational bynames include (but are not limited to):  Patronymic — indicating the person's father.  Matronymic — indicating the person's mother.  Official — indicating an office held by the person.  Occupational — indicating the trade or occupation of the person.  Descriptive — nicknames, personal attributes, etc.

Married Women's Bynames In Scotland the practice of a married woman using her husband's surname only began among certain classes in the 17th century, and only became the general norm in the late 19th or early 20th century. Even today, in Scottish law, a married woman is identified primarily by her original name, with any married name treated as an alias. So, for example, nowadays if Elspeth Buchan marries Alexander Elphinstone and thereafter normally uses his surname, in the eyes of the Scottish law courts she is "Elspeth Buchan or Elphinstone". In the Middle Ages, since most people did not have fixed, inherited family surnames anyway, there was no question of a woman changing her personal byname (which described her) to that of her husband (which, after all, described not her but him). Even among those times, cultures, and classes which did use fixed, inherited family surnames in Scotland, women did not normally change their surnames to that of their husbands on marriage. As a consequence, in contrast to the modern English speaking world where we are used to thinking of a family as a group sharing the same surname, in medieval Scotland a family all using the same byname would have been an unusual coincidence. There were many families where each individual family member had a different byname. In the Scottish cultures where patronymic bynames were the norm (such as Gaelic culture), only children of the same gender who shared the same father would share the same byname, while their father and mother would each have a different one. Even in Scottish families from times and naming cultures that used fixed, inherited family surnames, only the father and his children would share the same surname. The mother's surname would be different. (Note that in such naming cultures, even bastard children would normally use their father's surname.)

Adapted from information on the following sites, where more detail can be found. www.gro-scotland.gov.uk/statistics/publications-and-data/occpapers/surnames-in- scotland-over-the-last-140-years.html http://www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk/content/help/index.aspx?560 http://www.medievalscotland.org/scotnames/scotnames101.shtml