96 Notes on the Catrail. By Miss Russell. 



and Gaelic name of the Coed Celydon sliows there were Gael in 

 Peebleshire before the Welsh, who did not understand their 

 language. The name of the Attacotti, who could only be sub- 

 dued by drawing off their men for the Eoman Army, was pro- 

 bably rather Ota-catti, and meant warriors of the woods. 



The name of Manau or Mannan, and variations of it, occur in 

 so many places connected with the Picts, that I have a theory 

 that the Picts, and Otadeni alike, must have called themselves 

 something like man as their original national name. The word 

 man, which pervades so many languages, is not used in the Cel- 

 tic, as far as I know, for either the species or the individual, and 

 it does seem to have been a proper name in Ireland, Scotland, 

 and also in Wales. Captain Thomas' observation, that the Cree 

 or Minnoth in Galloway was formerly called the Manach, has an 

 interest in this way besides identifying the Abravannus of the 

 Eoman geography. The half-dozen names by which the Picts 

 are called in early history all mean much the same as Picti, 

 coloured or spotted. Their Gaelic name in historical times was 

 something like Cruiney, attributed to a mythical ancestor ; but 

 then it meant colour. Even the name of Agned, for their great 

 stronghold of Edinburgh, Mr Skene suggests is derived from 

 " agneaw," an obsolete Celtic word for painted or spoted. The 

 rock is sometimes gay enough with the rock-waMower and other 

 plants, but I do not suppose the name refers to that. That the 

 Picts were stiQ tatooed in Eoman times seems certain, but never- 

 theless the name of Cathbregion, applied to the people about 

 Agned or Edinburgh, suggests another idea about them. It 

 seems to be Cathbreacan, and to be an old Celtic form for spotted 

 warriors ; cateran is really warrior in modern Gaelic. And in 

 one of the Welsh poems, a warrior called first Palach, and then 

 the Cath Palug, is killed by Cai fPordun seems to connect this 

 legend with Dunbar). So that I imagine the English cad and the 

 more honourable Scotch cadie, are degraded Celtic words for a 

 warrior. Now "breacan" in the modern Gaelic not only means 

 spotted, but is the regular word for tartan or a plaid ; and as 

 there does not appear any evidence that tartan was worn in Ire- 

 land by the Scots ; on the contrary, it is very distinctly recorded 

 that at the time of Strongbow's invasion the Irish wore but little 

 woollen, and that chiefly of the black or dark colour of the sheep ; 

 it is not improbable that tartan both in the Highlands and Low- 

 lands is a Pictish inheritance, and that the many-coloured breacan 



