Lochaber

Lochaber (lɒx'ɑːbər ; Loch Abar) is a name applied to a part of the Scottish Highlands. Historically, it was a provincial lordship consisting of the parishes of Kilmallie and Kilmonivaig, as they were before being reduced in extent by the creation of Quoad Sacra parishes in the 19th century. Lochaber once extended from the Northern shore of Loch Leven, a district called Nether Lochaber, to beyond Spean Bridge and Roybridge, which area is known as Brae Lochaber or Braigh Loch Abar in Gaelic. Lochaber is now also used to refer to a much wider area, one of the 16 ward management areas of the Highland Council of Scotland and one of eight former local government districts of the two-tier Highland region. The main town of Lochaber is Fort William. According to legend, a glaistig, a ghostly woman-goat hybrid, once lived in the area. William Watson outlined two schools of thought on this topic. He favoured the idea that Abar came from the Pictish and Welsh for "river mouth" and that Loch Abar meant the confluence of the Lochy and the Nevis as they flowed into Loch Linnhe, an Linne Dhubh in Gaelic. He also conceded that abar might also come from the Gaelic eabar, meaning "mud" or "swampy place". Thus Lochaber could be the "loch of swamps", a historic water feature that existed on the Blàr Mòr, where the area's High School and Health Centre are situated today. Other experts favour the "swamp" derivation. A Lochaber person is called an Abrach. Lochaber is first recorded in the Life of Columba written in c.690 by Adomnán, the Abbot of Iona Abbey. Although there are no known Pictish stones within the area, Ardnamurchan Point is believed to have marked the boundary between the lands ruled by the Picts to the north and east, and those ruled by migrating Irish clans in Dál Riata to the south. Archaeological evidence of earlier structures supports the tradition that Inverlochy Castle was built on the site of an earlier Pictish settlement, described by the historian Hector Boece in 1526 as a "city ...