Abercrombie (
Gaelic: ''Obar Chrombaidh'') is a village in
Fife
Fife ( , ; ; ) is a council areas of Scotland, council area and lieutenancy areas of Scotland, lieutenancy area in Scotland. A peninsula, it is bordered by the Firth of Tay to the north, the North Sea to the east, the Firth of Forth to the s ...
, Scotland.
Abercrombie, recorded in 1157-60 as ''Abercrumbin'', means 'mouth of the river Crombie'. The first element is the
Pictish
Pictish is an extinct Brittonic Celtic language spoken by the Picts, the people of eastern and northern Scotland from late antiquity to the Early Middle Ages. Virtually no direct attestations of Pictish remain, short of a limited number of geog ...
word ''aber'' 'river mouth'. Crombie is a stream-name derived from the Gaelic word ''crombadh'' 'bending, winding'. This Gaelic stream-name probably replaced an earlier Pictish name.
The only stream near here entering the sea is the Inverie Burn, also known as St. Monan's Burn, which discharges at St. Monan's. We might suppose that Crombadh was an earlier name for the burn.
Abercrombie is situated north of the village of
St Monans
St Monans (, ), sometimes spelt St Monance, is a village and parish in the East Neuk of Fife and is named after the legendary Saint Monan.
Situated approximately west of Anstruther, the small community, whose inhabitants used to make their liv ...
, and miles south of the town of
St Andrews
St Andrews (; ; , pronounced ʰʲɪʎˈrˠiː.ɪɲ is a town on the east coast of Fife in Scotland, southeast of Dundee and northeast of Edinburgh. St Andrews had a recorded population of 16,800 , making it Fife's fourth-largest settleme ...
. Abercrombie was the former name of the parish of St Monans,
although both Abercrombie and St Monans had churches.
The hamlet is centred on Abercrombie Farmstead, dating from 1892, which was built on the site of an earlier 13th century building.
The land around Abercrombie was formerly owned by the Sandilands family and Sir James Sandilands was raised to the Peerage of Scotland as
Lord Abercrombie in 1647. Lord Abercrombie wasted his estates following the death of his father and had to sell his properties in Fife in 1649. The title became extinct on the death of the second Lord Abercrombie in 1681.
References
Villages in Fife
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