Gallow Hill
Gallow Hill BMO FGN R NO388239 1 351 130m
(land of) Gallahill 1601 RMS vi no. 1217 [in barony of Naughton, q.v.]
Gallahill 1775 Ainslie/Fife
Gallow Hill 1855 OS 6 inch 1st edn
Sc gallow + Sc hill
‘Hill where gallows are erected’, it gave its name to The Gauldry BMO (q.v.). It is the west end of the ridge which rises in the east to Newton Hill (144 m). These must have been the gallows for the barony of Naughton BMO.
Campbell records a Gallowstone on the top of Coultra Hill, more than 3 km to the west of Gallow Hill, noting that it ‘no doubt marks the place of execution for those condemned to death in the court of the proprietor of Balmerino’ (1899, 52). This Gallowstone seems to belong to the remains of a cairn, the stone being part of the cap-stone of a cist or burial chamber (NMRS NO32SE 21).
On OS 6 inch 1st edn (1855) Gallowhill is the name of a settlement at NO386237. It still has that name (OS 1:10,000 2006).
This place-name appeared in printed volume 4