Balmain

Balmain LAR S NO416058 1 374 80m

Balman’ c.1335 Dunf. Reg. no. 334
Balman’ c.1335 Dunf. Reg. no. 335
Balmane 1452 x 1480 RMS ii no. 1444
(third part of the lands of) Balmane 1501 ADC no. 237 [Alexander Bruce of Earlshall (Erlischaw) LEU against Patrick Lord Lindsay of the Byres for wrongful occupation of a third part of Balmain]
(third part of the lands of) Balmane 1501 ADC no. 238 [as no. 237 above]
myln of Balnamane 1501 ADC no. 191 [Patrick Lord Lindsay]
Balmene 1545 x 1555 N. Berwick Cart. p. xxiii [see Pitcruvie LAR]
Main 1753 Roy sheet 18, 1 [also shows Main mill]
Balmain 1775 Ainslie/Fife [with Mill shown close by]
Balmain 1795 Sasines no. 4187 [‘except part thereof called Noughnarie, mill of Balmain and mill lands’]
Balmain Mill 1829 RHP320
Balmain Mill 1855 OS 6 inch 1st edn [at the site of OS Pathf. Balmain]

G baile + ? meadhan

‘Middle farm’? This interpretation is only very tentatively proposed, and in the absence of any better suggestion. While -main can be a development of G meadhan ‘middle’, as in Pitmain, Badenoch INV, this latter took place in an area where Gaelic was still widely spoken into the twentieth century. In Fife, however, G medial dh usually survived long enough in the local Gaelic for it to have been retained in place-names (see for example Beath and Banbeath SCO). The specific meadhan is more certainly found in Pitmeddan, Abernethy PER, very near Auchtermuchty FIF,[154] where the dental is clearly preserved, and in the lowland Aberdeenshire name Pitmedden (Watson 1926, 412). However, names such as Balone SSL (PNF 3) and perhaps Balbie BUI (PNF 1) and Carnbee (PNF 3) show that at least in some parts of Fife this sound was already becoming unstable at the end of the Gaelic-speaking period (this is discussed further in ‘Place-names and Language’ section in PNF 5). If it is indeed ‘middle farm’, then it is probably named in relation to the cluster of other Bal-names in this area, lying as it does roughly mid-way between Balcormo, Baldastard and Balhousie (see also LAR Introduction).

    The 1501 form Balnamane, which uniquely appears to contain the G definite article, is best seen as an analogical re-formation on the model of names such as Ballenkirk, Ballinbreich, Ballindean and Ballingall (all FIF).

    /balˈmen/ or /bəlˈmen/

This place-name appeared in printed volume 2