Thread by @cocteautriplets

Sometimes in one's daily trawling of the estate agents' listings for funky carpets and bath suites, you come across an unusual street that name you don't recognise.
Auchingane is one such name.

"Auch-" place names are nearly always from Gaelic and "Auchen" or "Auchin" are nearly always from Achadh, or field.

The only other Edinburgh Auch- placename is Auchinleck's Brae (and by extension, Court) in Newhaven, named for a former landowner, Auchinleck being a village in Ayrshire with a Gaelic name - Achadh an Leac, "Field of Flat Stones" (🗺️Ainslie's Town Plan, 1804, NLS).

There are a few more Auchs in Midlothian, e.g. Auchendinny and Auchencorth by Penicuik, and there's Auchinoon Hill in West Lothian - all with Achadh/ field derivations; Fields of height or fortress 🏰, of a standing stone 🪦 and of wool 🐑respectively.

Back to Auchingane, it's an unusual and rather obscure one. It's recorded as early as 1554 as a portion of land, joined with Dreghorn in 1606. The original place may have been in the vicinity of what William Roy curiously calls "Showerhole" on his 1750 Lowland Map (🗺️NLS)

The likely derivation of Auchingane is Achadh nan Gaimhne, Field of Stirks or Yearlings. It was probably just a good bit of pasture for such beasts at one time.

It's not a placename ever included in an OS map (or even recorded in the OS Name Books of Midlothian that I can find). Someone at Edinburgh District Council as it was obviously had a very long memory when they resurrected it in 1985 for a new housing scheme.

Such placenames as these are particularly interesting as they are direct evidence that the Gaelic language was in common enough use in these parts in late Medieval times that it gave names to places, and also that people of station sufficient to own land were using it.

Even in a city and county long dominated by the Scots and then English languages, Gaelic was always there. And still is. Hiding in plain sight.

There is an Auchingane in the OS Name Book for Stirlingshire.

The village and seat of Auchinleck gives its name to the surname. A notable Auchinleck was Sir Claude John Eyre Auchinleck, a British WW2 general. Auchinleck's career is evidence that sometimes it *is* the right thing to do to remove a leader during wartime. (🚨 Topical Klaxon!)