56 HISTORY OF THE OUTER HEBRIDES. 



great-grandfather. " Muire " appears to be St. Mourie or 

 Maelrubha (rather than the Virgin Mary) of whose name 

 Rice (Raice) is known to be a variant. Such compound 

 names as Gille-Muire, Gille-Colum, Gille-Anrias, Gille- 

 Bride, and similar appellatives, were of frequent occurrence 

 among the Celtic Christians during the Norse domination 

 of the Hebrides ; and after the conversion of the Norsemen 

 to Christianity, they may have been applied by the Celts to 

 Norwegians of rank in the Isles, who were distinguished 

 for their devotion to the saints under whose patronage 

 they had placed themselves. In heathen times, it was a 

 common practice among the Norsemen to adopt the name 

 of the god Thor as a talisman against danger ; for example, 

 Thor-kall (Torquil i.e. Thor's servant) and Thor-mod 

 (Tormod t.e. brave like Thor), and the same idea may be 

 traced in the personal names derived from those of Chris- 

 tian saints. St. Mourie, who was venerated in the Long 

 Island, as well as on the west coast of Ross and in 

 Sutherland, was likely enough the patron saint of Olave 

 the Black and his predecessors when they sojourned in 

 the North Isles. The church of St. Maelrubha at Eorra- 

 pidh, Ness, which is commonly called St. Olafs, was very 

 probably founded by Olave the Black during his residence 

 in Lewis. The local tradition is that it was built by a 

 " Norse King " named Olaf, and the name of its founder is 

 applied to it even more frequently than that of the saint to 

 whom it was dedicated. 



Whether it is possible to reconcile the apparently con- 

 flicting genealogies or not, the weight of evidence in 

 support of a Scandinavian origin of the clan is over- 

 whelming. Such purely Norse names as Torquil and 

 Tormod,* which persist among the Macleods to the 

 present day ; the eponym " Leod " which is the same as 

 the Norse " Liot," and which appears in the Saxon 

 Chronicle under the Teutonic forms of Leod-wald and 



* It is a curious circumstance that whereas " Torquil '' has no English 

 or Gaelic equivalent, "Tormod" has been Englished as "Norman" i.e. 

 Northman or Norwegian. 



