Clathywas
Clathywas # SCO S NO383024 3
Clathywas 1753 Roy sheet 18, 1
Sc claw or clay + Sc the + Sc waa
‘Claw the walls’ or ‘clay the walls’; if the first, then perhaps out of desperation at the poverty of the place; if the second, then meaning ‘smear or plaster the walls with clay’, alluding to the low status of the dwelling-house. This is one of a small but significant group of humorous Scots place-names containing a verbal phrase, sometimes wryly alluding to difficult living conditions. Examples are Pilkembare (later Pilkhambrae) ATL (PNF 1), a name which also occurs in FGN, KTT and KDT; and Hungerhimout # KTT and Mackimrough # KTT (this volume). For more on this type of name, see Taylor 2008.
In Echt parish ABD is a place Clathewas (pronounced as if consisting of three words, Cla-the-was), first recorded in 1740 as Clathewalls, which Alexander describes as ‘a satiric name’ (1952, 214).
This place-name appeared in printed volume 2