The Name of Rule

Many inquiries that reach me concerned with the origin of surnames, which have some connection with a SCOTTISH place name, or seem to have.

The name of RULE is traced to the lands of RULE in ROXBURGHSHIRE, which in turn have been given their name by the WATER of RULE, a tributary of the TEVIOT. We have ALAN, RICHARD and THOMAS de Rule in the first half of the 13^th century and later in the same century we have record of ASAM and THOMAS de ROULE. Nothing definite can be said about the river name of present, but to the place-name scholar two other related place names in the vicinity are of considerable interest, BEDRULE and ABBOTRULE.

The former is recorded as BADROWL in1275, RULEBETHOR in 1280, BERHOCRULLE in 1306-29, and is RULE HEREVEI about 1165. The decisive forms here are RULEBETHOK and RULE HEREVEI for not only do they preserve the respective personal names of their 12th century proprietors, but they also show CLETIC (GAELIC?) word order in he, by this time, very GERMANIC county of ROXBURGH. The basic element comes first, the explanatory one second, whereas ENGLISH practice is demonstrated by BETHOCRULLE and the others. This may, not be directly connected with the question, but it throws some light on the linguistic and cultural contacts, which must have taken, place in the RULE VALLEY at that time.

The Story Behind the Name

By Dr. W.F.H. Nicolaisen

School of Scottish Studies

University of Edinburgh

From the Scots Magazone

February 1962

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