Blair Collection > Place names in Strathbogie, with notes historical, antiquarian and descriptive

Place Names in Strathboo-ie.
covered a considerable extent of the land now
cultivated or planted. CriocJt becomes cri and
ere in place names, as in Crimond, old form
Creichmount (a.d. 1458, r.m.s.). We can follow
the changes in the old spelling of Crevechyn
from ere to era, car and cor — the last being the
present form. Beitheach is a derivative of beit/i,
and signifies a ' birchwood.' The diminutive an
is used as in the common Gaelic name Guisachan,
a ' firwood.' So Joyce gives Kiltalaghan, Kiltil-
lachan, and Kilsallaghan, all meaning the ' wood
of the sallows,' and he explains, — ' in these three
names there is a combination of the adjective
termination ac/i, and the diminutive an ' (Irish
Names, II., 358). In this county we have also
the names Tornavethyne, sometimes written
Tornavechin, ' the hill of the birchwoods,' and
Culnabaichan, ' the back of the birchwoods.' In
Morayshire is Beachans, which is given in the
old writings Beachan. At Aviemore, Strathspey,
is Loch Va, and in its vicinity is Kinveachie,
understood in the locality to mean 'the head of
the birchwood,' and which in fact it is. A name
in the parish of Keith-hall, from the forms in
which it occurs in the old documents, shows the
broadening of the vowel sound into ba — Bal-
bithan, Balbethan, and Balbathan. Fifeshire
also gives us Balbeth, Balbethy, and Balbathy.
All these names, I think, are derived from the
.same root as Ba'hill and Corvichen.