Scotia

Scotia was originally a Roman name for Ireland, inhabited by the people they called Scoti or Scotii. Use of the name shifted in the Middle Ages to designate the part of the island of Great Britain lying north of the Firth of Forth, the Kingdom of Alba. By the later Middle Ages it had become the fixed Latin term for what in English is called Scotland.

Etymology and derivations

The name of Scotland is derived from the Latin Scoti, the term applied to Gaels. The origin of the word Scoti (or Scotti) is uncertain. It is found in Latin texts from the 4th century describing a tribe which sailed from Ireland to raid Roman Britain. It came to be applied to all the Gaels. It is not believed that any Gaelic groups called themselves Scoti in ancient times, except when writing in Latin.Old Irish documents use the term Scot (plural Scuit) going back as far as the 9th century, for example in the glossary of Cormac úa Cuilennáin.

Oman derives it from Scuit; a man cut off, suggesting that a Scuit was not a Gael as such but one of a renegade band settled in the part of Ulster which became the kingdom of Dál Riata.

Scotia (barque)

Scotia was a barque that was built in 1872 as the Norwegian whaler Hekla. She was purchased in 1902 by William Spiers Bruce and refitted as a research vessel for use by the Scottish National Antarctic Expedition. After the expedition, she served as a sealer, patrol vessel and collier. She was destroyed by fire in January 1916.

Description

The ship was 139 feet 6 inches (42.52 m), with a beam of 28 feet 9 inches (8.76 m). She had a draught of 15 feet 6 inches (4.72 m). The ship was assessed at 375 GRT.

History

Hekla was built as a barque in 1872 by Jørgensen & Knudsen, Drammen for S. S. Svendsen of Sandefjord. She was used as a sealer, making voyages to the east coast of Greenland from 1872–82 and to Scoresby Sound in 1892. In 1896, she was sold to N. Bugge, Tønsberg. She was sold in 1898 to A/S Sæl- og Hvalfangerskib Hekla, Christiania and was placed under the management of M. C. Tvethe. Hekla was sold in 1900 to A/S Hecla, Sandefjord, operated under the management of Anders Marcussen.

Scottish National Antarctic Expedition

The Scottish National Antarctic Expedition (SNAE), 1902–04, was organised and led by William Speirs Bruce, a natural scientist and former medical student from the University of Edinburgh. Although overshadowed in prestige terms by Robert Falcon Scott's concurrent Discovery Expedition, the SNAE completed a full programme of exploration and scientific work. Its achievements included the establishment of a manned meteorological station, the first in Antarctic territory, and the discovery of new land to the east of the Weddell Sea. Its large collection of biological and geological specimens, together with those from Bruce's earlier travels, led to the establishment of the Scottish Oceanographical Laboratory in 1906.

Bruce had spent most of the 1890s engaged on expeditions to the Antarctic and Arctic regions, and by 1899 was Britain's most experienced polar scientist. In March of that year, he applied to join the Discovery Expedition; however, his proposal to extend that expedition's field of work into the Weddell Sea quadrant, using a second ship, was dismissed as "mischievous rivalry" by Royal Geographical Society (RGS) president Sir Clements Markham. Bruce reacted by obtaining independent finance; his venture was supported and promoted by the Royal Scottish Geographical Society.