How do you pronounce MacEanruig

**Knuckle Beast** · 15th September 17, 11:27 AM

Hey everybody, my names Dan Kindred, clan Henderson, both sides mom and dad. I have always wanted to know how you pronounce this name.

Also if any knows where I can go to at least be able to read (not necessarily understand even) and pronounce our mother tongue, you're input would be priceless.

This is my first post by the way. Been reading off of this site for a year or two now. I love it, I'm glad it exists. Good site good people.

Thanks everybody.

**The Wizard of BC** · 15th September 17, 12:44 PM

Interestingly I just had a customer in my shop with the exact same question.

While I do not speak Gaelic and cannot help with the pronunciation you are asking about, perhaps I can share some of the information this customer related to me.

It seems that the names commonly associated with the Gaelic name MacEanruig mean that you will have to go back to where your particular people come from to determine if you have a Highland Clan affiliation It appears that there are people with these names located in Caithness, Dumfries, Fife and around Glencoe. There is a possibility to a link to the Gunn Highland Clan.

If your people come from Caithness, which is in the very north of Scotland, they may have been associated with the Gunn name.
If your people come from Fife just North, and across the Firth of Forth from Edinburgh, or Dumfries-shire in the South, then they may not have had a Highland Clan affiliation at all.

So it really is more about where your particular line or branch originally came from, than it is about what last name you carry. This idea that it is about last names is a very common misconception and simplification of a wide and varied population.
For example, if you look on almost any map of Scotland that shows the Clans you can see that Highland Clan influence was over an area. Not everyone within that area would have had the same last name, and someone with the last name could, and did, live in other places. The older the map, the smaller the area of the Clans will be.
It is also common to believe that if you have Scottish ancestry that you are automatically part of a Clan. The truth is that the majority of the population would not have been a member of a Highland Clan. The Clan system is generally considered to be the NW portion of the country. It was in the Lowlands where the majority of the population and most of the cities are located.

The best advice anyone can give is to do your genealogy. This requires more than a search by your last name. It is a paper chase of birth certificates, marriage licenses, tax and church records and any other piece of paper you can find leading, in an unbroken chain, back to where your particular people came from.
Clan membership is also not just signing up with the tent at your local Highland Games. Most of these tents are for Clan societies. Some are simply signing up to receive their newsletter. Some, but not all, actually represent a Scottish Highland Clan with the blessing of a Clan Chief.

There is a lot of myth and misconception out there. The web is full of sites that pass on totally false information. For example those who offer a "family coat of arms". A little research and knowledge really does go a long way to understanding your family's history.

**Tobus** · 15th September 17, 01:09 PM

I can't vouch for the validity, but this site says the following:

"Clann Eanruig (pronounced KLAHN YAHN-reegk)" - I assume MacEanruig would be similar.

I have always been under the impression that it was the Gaelic form of Henry, and that the pronunciation would be something close to "McHenry". But I'm often wrong when it comes to the Gaelic.