Thanks Jerry I assure you that did me no disservive at all. Quite the contrary, you did me a service by kick-starting my sometimes sluggish brain. I think we have to differentiate between names chosen by parents, and adjectival names acquired later in life, chosen by scribes in an attempt to give as much information as possible about the person whose history they recorded. I think the scribes wanted not only to give information but they also tried to attain a kind of longevity in the minds of future generations of the histories they recorded. I also suspect that many scholars underestimate the amount of thought that the scribes put into their trade. I think there are many double meanings, maybe even treble meanings. Perhaps a little like naming racehorses. Perhaps a pedigree is a bit like the cryptic crosswords today. And I think we must also believe logically that the scribes had a sense of humour, and sometimes expressed that in the way they described things. So yes, names still mean what they meant in earlier times, but the reason for choosing a particular name may have changed. Parents who choose to name their daughter Siobhan (a truly beautiful name), don't do so because they believe that their daughter is of a super-natural people, but perhaps because she is fair, and they like the name. Let's get back to Somhairle. Now I'm on thin ice here, because my knowledge of history is weak, but I don't think he was named Domnail by his parents. His parents named him Somhairle, and he became known in later life as Lord of the Isles. The scribes recorded this, and to emphasise it, they gave him an adjectival nodannic name as well. In a sense, they sought longevity by repeating the same name in two different languages. But perhaps they were just showing off their skills? do na ille with a tilde over the 'o', Lord of the Isles The scribes were of course scholars themselves and would have been well aware of earlier scholars' views on the meaning of Domnail. However, they would in all likelihood have considered that meaning to be consistent with domnail, Lord of the Isles. A "kind of but not quite" double meaning. A cryptic crossword. Showing off their skills with wordplay. But in the context of the underlying discussion (the new transcript of 1467), I'm beginning to wonder whether Domnail in line 27 wasn't perhaps Somerled himself. If so, it means we have to bin at least 6 names in the pedigree to end up with Nial Gille Dubh Gille Criost Somerled Ferchar Ferchar Malcolm Laumon I may well be accused here of manufacturing a pedigree. Making it fit. But what I'm trying to do is to combine what we know about DNA with a pedigree that looks a touch dodgy in parts. It's offered as a possibility, not claimed as fact. The shorter pedigree is not as ridiculous as it may seem. There is R1a in Lamont, and quite frankly, the Lamont R1a haplotypes would look very much at home amongst the Clan Donald R1a, the group containing the chiefly line. There would still be a lot of explaining to do. How does the M222 in Lamont fit in? At this stage, it looks as if the McPhadrick Lamonts of Coustoun may be the Lamont M222. That still leaves the L21+ Lamont unexplained, the largest haplogroup in Lamont DNA. But there are still other clues that need investigating. Arthur Dall McGorrie may well have been a Lamont ancestor. As I've said before, I don't think Clan Lamont or indeed the chiefs of Lamont all descend from one man. I think they may well descend from three different men. Sandy -----Original Message----- From: dna-r1b1c7-bounces@rootsweb.com [mailto:dna-r1b1c7-bounces@rootsweb.com] On Behalf Of Jerry Kelly Sent: 22 May 2011 17:49 To: dna-r1b1c7@rootsweb.com Subject: Re: [R-M222] heroic Gaelic names Hi Sandy, I did you a disservice by not explaining why there's such unanimity as to the meaning of Domhnall and other early Gaelic names.