APPLERINGIE. 25 



the time of Mary Queen of Scots, and, according to the best 

 authorities we can find, it was introduced during her reign. 

 And, as we know that there was a good deal of coming and 

 going between France and Scotland in Mary's time, it is reason- 

 able to assume that the plant came from France to us. 



Now, the name passed from the Greek through the Latin to 

 the French in this way. Abrotonum became in old French,* 

 abroigne, and then avroigne, and these gave place to the modern 

 French name, aurone. One of the best-known attempts to derive 

 the name Appleringie from this is that found in Dr. Jamieson's 

 Scottish Dictionary, in which the derivation is said to be from 

 the French " apile, strong, and aurone." This looks feasible as 

 far as sound goes, but it will not do for various reasons, chiefly 

 because apile is not a French word at all, nor does there appear 

 to be any similar French word meaning " strong " that it could 

 have been mistaken for. Had he said epile, and taken it to 

 mean " without hairs," he might have been reasoned with, 

 because the plant is less hairy than some of the other species. 

 Glabre, however, is the French word in constant use in this 

 sense, and I am not aware of epile being ever so used regarding 

 plants. This word would rather signify that the hairs had been 

 taken off. But another fatal objection is that a Frenchman 

 would not say epile aurone, but aurone epile, which entirely 

 defeats Dr. Jamieson's theory, whether we take epile, apile, or 

 any such word to represent the " apple " in Appleringie. 



Any attempts which I have ever seen to trace the derivation 

 of our Scotch name through the French have entirely failed, or 

 been insufficient, mainly on account of the omission of two 

 important links. These are found in the northern provincial 

 French and the Aberdeenshire names, both of which are still in 

 use. In drifting into corruptions, there is often a tendency to 

 alight upon some form of word that means, or seems to mean, 

 something. Of this we have examples in gillyflower and jelly- 

 flower, from giro/lee, and Jerusalem, in the name Jerusalem 

 artichoke, from girosole, a name of the sunflower, while in 

 neither case is there any connection with jelly or Jerusalem. 

 In the same way, in France the word aurone, after perhaps 

 passing through various shapes and sounds, settled down into the 

 * Amour's " Scottish Alliterative Poems," pp. 374-375. 



