English / Map Form: Staffin
Gaelic Form: Stafainn
Location: Skye, Inner Hebrides
Post Town: PORTREE
Postcode area: IV51
County: Inverness-shire
Local Authority: Highland
Nearest Main Roads: A855
English / Map Form: Staffin
Gaelic Form: Stafainn
Language Notes
Perhaps element relating to ON stafr, ‘staff’Element Meaning
Perhaps element relating to ON stafr, ‘staff’
Sources
| Staffin*, Stafainn*-CR | Dwelly 1912 |
| Staffin, Stafain: place or (sic) upright, | Forbes, 411 |
| staff-like pillars.. staffr (Norse) | Forbes, 411 |
Additional Information
Mac an Tàilleir: “The English and second Gaelic names come from Norse and may contain the word for staff or be based on stamh, a type of seaweed… Staffin Island is Eilean Stafainn”
See B. Gordon 1964, 101-103 who suggests this derivation and discusses possibilities for the origin of the final syllable, but concludes that the problem ‘must remain obscure’.