Whilst I have stopped blogging for a bit, due to my teacher training course at Strathclyde, I haven't forgotten about you! Here's a free article for you, one that I wrote for British Connections, the journal of the International Society for British Genealogy and Family History (https://isbgfh.com) in 2023 - enjoy!
Scottish Maps (Chris Paton)
When looking at key documents for Scottish history research, such as the vital records or the censuses, we can connect families to specific locations within the country. Our primary focus is often the stories of our ancestors, but the place names and addresses at which they resided have tales of their own, equally worthy of investigation. Getting to grips with the environments within which they lived can not only shed further context on the family narrative, but on the history of Scotland itself.
Every placename in Scotland has an origin, derived from lived experience, geological features and ancient languages such as Gaelic, Scots, and even Pictish. For example, the name of Pittenweem in Fife is believed to derive from the Pictish word 'pett' meaning 'a place', and Gaelic 'na h-Uaimh', meaning 'the caves', thus signifying the 'place of the caves', whilst the city of 'Perth' is belived to derive from a Pictish word for a 'wood' or 'grove'. The documents that can really help us to gain a fascinating insight into how the landscape has changed over the years are maps, particularly when considered in a chronological order. Maps can identify when and where certain settlements appeared, offering clues as to why they were created, and also how others disappeared, only to be commemorated many years later through street names and folk memory.
Perhaps the single most useful mapping resource available for research is the Maps Reading Room of the National Library of Scotland (www.nls.uk/collections/maps), based at Causewayside Building, 33 Salisbury Place, Edinburgh, which can be visited via a pre-booked appointment from Tuesdays to Thursdays each week. The library has over two million printed items, including four thousand manuscript maps and fifteen thousand worldwide atlases. In addition, it has an extensive collection of material from the Ordnance Survey, formally established from 1791, but going back to the aftermath of second Jacobite rebellion in Scotland, when The Duke of Cumberland’s Map was created by William Roy to help the British Army to take control of the Highlands. Even as this exercise was underway, the Advocates Library, the forerunner to the modern NLS, was already building up the collection that we can now so effectively use today for our research. Details on how to visit the NLS Maps Reading Room are available at https://www.nls.uk/using-the-library/reading-rooms/maps/.
The good news for those unable to get to Edinburgh, is that the NLS mapping team also hosts one of the single most impressive websites available for Scottish ancestral research. Located at https://maps.nls.uk/, the 'Map Images' platform hosts over a quarter of a million free to access digitised documents from the library's holdings, with records available to consult including the following:
Maps of Scotland the whole of Scotland, 1560-1928
A series of maps from 1560-1928 showing the whole island, from the Scotia: Regno di Scotia map (approx 1558-66) to the Ordnance Survey one inch maps of Scotland from 1921-28. Also available is a separate collection of thematically based maps, showing administrative boundaries, clan territories, geology, railways and roads.
County Maps maps of Scotland, 1580-1928
Maps for each county from 1580-1928 presented in chronological order, including Pont’s Maps of Scotland (1580s-1590s), the Blaeu Atlas of Scotland (1654), Herman Moll’s County Maps of Scotland (1745), John Thomson’s Atlas of Scotland (1832) and J. G. Bartholomew’s Survey Atlas of Scotland (1912).
Town Plans and Views plans/views, 1580-1919
Various maps and surveys of Scottish towns from 1580-1919, as well as maps and reports drawn up for 75 towns as prior to the introduction of the Scottish Reform Act of 1832, and large scale Ordnance Survey maps of 62 towns from 1847-1895.
Series maps of Scotland, 1795-1961
Ordnance Survey maps from 1843-1991, as well as John Bartholomew and Son’s half inch to the mile maps for Scotland (1926-35), Admiralty Charts (1795-1904), Charles Goad's Fire Insurance Maps (1880s-1940s), and the post-Second World War Ordnance Survey Air Photo Mosaics of Scotland (1944-1950) collection.
Ordnance Survey maps
Scottish maps at various scales published by the Ordnance Survey and the War Office from the 1840s-1960s. The maps are geo-referenced, with geographic co-ordinates attached to key points on each, which means that once you identify an area of interest on one map, you can easily locate it across time on others, with all of them 'pegged' at the same co-ordinates.
Bartholomew maps
Various Scottish maps as produced by Bartholomew & Co., J.G. Bartholomew, and John Bartholomew & Son Ltd, from the late 19th century to 1940.
Air photo mosaics
Aerial photographs of Scotland taken by the Ordnance Survey between 1944-1950, which can be overlaid by Google Maps and Virtual Earth satellite and map layers for modern comparisons.
Coastal charts Coasts of Scotland on marine charts, 1580-1850
Various marine charts showing the Scottish coast, from Nicolas de Nicolay’s 1580 chart 'Vraye & exacte description hydrographique des costes maritimes d’ Ecosse', to John Knox’s 'Map of the Basin of the Tay' from 1850. A separate page lists a series of Admiralty Charts drawn up from 1795-1963.
Bathymetrical Survey
This contains a comprehensive examination of 562 inland Scottish lochs, including some 60,000 depths soundings on 223 coloured maps.
Military maps of Scotland (18th century)
This particular section includes a detailed series of maps drawn up by the Board of Ordnance during the Jacobite periods of the 18th century, as well as William Roy’s Military Survey of Scotland (1747-1755), the immediate forerunner to the Ordnance Survey. The section also hosts and Roy’s equally detailed map from 1793, Military Antiquities of the Romans in North Britain.
Estate Maps maps of Scotland, 1772-1878
This small section contains 19th century maps for various estates in Edinburgh, Dumfriesshire, Kirkcudbrightshire, Lanarkshire, Sutherland and Wigtownshire. Edinburgh and a couple in Sutherland from the 18th century, for Golspie and Loth (1772) and Assynt (1774).
There are several other tools permitting access to all of these collections from the home page. The 'MapFinder with Marker Pin' option allows users to place a marker pin on a point of interest, and to then call up other maps that will show the exact same location at different points of time. The 'MapFinder with Outlines' tool allows users to call up historic maps and to see where the boundaries of those printed maps lie in relation to a modern map of Britain. Through the 'Explore Georeferenced Maps' tool a historic map image appears laid against a satellite image of the country as a backdrop; a 'change the transparency of overlay slider' permits users to slide between a historic map image and the modern image embedded beneath it. The 'Side by Side Viewer' tool further permits a comparison of historic map images beside each other.
Other tools on the home page allow users to browse series by the map maker, to view the astonishing maps of the Roy Military Survey from 1747-1755, compiled immediately after the Battle of Culloden in 1746. One of my personal favorite tools on this page is the 'Boundaries viewer', a simple tool which allows you to identify the ancient boundaries of Scotland's parishes, counties and unitary authorities (which replaced counties in 1975), projected against a selected Ordnance Survey map.
It will take hours of merciless plundering to truly appreciate the sheer range of content available, but if I had to select a personal favorite collection, it would probably be the Charles Goad Fire Insurance Maps from the 1880s-1940s for Campbeltown, Dundee, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Greenock, Leith, and Paisley, created to assess the fire risk of urban buildings. The maps are accessible at https://maps.nls.uk/towns/goad/.
The National Library is, of course, not the only platform online with useful maps available for research. The Google Maps platform at https://www.google.co.uk/maps can be especially useful in not only providing a satellite overview image, but also its Street View service, showing ground level panoramic photographs, which can be of use if you wish to see what a surviving building looks like today, particularly if a visit is not possible in person. (On the same day that I am writing this, Ayrshire Archives has just posted an image on Twitter of an unidentified historic street photograph from its collection; using an equivalent modern Street View perspective I was able to prove to them categorically that it depicted Bank Street in Irvine).
Elsewhere, the National Records of Scotland holds over 150,000 maps and plans as part of its Register House Plans (RHP) collection, comprised primarily of government based materials, but also collections from churches, private organisations, landed estates and families.Many of the items have been digitised and can be consulted at the facility’s General Register House premises on Prince’s Street, with some also free to view on ScotlandsPeople via its Maps and Plans section at https://www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk/help-and-support/guides/maps-and-plans. For items that could not be digitised, or which have copyright restrictions, an appointment can be made to visit the organisation’s Thomas Thomson House facility to consult them; a guide is available at https://nrscotland.gov.uk/learning-and-events/research-guides/maps-and-plans/.
Finally, the National Records of Scotland also has a collection of Ordnance Survey Name Books, catalogued under RH4/23, which were recorded during the creation of the 6 inch and 25 inch scale maps between 1845 and 1878, although not all of the books have survived. Several entries contain additional information on the properties and inhabitants which may be of interest for research. The books have been digitised and can be freely consulted on the ScotlandsPlaces website at www.scotlandsplaces.gov.uk.
Chris
Order Researching Ancestral Crisis in Ireland in the UK at https://bit.ly/4jJWSEh. Also available -Tracing Your Belfast Ancestors, Tracing Your Irish Ancestors Through Land Records, Sharing Your Family History Online, Tracing Your Scottish Family History on the Internet, Tracing Your Irish Family History on the Internet (2nd ed), and Tracing Your Scottish Ancestry Through Church and State Records - to purchase, please visit https://bit.ly/ChrisPatonPSbooks. To purchase in the USA visit https://www.penandswordbooks.com. Further news published daily on The Scottish GENES Facebook page.
