676 CASTORID^— CASTOR 



The Beaver has apparently given rise to a fair number of English 

 place-names. Thus we have the name (and arms) of the town of 

 Beverley, Yorkshire ; Bevercoates, Notts ; Beversbrook, Wilts ; Bever- 

 stone, Gloucestershire ; the Barbourne or Beaverbourne, associated 

 with Beaver Island and Beverege, Worcestershire ; and Beverley Brook, 

 Battersea (mentioned as Beferith in an original charter, dated A.D. 693). 



With regard to Scotland the documentary evidence is less satis- 

 factory than that respecting Wales. The earliest record appears to be 

 that described by E. R. Alston as follows : — " In a capitular of export 

 duties of David I., 1124-1153, skins of Beveris are included (^Acts Pari. 

 Scot, i., 303) ; but they are not mentioned in a similar Act of 1424. 

 The late Prof Cosmo Innes, however, pointed out to me that too much 

 trust must not be given to these documents, as the lists of commodities 

 appear in some cases to have been adopted from similar English or 

 foreign enactments." 



Notwithstanding the non-appearance of the Beaver in the Act of 

 1424, Boethius, in 1526, included it in his list of the animals which 

 abounded around Loch Ness, and whose furs were in request for 

 exportation ; and Bellenden, who published a vernacular translation of 

 Boethius in 1536, accepted the "Be vers," although he omitted the stags, 

 roe-deer, and otters of the original list. Little can be based upon this, 

 however, for, as Neill pointed out (op. cii., 179), Bellenden's translation 

 shows carelessness and looseness; moreover, Boethius himself may have 

 quoted the Beaver merely from hearsay. In 1684 Sibbald contented 

 himself with saying : — " Boethius dicit fibrum seu castorem in Scotii 

 reperiri ; an nunc reperiatur, nescio." 



Some further evidence that the Beaver survived in Scotland until 

 the historic period may perhaps be found in the Losleathan tradition. 

 Neill [pp. cit., 181) says that Walker used to mention in his lectures that 

 " the Scots Highlanders still retain, by tradition, a peculiar Gaelic name 

 for the animal." This was confirmed by Dr Stuart of Luss, a well- 

 known Celtic scholar, who in a letter to Neill wrote .■ — " The name is 

 Losleathan, derived from los, the tail, point, or end of a thing, and 

 leathan, broad ; or dobhran losleathan, the broad-tailed otter " Stuart 

 added that he " recollected to have heard " of a tradition among the 

 Highlanders " that the beaver, or broad-tailed otter, once abounded in 

 Lochaber." As Neill says, " It is rather a puzzling circumstance, that, 

 in the poems of Ossian, no mention should occur of the losleathan, an 

 animal whose manners must have struck with admiration a rude 

 people, and whose fur must have been invaluable in the eyes of the 

 Fingalian heroes and their ladies." C. H. Alston, in his review of 

 recent inquiries respecting this tradition, says : — "To the most 

 intelligent and well-informed Gaelic-speaking Highlanders of to-day 

 the words Dobhar-chu or Dobhran-losleathan appear to have but the 



