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

Xajnes of Hills and Rivers.
elude Mar, Buchan, and Moray, and it is possible
that part of the north-eastern counties fell to Ce,
one of the sons, whose descendants may have
settled in the Garioch. Whatever of truth there
may be in this conjecture, it appears that par-
ticular places and districts occasionally derived
names from individuals or families of influence,
and it is possible that some one of the name of
Ce, whoever the person may have been, was
commemorated in the hill-name Bennachie.
The Tap o' Noth is the most remarkable hill
in Strathbogie, partly because it is the highest
(185 1 ft.), and differs in its conical form from the
surrounding hills ; but chiefly because it is
crowned by the most perfect vitrified fort now
remaining in the country.
The name has given rise to much guessing
as to its origin and meaning, and perhaps we
shall never reach absolute certainty about it. It
has been conjectured that Noth is a personal
name, and only another form of Nuath, who is
represented in Ossian's poems as a Pictish chief
living near the dark rolling stream of the Duv-
rana. We have no evidence, however, that Nuath
was other than a purely imaginary personage, or
that Ossian knew anything of the Deveron, or
indeed that the poems in which these names
occur are older than MacPherson's time, as we
have them only in English. However this ma}-
be, I am not inclined to attach any value to a