Blair Collection > Critical dissertations on the origin, antiquities, language, government, manners, and religion, of the antient Caledonians, their posterity the Picts, and the British and Irish Scots

PREFACE. ix
was naturally called by the latter An Dua-
chaeldochy a word compounded of An Dua^
or Tuay North, and, Caeldoch, Caledonian
country. Some of the South-weft High-
landers of the counties of Perth and Argyle
diftinguifhed to this day thofe of Rofs,
Sutherland and Caithnefs, by the name of
An Dua-ghaeU and their country by the
appellation of An Dua-ghaeldoch. This
appears fo obvioufly the etymon of T>eu-ca~
ledonesy that nothing but a total ignorance
of the Galic language could permit antiqua-
ries to have overlooked it.
The etymon oi Ve5iuriones is not fo ob-
vious* We learn from the moft antient do-
meftic records in Scotland, that a ridge of
mountains, called Drum Albin, was the
ancient boundary of the Scottifli territories
towards the Eaft. The author of the Dif-
fertations has clearly demon flrated that
Druni Albin is the chain of mountains
which runs from Lochlomond, near Dum-
barton, to the frith of Taine, in the county
of Rofs. This Dorfum Britannia;, as it is
called by Adam.nan, abbot of iona, runs
through the Weftern end of the diilrids of
Athol and Badenoch. That part of this
ridge of hills which extends between thefe
diftri(fts, for a length of more than twenty
miles.