oggbashan
Dying Truth seeker
- Joined
- Jul 3, 2002
- Posts
- 56,017
On the pele towers, Og...
Since they seemed to largely be along borders, do you think their name has any relationship to the 'pale' or 'pallisade' as marking the enclosed, or home, territory?
Yes.
Shorter Oxford: Peel 1. A stake (rare) ME only, 2. A palisade formed of stakes; a stockade; a stockaded or palisaded (and moated) enclosure 1596; 3. A castle; especially a small castle or tower 1679, 4. The general name, in modern writers, for the massive square towers or fortified dwellings built in the 16th Century in the border counties of England and Scotland, for defence against forays 1726, 5. Hence, the proper name of a place in the Isle of Man 1718. 6. attrib. as peel-house, peel-tower = sense 4. 1505.