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In the Scottish Highlands, mapping recommenced in earnest on Lewis in 1846, for no other reason than that the landowner, Sir James Matheson, wanted an update on the resources of his estate. Rules developed in Ireland about gathering place-names were extended to Lewis. Alexander Carmichael was one of the ‘authorities’ commissioned to ascertain the authenticity of names. He was a Gaelic-speaking historian and folklorist from Lismore and thus an exemplary ‘authority’. Today he would be called an ethnologist. Carmichael wrote about what happened to his painstaking work, once it was beyond his control.

I have gone to the locality and in every instance corrected the place-name from the living voice on the spot. From these corrections I have written out each name in correct Gaelic and have revised and re-revised my own work. I have adhered strictly to the local sound and pronounciation of every word. Well then fancy my mortification when Cap. MacPherson tells me that he means to adopt neither Norse nor Gaelic theory in spelling but to give the name in phonetic spelling.