Tarbert

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title: "Tarbert" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["portages"] topic_path: "general/portages" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tarbert" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

Tarbert () is a place name in Scotland and Ireland. Places named Tarbert are characterised by a narrow strip of land, or isthmus. This can be where two lochs nearly meet, or a causeway out to an island.

Etymology

::data[format=table title="Pronunciation"]

Language	Name	Pronunciation
Scots Gaelic	An Tairbeart	{{IPA
Irish	An Tairbeart
::

All placenames that variously show up as tarbert, tarbat or tarbet in their anglicised form derive from either the Irish or Scottish Gaelic an tairbeart, commonly translated as "the isthmus" today.

Both these words derive from two Old Irish elements, tar "across" and a nominalised form of the verb ber "to carry". The in tar was assimilated to as a result of being next to the historically palatal in Old Irish, causing the change in spelling from tar to tair-. So the literal translation would be an "across-carrying". The reason for this is that all tarberts are in fact located at or near old portage sites.

In English language spellings the first syllable "tar" has generally remained constant but the second syllable "bert" has variously been spelled as "bart", "bert" "bat", "bad" etc.

Examples

Places named Tarbert include:

Scotland

• Tarbert, Gigha, on Gigha
• East Tarbert Bay and West Tarbert Bay on the Isle of Gigha
• Tarbert, Jura, on Jura
• Loch Tarbert, Jura, on the west coast of the island of Jura
• Tarbert, Kintyre the town at the northern end of the Kintyre peninsula, Argyll
• West Loch Tarbert, Argyll in Argyll
• East Loch Tarbert, Argyll also in Argyll
• Tarbert, Harris, a ferry port in the Western Isles
• West Loch Tarbert, an inlet between North and South Harris
• East Loch Tarbert also by Harris in the Western Isles of Scotland
• Tarbert, on Canna
• Tarbert Bay, on the island of Canna
• Tarbert, on Salen Bay, Highland
• Glen Tarbert, between Loch Linnhe and Loch Sunart
• Tarbert Hill, above the town of West Kilbride
• East Tarbert Bay and West Tarbert Bay on the Mull of Galloway

Ireland

• Tarbert, County Kerry, a ferry port on the estuary of the River Shannon in County Kerry.
• Tarbert, County Laois, a townland in County Laois

Canada

• Tarbert, Ontario

References

References

1. ''Foclóir Póca'' [[An Gúm]] 1992
2. Dwelly, E. ''The Illustrated Gaelic-English Dictionary'' 1901
3. MacBain, A. (1911) ''An Etymological Dictionary of the Gaelic Language'' Stirling. Eneas MacKay. 1982 edition by Gairm {{ISBN. 0-901771-68-6.
4. [http://www.tarbert.info/tarberttext/historyt1.htm "Tarbert History: Who Named it, 'Tarbert'?"] {{Webarchive. link. (2008-12-20 Tarbert.info. Retrieved 13 September 2008.)
5. "Tarbert, Argyll and Bute". Gazetteer for Scotland.
6. "Tarbert". GeoNames.
7. "Tarbert, Highland". Gazetteer for Scotland.

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