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Field Visit
Date 27 June 1928
Event ID 1099545
Category Recording
Type Field Visit
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1099545
“Clack-Mannan."
This is an irregular, roughly tapering block of whinstone measuring 9 feet 4 inches in height and 15 feet in girth near the base, surmounted by a capstone, set in mortar, 1 ½ feet in thickness, 3 ¼ feet in length, and 2 ½ feet in breadth (SC 1167939). The large stone was placed beside the Tolbooth in 1833, and on it was set the small one, which had previously lain on the ground close by the old town cross "alongside of the old jail and courthouse" (1). The first part of the name appears to be the Old British or Welsh form clog and not the Gaelic cloch or clach, both words having the meaning "stone." "Mannan" or, more properly, Manann is the genitive case of Manau, the ancient name of the district round the upper reaches of the Firth of Forth, and appears also in Slamannan, a parish in south-east Stirlingshire (2). In some 12th-century charters, however, the name is "Clamanec" or "Clacmanet" (3).
RCAHMS 1933, visited 27 June 1928.
(1) Proc. Soc. Ant. Scot., xxiii (1888-9), p. 160. (2) Watson's Celtic Place-Names of Scotland, pp.55, 103. (3) Lawrie's Early Scottish Charters, Nos. clvi, clxxxviii.
