Strategic Objectives:

• Development and maintenance of the Place Names Database
• Promotion of the collection, understanding and use of place names

This year saw the Project enter its fourth year. We are building on the enthusiasm and support for the project developed within communities during the pilot phase, to ensure the continued interest in collecting and understanding local place names.

Recording
Good progress has been made in the recording process. Throughout the year, the Place Names Project Officer worked closely with the following History Groups: Unst, Waas, Sandsting, Tingwall, Whiteness & Weisdale, Burra, Bressay, Cunningsburgh and Sandwick. Place names are located on copy maps and aerial photographs with details about each name noted on record sheets.

Members of the Waas History Group held several very successful recording nights resulting in 400 names being recorded. Particularly valuable were the detailed hill names, which in many areas are most a risk of being lost.

Exciting new ventures included Cunningsburgh History Group's walks around Fladdabister and Aith. This proved a hugely successful means of learning more about the history of some of the old buildings and features. Some sites were photographed so that these can be linked to the digital maps and database.

The photographing of sites is now being undertaken by a number of volunteer recorders in their own areas. Another new initiative used a video camera to link commentary to the place names located on a map of Skerries.

Sandsting History Group got off to a good start by recording 100 names for Reawick and Skeld. A picture of Whiteness and Stromfirth is emerging through the work of members of Tingwall, Whiteness & Weisdale History Group. Burra History Group's map records over 200 place names. We also now have two detailed maps with names for Havra.

Recording by individuals and other groups has continued resulting in further maps and names being gathered for Yell, Northmavine, Delting, Aithsting, Cunningsburgh and Fair Isle. This also includes work by Shetlanders living in other parts of Britain. Work in Northmavine has culminated in 250 names added to maps of Gluss, Sullom and Olnesfirth. Further maps and recording sheets have been supplied for parts of Unst, Yell, Northmavine, Whalsay, Weisdale, Bressay, Quarff and Cunningsburgh.

John Stewart Archive
Work continues on the John Stewart Archive. To date approximately 15,000 names have been transcribed from the original John Stewart recording sheets deposited in the Archives. These lists of names, recorded in 1951, have been supplied to individuals and groups to try and verify names and locate them on the ground and on maps.

Database and Digital Maps
Approximately 8,000 place names have been forwarded to date. Data entry continues on a regular basis and this year 1,300 were added to the database giving a total of 2,270 names to end of March. Once recorded, local maps are generated and given back to the recorder or informant for further verification and addition of extra names. As more data is entered the database is becoming more useful for searches for occurrences of particular names or features e.g. burra, brough, burgh, broch and burgi names, noosts or craig seats.

A user manual for the Place Names Database has been prepared. Copies of data are now being forwarded to the Scottish Place-Names Database based at the University of Edinburgh's Department of Celtic and Scottish Studies.

Enquiries and Interpretation
Through the year we have received a range of enquiries relating to the locations and origins place names through the isles.

Help has also been provided to folk choosing names for their new houses. Research projects have included Bressay place names to form part of the interpretive board about the Bressay Stone and places mentioned in the sagas as part of the Viking Stories project.

Charlie Simpson has commenced work on a book on fishing meids, which we hope to publish during the next financial year.

Spelling of place names in interpretive leaflets and area maps has been checked and amended prior to reproduction in 2005.

School Links
Eileen has been working with Sarah Hutcheson in the preparation of educational packs on Iron Age and Vikings for use in primary schools. These include place name element sheets and maps and a series of worksheets. We helped Cullivoe Primary School with place name information and a guide map, based on the bairns' work for their Guide to Yell. This project was a good example of partnership working between the school and other organisations including Shetland Amenity Trust.

Outreach
Exhibitions on place names were staged at Cunningsburgh History Group's Sunday Teas, the Cunningsburgh Show and the Scatness Open Day.

Talks on Shetland place names were delivered to visiting students from the Centre for Northern Studies in Vermont, USA and as part of the Shetland Family History Week to local and visiting participants. These were well attended and well received.

In September, we accepted the invitation to showcase the Shetland Place Names Project at a colloquium in Edinburgh organised by the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historic Monuments of Scotland entitled "Creating a Future for the Past: Archive Projects and the Heritage Lottery Fund". Brian Smith, Shetland Archives, also attended with a display for the new Museum and Archives thus giving the Trust a good presence staging 2 of the 8 showcased-projects.

An article on place names appeared in the Shetland Visitor 2004 and generated some follow-up enquiries from tourists. We supplied reference sheets of place name elements for use by Shetland Tour Guides, and have prepared a web page to form part of the Shetland Heritage website.

Meetings and Training
The Project Officer attended the Scottish Place-Name Society's AGM and Day Conference in Kilmarnock and a Place Names Database Round Table in Edinburgh, organised by the University of Edinburgh's Department of Celtic and Scottish Studies.

This forum brought together individuals and representatives of groups from throughout Scotland who are working on place name projects, mostly at a very small scale. We are seen as a model that perhaps could be used elsewhere. The need to develop the Scottish place name database was recognised.

Whilst in Edinburgh, Eileen also attended lectures by two place name scholars visiting from Copenhagen.

The Place Names Officer has represented the Trust at monthly meetings of ShetlandForWirds, the dialect sub-committee of the Shetland Folk Society. She also undertook a module in Old Norse based Shetland College.