Rothesay, Buteshire : Historical writing

Descriptive gazetteer entries

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

Place Type of entry Source
Rothesay watering-place Bartholomew
Rothesay a post and market town, sea-port, and royal burgh Groome

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

Place Type of entry Source
Bogany headland Bartholomew
Bogany a headland Groome
Kilmorie the Jamiesons' ancient castle Groome
Kilmorie Castle ruin 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 Rothesay 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.
William Camden Scotland: South of the Antonine Wall 1
Daniel Defoe Letter 13, Part 2: Dundee, Aberdeen and the Highlands 1
George Head Up the West Highland Coast 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
Bute 0 2
Ascog 0 2
Port Bannatyne 0 3
North Bute 0 2
Mountstuart 0 2
Inellan 0 2
Kingarth 0 2
Kilchattan 0 2
Ardlamont 1 4
Skelmorlie 1 2
Cumbrae 0 3
Millport 0 2
Largs 2 2
Inverchaolain 0 2
Inverkip 0 2
Little Cumbrae 0 2
Ardgowan 0 2
Dunoon 0 3
Fairlie 0 2
Dunrod 0 2

Names from historical writing

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

Name Author Source
REOGH SIUDH F.H. Groome Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland (Edinburgh: T.C. Jack, 1882-4).
ROTHESAY John Bartholomew Gazetteer of the British Isles (Edinburgh: Bartholomew, 1887).
F.H. Groome Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland (Edinburgh: T.C. Jack, 1882-4).
ROTHSAY William Camden Britain, or, a Chorographicall Description of the most flourishing Kingdomes, England, Scotland, and Ireland (London: George Bishop and John Norton, 1610).
Daniel Defoe A tour thro' the whole island of Great Britain, divided into circuits or journies (London: JM Dent and Co, 1927).
George Head A Home Tour through various parts of the United Kingdom (London: John Murray, 1837).

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.