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Orkney.

Ellipsis of Orkney Islands.

6 characters2 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

name/ˈɔɾkne/Scotland/ˈɔɾknɪ/Scotland/ˈɔɾkni/Scotland/ˈɔːkni/Received-Pronunciation
  1. Ellipsis of Orkney Islands.

    abbreviation · alt-of · ellipsis
  2. A historical county of Scotland, United Kingdom.

Where this word comes from

From Old Norse Orkneyjar (“seal islands”), from Old Norse ørkn (“seal”) + ey (“island”). The modern form is singular. Ninth-century Norwegian settlers reinterpreted the Pictish/Proto-Brythonic name for the islands, recorded as Ancient Greek Όρκάδες (Órkádes), which was derived from Proto-Celtic *ɸorkos (“young pig”). Less common theories include a connection with Welsh erch (“speckled”) (on the basis of the Welsh form Erch) or Proto-Celtic *orkā (“pine”) (however, these islands are known for their lack of trees).

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.