Burntisland, Fife : Historical writing

Descriptive gazetteer entries

These other entries in our collection of descriptive gazetteers are also about Burntisland. You may be able to find further references to Burntisland in the descriptive gazetteers by doing a full-text search here.

Place Type of entry Source
Burntisland parish, parliamentary and royal burgh, seaport, and watering-place Bartholomew
Burntisland a town and a parish Groome

This additional information from our descriptive gazetteers is for locations within the parish or parishes associated with Burntisland.

Place Type of entry Source
Bin a conspicuous hill Groome
Grange an estate Groome
Grange estate Bartholomew
Knockdavie Castle ruin Bartholomew
Orrock Hill hill Bartholomew
Rossend Castle ancient mansion Bartholomew
Starleyburn hamlet and stream Bartholomew

Travel writing

This website includes the complete texts of books describing journeys around Britain, written between the twelfth and nineteenth centuries. Selecting one of the links below will take you to the first reference to Burntisland within the selected text. This will not always be a description of a visit: travellers often mention places other than where they are, for example as a basis for comparison.

Traveller Section No. of Refs.
Daniel Defoe Letter 13, Part 1: Fife and Perth 3
Daniel Defoe Letter 11: South-Eastern Scotland 2
Thomas Pennant July 24-31: Fife and Perthshire 1

This website includes two large libraries, of historical travel writing and of entries from nineteenth century gazetteers describing places. We have text from these sources available for these places near your location:

Place Mentioned in Travel Writing Mentioned in Historical Gazetteer
Kinghorn 8 2
Aberdour 5 2
Newbigging 0 1
Auchtertool 0 2
Inchcolm 3 2
Dalgety Bay 0 2
Linktown 0 2
Inchkeith 4 2
Abbotshall 0 2
Kirkcaldy 6 2
Donibristle 1 2
Granton 0 2
Mossgreen 0 2
Hillend 0 2
Pathhead 0 1
Lochgelly 0 3
Newhaven 0 2
Cowdenbeath 0 2
Crossgates 0 2
Cardenden 0 2

Names from historical writing

The following appear as names for Burntisland. Follow the links for what the author actually said:

Name Author Source
BORUNT ISLAND Daniel Defoe A tour thro' the whole island of Great Britain, divided into circuits or journies (London: JM Dent and Co, 1927).
BRUNTILLIAN Daniel Defoe A tour thro' the whole island of Great Britain, divided into circuits or journies (London: JM Dent and Co, 1927).
BRUNT ISLAND Thomas Pennant A Tour in Scotland 1769 (London: Benjamin White, 1776).
BRUNTISLAND Daniel Defoe A tour thro' the whole island of Great Britain, divided into circuits or journies (London: JM Dent and Co, 1927).
BURNT ISLAND Daniel Defoe A tour thro' the whole island of Great Britain, divided into circuits or journies (London: JM Dent and Co, 1927).
BURNTISLAND John Bartholomew Gazetteer of the British Isles (Edinburgh: Bartholomew, 1887).
F.H. Groome Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland (Edinburgh: T.C. Jack, 1882-4).

NB: These variant names come from our collections of historical travel writing and descriptive gazetteers:

  • The above links take you to the first reference to this particular version of the name within a book of travel writing, or to the relevant gazetteer entry.
  • Some names may derive from research by antiquarian writers such as William Camden and Thomas Pennant into the Roman, Saxon and medieval names of places. Their claims are not always supported by modern place-name researchers.
  • References by travel writers to the place using its "normal" name are not included. Descriptive gazetteer entries are included only if the name does not appear anywhere else.