A Scottish naming query

[John Palmer]

Volume 6A of the RCTS bible dealing with LNER engines remarks in slightly critical terms of the naming of K2 No. 4693: 'Loch Shiel was rendered Loch Sheil and this was never corrected.' True it is that the Ordnance Survey always adopted the 'Shiel' spelling, but I have my doubts as to whether the railway spelling of the name was an aberration, since D34 No. 9298 was turned out as Glen Sheil. There seems to have been a deliberate pattern here, and one originally set by the North British Railway. Can anyone account for it?

[Vagabond]

I don't know how many spellings there are of Loch/Glen Shiel or Sheil, but I did know a girl from the Shetlands that spelt her name "Shiela" instead of the usual "Sheila"

She was of an ancient Highland family, and a university lecturer to boot, so I have no doubt the spelling was deliberate and "correct". At any rate, she was insistent on it being spelt her way.
The Gaelic spelling can be Shelagh or Sheelagh, and no doubt there is some flexibility in the spelling of English equivalent.

Perhaps the same applies to the Loch and Glen

[richard]

...and historically Ordnance Survey spellings are not necessarily "correct". As well as the mistakes (e.g. all the Welsh farms named "Beware of the Dog" in Welsh), others are standardised / anglicised spellings. In the last couple of decades there has been a move to fix these - eg. "Rhum" is now spelt "Rum" on OS maps.

[Solario]

According to my dictionary of Scottish place names, Shiel is the correct spelling and probably stems from a Pictish word meaning flowing water.

Shiel(d) also appears in names in the Scottish Borders (e.g. Galashiels) & Northumberland (e.g. North Shields) but in this case has a different root.

That does not answer the original question, but it would not be the only time that a name was mis-spelled; the first K4 was named MacCailein Mor and the spelling was queried and it was renamed The Great Marquess, but a later K4 was then named MacCailin Mo'r which is supposedly correct. Also A1/A3 Knight of Thistle had a missing the which was never rectified.

[John Palmer]

Thanks to all for your thoughts on the subject, which caused the penny to drop that I might find the answer in my gaelic dictionary.

No such luck! You will look in vain for dictionary entries commencing either 'shei-' or 'shie-', due, I think, to the fact that gaelic spellings have indeed been anglicised by inclusion of an 'h', the better to convey an impression of their pronunciation.

There are words beginning 'sei-' and 'si-' (but not 'sie-'), and most of the esses in these would be pronounced as 'sh-', it seems.

The absence of any words commencing 'sie-', which might lead to an anglicised spelling of 'shie-' as in 'Loch Shiel', leads me to wonder whether the derivation of this place name is the gaelic word 'sil' (pronounced 'seel'), meaning rain. Hence Glen or Loch of Rain. I don't find either of the anglicised renditions 'Shiel' or 'Sheil' to be inconsistent with this. Both, it seems, are likely to be wrong.

Perhaps the North British drawing office was inhabited by a gaelic speaker who concluded that dull lowlanders would never properly get their tongues around 'Glen Sil' and set out the Glen's name accordingly, whilst a successor charged with the naming of K2s simply followed suit.

[Solario]

More detail from my dictionary - the name Shiel probably comes from the root form "sal".

The Gaelic name seileach (willow) is from the same source.

Funny how an interest in steam locomotives & railways leads to a discussion on linguistics.

[giner]

Rather sintillating, er, seintillating, er, shintillating, er, scintillating, I think. The missus' name is Sheelagh. Not much Gaelic about her - pure Rotherham.

[STAFFORDA4]

just felt I needed to advise of a recent day-trip to Oban by DMU from Glasgow** where I was corrected by a local for saying "Gay-lick"....apparently that's Irish...the Scots are "Gal-Lick"... (**and what a line that is!...)

[giner]

Funny, that. I had a discussion with a Glaswegian work colleague once about the word 'celtic'. The football team being 'Seltic' and any other usage being pronounced 'Keltic'. How did that come about?

You lucky lad, StaffordA4. That Oban run is on my bucket list.

[richard]

The Boston,MA team is also pronounced with a soft C.

The soft C is an English pronunciation, whilst the hard 'K' is actually of Greek origin (Keltoi).
We could put this down to ignorant followers of sports teams, but it would appear the soft C was originally preferred and it is only in the 20th century that the etymological pronunciation was 'discovered' (rather like how Boadicea is now Boudicca).

[John Palmer]

According to my dictionary of Scottish place names, Shiel is the correct spelling and probably stems from a Pictish word meaning flowing water.

Solario, is that W.H.F.Nicholson's book published by Batsford in 1976? I don't have it, but it is cited by Gordon Barr in his paper on Moidart place names, available from the Moidart Local History Group's website at http://www.moidart.org.uk/placenames/placenames.htm. Who better to authenticate the derivation of their local loch's name? Barr remarks that a bottle with a message thrown into the Loch at Glenfinnan landed on the Isle of Wight six months later, so perhaps it's a loch notable for its strong currents.

I once took the train to Oban from Crianlarich, and although I highly recommend it, this part of the route still takes a place in my affections below the rest of what is now referred to as the West Highland Lines. Anyhow, isn't the C&O 'enemy territory'?

[Solario]

Solario, is that W.H.F.Nicholson's book published by Batsford in 1976?

NO - my book is by George Mackay, published by Lomond Books in 2000.