Galwegian Gaelic
| Galwegian Gaelic | |
|---|---|
| Region | Galloway, Annandale, Nithsdale and Carrick, Scotland |
| Extinct | 1760, with the death of Margaret McMurray |
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Indo-European
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| Gaelic alphabet (Latin script) | |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | – |
| Glottolog | None |
Galwegian Gaelic (also known as Gallovidian Gaelic, Gallowegian Gaelic, or Galloway Gaelic) is an extinct dialect of the Gaelic language formerly spoken in southwest Scotland. It was spoken by the people of Galloway and Carrick until the early modern period. It was once spoken in Annandale and Strathnith. Little (except numerous placenames) has survived of the dialect, so that its exact relationship with other Goidelic dialects is uncertain.
Gaelicisation in Galloway and Carrick occurred at the expense of Old English and Cumbric, a British dialect. Old Irish can be traced in the Rhins of Galloway from at least the fifth century. How it developed and spread is largely unknown. The Gaelicisation of the land was complete probably by the eleventh century, although some have suggested a date as early as the beginning of the ninth century. The main problem is that this folk-movement is unrecorded in the historical sources, so it has to be reconstructed from things such as place-names. According to the placename studies of W. F. H. Nicolaisen, formerly of the University of Edinburgh, the earliest layer is represented by compound placenames starting with Sliabh "mountain" (often Anglicised Slew- or Sla(e-) and Carraig "rock" (Anglicised as Carrick). This would make the settlement roughly contemporary with what was then Dál Riata. The Gall-Gaidhel (the Norse Gaels or "foreign Gaels"), who gave their name to the area, appear to have settled in the ninth and tenth centuries. Many of the leading settlers would have been of both Norse and Gaelic heritage, and it was the Gaelicisation of these Norse leaders which distinguished them from other Norse lords of northern Britain such as those in Shetland, Orkney and Caithness.
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