Sunday 28 March 2010

Bushmills and Lagadrade

Click to enlarge
I stumbled upon a curious place-name in the Rev George Hill's "Macdonnells of Antrim". It was Logenadoaid and according to the reference from William Petty's Down Survey 1655/6 appears to be on the west bank of the river Bush/Bush Water more or less directly across the river from the present Spar shop on Upper Main Street, Bushmills. This shop is in a building formerly known as Ballyness House.


David Speers of Causeway Books recognised the place-name as Lagadrade and Pat McKay of the Northern Ireland Place-Name Project at Queens University Belfast provided the following derivation:


It seems that Irish Log an Droichid 'hollow of the bridge/crossing place' is the most satisfactory interpretation as suggested by the local pronunciation and that 'Logenadoaid' is a corruption. Info on pronunciation of 'Cowenfishyn' as 'Carnfishin' is also interesting. I'm sure the first element is Irish 'carn' but the final element is obscure.


Carnfishin is in the townland of Ballyhemlin and Lagadrade might overlap the townlands of Magheraboy and Ballaghmore.