102 [Proc. B.N.F.C., 



and 17th centuries by English and Scotch settlers would have 

 entirely altered our local names, but the contrary seems to be 

 the fact, especially in the Scottish districts where the transition of 

 a Celtic name from the Irish pronunciation to the Scottish 

 pronunciation was an easy one, and then in nearly all the 

 country there was a sufficient number of the Irish remaining to 

 hand over the local designations to the new comers. We thus 

 have in Antrim and Down a much more correct rendering of 

 the ancient names than what exists in the pale along the 

 eastern coast. What, however, we have retained in nomen- 

 clature, we have in many cases lost in more material evidences 

 of a past history. There is not a district where raths and 

 cromleacs have not been destroyed or souterrains torn up, 

 where old castles and abbeys have not been used as quarries, 

 and ancient grave-yards ploughed over and cropped by the 

 husbandman ; but the ancient names remain, in many in- 

 stances in a corrupted or mangled form but still sufficient to 

 attest a former history, and the kernels ot many wonderful 

 historic truths are lapped up in them. 



To any intelligent person with a taste for history or antiqui- 

 ties there could not be a more fascinating study than this, and 

 it is here the value of a knowledge of the native tongue will be 

 most esteemed. Our local names are so minutely descriptive 

 that there is not a mountain, hill, river, lake or glen without 

 its distinctive appellation that either points out its physical 

 features, its former owner or occupier, or some important event 

 worthy Of record that occurred in its vicinity. It is impossible 

 to over estimate the importance of such a study as this to the 

 topographer. Not only is he enabled to trace to its proper 

 position the site of an ancient church, or the field of a distant 

 encounter or the subject of an early grant, but he has also 

 materials for the correction of etymological fallacies and the 

 establishment of a true standard of interpretation. {Reeves). 

 We have names that are the keys to the most romantic events, 

 a hidden book to the uninitiated, and as in nature a man who is 

 not a student of her mysteries may walk by field and flood and 



