Scottish Gaelic Personal Naming System - Identifying Names

Identifying Names

Due to the relative paucity of names and surnames in Gaelic, the official name of a person (i.e. first name plus a surname, in Gaelic or English) is rarely used in Gaelic speaking communities as, with a small number of surnames usually predominating in an area, there are usually several people who go by the same combination, for example John MacLeod might apply to several people in the same village. In everyday life, this is usually solved by using the first name of a man, followed by the first name of his father in the genitive case or by using the first name plus an epithet. So a man called James (Seumas) with a father called Neil (Niall) would become Seumas Nèill or Seumas a' Ghlinne ("James of the glen"). In the case of married women, the convention is normally to use bean ("wife") plus the husband's first name and father's first name, in our example resulting in Bean Sheumais Nèill ("the wife of Neil's James"). The (fictitious) family tree below illustrates this custom.

Historically, such an identifying name would take the mac "son" element, e.g. Dòmhnall mac Sheumais mac Nèill ("Donald son of James son of Neill") but in modern usage, this is usually dropped, resulting in Dòmhnall Sheumais Nèill.

Identifying names sometimes use female reference points, for example if a local woman marries an outsider, this may result in the children being identified via the mother. Dòmhnall Chiorstan ("Kirsten's Donald") for instance would indicate a son called Donald with a mother called Kirsten.