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Caledonia is the Latin
Latin

Latin is an Italic language, historically spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. Through the Military history of the Roman Empire, Latin spread throughout the Mediterranean and a large part of Europe....
 name given by the Romans
Ancient Rome

Ancient Rome was a civilization that grew out of a small agricultural community founded on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 10th century BC....
 to the land in today's Scotland north of their province of Brittania
Roman Britain

Roman Britain refers to those parts of the island of Great Britain controlled by the Roman Empire between AD 43 and 410. The Romans referred to their province as Britannia....
, beyond the frontier of their empire
Roman Empire

The Roman Empire was the Roman Republic phase of the Ancient Rome, characterised by an autocracy form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean....
. Modern use is as a romantic or poetic name for Scotland, as a whole.

original use of the name, as used by Tacitus
Tacitus

Publius Cornelius Tacitus was a Roman Senate and a historian of the Roman Empire. The surviving portions of his two major works—the Annals and the Histories —examine the reigns of the Roman Emperors Tiberius, Claudius, Nero and those that reigned in the Year of the Four Emperors....
, Ptolemy
Ptolemy

Claudius Ptolemaeus , known in English as Ptolemy , was a Roman Greek mathematics, Greek astronomy, geographer and astrologer. He lived in History of Roman Egypt, and was probably born there in a town in the Thebaid called Ptolemais Hermiou; he died in Alexandria around 168 AD....
, Lucan
Marcus Annaeus Lucanus

Marcus Annaeus Lucanus , better known in English language as Lucan, was a Roman Empire poet, born in Corduba , in the Hispania Baetica. Despite his short life, he is regarded as one of the outstanding figures of the Classical Latin#Silver_Age_Latin period....
 and Pliny the Elder
Pliny the Elder

Gaius Plinius Secundus , better known as Pliny the Elder, was an ancient author, naturalist or natural philosopher and naval and military commander of some importance who wrote Natural History ....
, referred to the area (or parts of the area) also known as Pictavia or Pictland
Picts

The Picts were a confederation of tribes in what was later to become eastern and northern Scotland from Roman Empire times until the 10th century....
 north of the Antonine Wall
Antonine Wall

The Antonine Wall also known as the Severan Wall, is a rock and sod fortification, built by the Roman Empire across what is now the central belt of Scotland and is also known as the Clyde-Forth frontier line....
 in today's Scotland
Scotland

conventional_long_name = ScotlandAlba|common_name= Scotland|image_flag = Flag of Scotland.svg|flag_width = 130px...
.






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Caledonia is the Latin
Latin

Latin is an Italic language, historically spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. Through the Military history of the Roman Empire, Latin spread throughout the Mediterranean and a large part of Europe....
 name given by the Romans
Ancient Rome

Ancient Rome was a civilization that grew out of a small agricultural community founded on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 10th century BC....
 to the land in today's Scotland north of their province of Brittania
Roman Britain

Roman Britain refers to those parts of the island of Great Britain controlled by the Roman Empire between AD 43 and 410. The Romans referred to their province as Britannia....
, beyond the frontier of their empire
Roman Empire

The Roman Empire was the Roman Republic phase of the Ancient Rome, characterised by an autocracy form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean....
. Modern use is as a romantic or poetic name for Scotland, as a whole.

Original usage

The original use of the name, as used by Tacitus
Tacitus

Publius Cornelius Tacitus was a Roman Senate and a historian of the Roman Empire. The surviving portions of his two major works—the Annals and the Histories —examine the reigns of the Roman Emperors Tiberius, Claudius, Nero and those that reigned in the Year of the Four Emperors....
, Ptolemy
Ptolemy

Claudius Ptolemaeus , known in English as Ptolemy , was a Roman Greek mathematics, Greek astronomy, geographer and astrologer. He lived in History of Roman Egypt, and was probably born there in a town in the Thebaid called Ptolemais Hermiou; he died in Alexandria around 168 AD....
, Lucan
Marcus Annaeus Lucanus

Marcus Annaeus Lucanus , better known in English language as Lucan, was a Roman Empire poet, born in Corduba , in the Hispania Baetica. Despite his short life, he is regarded as one of the outstanding figures of the Classical Latin#Silver_Age_Latin period....
 and Pliny the Elder
Pliny the Elder

Gaius Plinius Secundus , better known as Pliny the Elder, was an ancient author, naturalist or natural philosopher and naval and military commander of some importance who wrote Natural History ....
, referred to the area (or parts of the area) also known as Pictavia or Pictland
Picts

The Picts were a confederation of tribes in what was later to become eastern and northern Scotland from Roman Empire times until the 10th century....
 north of the Antonine Wall
Antonine Wall

The Antonine Wall also known as the Severan Wall, is a rock and sod fortification, built by the Roman Empire across what is now the central belt of Scotland and is also known as the Clyde-Forth frontier line....
 in today's Scotland
Scotland

conventional_long_name = ScotlandAlba|common_name= Scotland|image_flag = Flag of Scotland.svg|flag_width = 130px...
. The name is related that of a Pictish tribe, the Caledonii
Caledonians

The Caledonians , or Caledonian Confederacy, is a name given by historians to a group of the Indigenous peoples of Scotland during the Iron Age that the Romans initially included as Brython, but later distinguished as the Picts....
, one amongst several in the area, though perhaps the dominant tribe. Their name can be found in Dùn Chailleann, the Scottish Gaelic word for the town of Dunkeld
Dunkeld

Dunkeld is a small town in River Tay, Perth and Kinross, Scotland, approximately 15 miles north of Perth, Scotland on the eastern side of the A9 road into the Scottish Highlands and on the opposite side of the River Tay from the Victorian village of Birnam, Perth and Kinross....
 meaning "fort of the Caledonii", and in that of the mountain
Munro

A Munro is a Scotland mountain with a height over . They are named after Hugh Munro , who produced the first compilation of a catalogue of such hills, known as Munro's Tables, in 1891....
 Sìdh Chailleann or Schiehallion
Schiehallion

Schiehallion is a prominent mountain in Perth and Kinross, Scotland. It is popular with walkers due to its accessibility, ease of ascent and spectacular views; in 2000 it was estimated that between 17,500 and 20,000 walkers a year made the ascent....
, the "fairy [hill] of the Caledonians".

]] According to Moffat (2005) the name derives from caled, the P-Celtic word for "hard". This suggests the original meaning may have been "the hard (or rocky) land" although it is possible it meant "the land of the hard men". Keay and Keay (1994) state that the word is "apparently pre-Celtic".

Location

The exact location of what the Romans called Caledonia is unknown, and the boundaries are unlikely to have been fixed. During the brief Roman military incursions into central and northern Scotland, parts of it may have been absorbed into the province of Brittania, a name also used by Rome, prior to their conquest of the southern and central parts of the island, to refer to the island of Great Britain
Great Britain

Great Britain is an island lying to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the List of islands by area, and the largest in Europe. With a population of 58.9 million people it is List of islands by population....
.

Modern usage

The modern use of "Caledonia" in English
English language

English is a West Germanic language that originated in Anglo-Saxon England and has lingua franca status in many parts of the world as a result of the military, economic, scientific, political and cultural influence of the British Empire in the 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries and that of the United States from the mid 20th century onwa...
 and Scots
Scots language

Scots or Lowland Scots refers to the Germanic Variety derived from Middle English spoken in parts of Lowland Scotland, Northern Ireland and the border areas of the Republic of Ireland....
 is as a romantic or poetic name for Scotland as a whole. An example is the song "Caledonia
Caledonia (song)

Caledonia is a modern Scotland folk music ballad written by Dougie MacLean somewhere between 1974 and 1977 and published in 1979 on an album of the same name ....
", a folk
Folk music

Folk music can have a number of different meanings, including:* Traditional music: The original meaning of the term "folk music" was synonymous with the term "Traditional music", also often including World Music and Roots music; the term "Traditional music" was given its more specific meaning to distinguish it from the other definition...
 ballad
Ballad

A ballad is a form of verse, often a narrative story and set to music. Ballads were characteristic of particularly British and Irish popular poetry and song from the later medieval period until the nineteenth century and used extensively across Europe and later north America, Australia and north Africa....
 written by Dougie MacLean
Dougie MacLean

Dougie MacLean is a singer-songwriter, composer and multi-instrumentalist.His career started with a traditional band, The Tannahill Weavers, in 1976....
, published in 1979 on the album of the same name and covered by various other artists since, including Amy Macdonald
Amy Macdonald (singer)

Amy Macdonald is a Scotland singer/songwriter.Her debut album, This Is the Life , was released on 30 July 2007 and has sold more than 2.4 million copies....
. Ptolemy's account also referred to the Caledonia Silva, an idea still recalled in the modern expression "Caledonian Forest
Caledonian Forest

The Caledonian Forest is the name of a type of woodland that once covered vast areas of Scotland. Today, however, only 1% of the original forest survives, in 35 isolated locations....
", although the woods are much reduced in size since Roman times.

The name "Scotland" itself is derived from Scotia
Scotia

Scotia was originally a Latin geographical expression of the territory inhabited by the people Latin writers called Scoti, the early Gaels. As such it became a common name for Ireland, the island also written, as it was known to the Romans, Hibernia....
, a Latin term first used for Ireland
Ireland

Ireland is the List of islands by area in Europe, and the twentieth-largest island in the world. It lies to the north-west of continental Europe and is surrounded by hundreds of islands and islet....
 (also called Hibernia
Hibernia

Hibernia is the Classical Latin name for the island of Ireland....
 by the Romans) and later for Scotland, the Scoti
Scoti

Scoti or Scotti was the generic name given by the Roman Empire to the Celts Gaels who raided from Ireland. Some of them, from the Ulster Kingdom of D?l Riata, migrated to the Inner Hebrides, Islands of the Clyde and Argyll and Bute, extending D?l Riata....
 peoples having originated in Ireland and resettled in Scotland. Another, post conquest, Roman name for the island of Great Britain was Albion
Albion

Albion is the oldest known name of the island of Great Britain. Today, it is still sometimes used poetically to refer to the island. It is the basis of the Scottish Gaelic name for Scotland, Alba....
, which is cognate
Cognate

Cognates in linguistics are words that have a common etymology origin.An example of cognates within the same language would be English shirt vs....
 with the Scottish Gaelic name for Scotland of Alba
Alba

Alba is the Scottish Gaelic language name for Scotland. It is cognate to Albain in Irish Gaelic and Nalbin in Manx language, the other Goidelic languages Insular Celtic languages, as well as similar words in the Brythonic languages Insular Celtic languages of Cornish language and Welsh language also meaning Scotland....
.

See also

  • Scotland during the Roman Empire
    Scotland during the Roman Empire

    Scotland during the Roman Empire encompasses a period of time from the arrival of Roman legions in c. AD 71 to their departure in 213. The history of the period is complex: the Roman empire influenced every part of Scotland during the period, however the occupation was neither complete nor continuous....
  • Hadrian's Wall
    Hadrian's Wall

    Hadrian's Wall is a Rock and Sod fortification built by the Roman Empire across the width of what is now northern England. Begun in AD 122, during the rule of emperor Hadrian, it was the middle of three such fortifications built across Great Britain, the first being from the River Clyde to the River Forth under Agricola and the last the Ant...
  • Battle of Mons Graupius
    Battle of Mons Graupius

    According to Gaius Cornelius Tacitus, the Battle of Mons Graupius took place in 83 or 84 AD. Gnaeus Julius Agricola, the List of Roman governors of Britain and Tacitus' father-in-law, had sent his fleet ahead to panic the Caledonians, and, with light infantry reinforced with British auxiliaries, reached the site, which he found occupied by th...
  • New Caledonia
    New Caledonia

    New Caledonia , is a "sui generis collectivity" of France located in the subregion of Melanesia in the Oceania. It comprises a main island , the Loyalty Islands, and several smaller islands....


External links

  • - 1628 map of the region by Mercator and Hondius