Orkney Road Ways Two on the Loose TRAVEL HUMANITIES PHOTOS

Orcadian: Human Genome Diversity Project

2012-01-10T08:57:00.001-05:00

Orcadians, people in and from Orkney, demonstrate genetic roots stemming from Picts (Iron Age), Vikings from Norway, and Scots. See note of it as a trading hub, thus spreading, at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orcadian. The Orcadian is one of the 52 population groups represented by the Human Genome Diversity Project, from collecting blood samples from around the world.

Some critics say that the project overloads Europeans, but others say to wait until the results are in, as the process is ongoing and had to start somewhere. See Archeology Magazine, May-June 2006 at p.48 (map, discussion). and http://www.hgalert.org/topics/personalInfo/hgdp.htm.
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Picts: many sources seem to point back to Thrace for early peoples, or to the Scythians (we found that for Ireland in particular). Our favorite Orkney site is Orkneyjar, see http://www.orkneyjar.com/history/picts/earlyaccounts.htm. There was a Welsh historian, Nennius, who records matrilinear descent matters and other bits.
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Click on Images in the left-hand menu of Orkneyjar for fine photos.
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Pictish history. It seems clear now that Pictish settlements predated the Viking, see http://www.heritagedaily.com/2011/08/pict-were-on-the-orkney-islands-before-the-vikings/ So what happened then? Heritage Daily notes that there is no evidence yet of the two combining. The search there was beneath Viking houses, to find Pictish, and also with settlement areas.
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The Picts disappeared under the Viking onslaught, see http://www.orkneyjar.com/history/vikingorkney/takeover.htm, not even leaving their place names behind; but their genes went on apparently, uncombined. Did they just leave?

Sanday. And Dr. James Foster McConaghy and Family

2010-03-24T17:59:00.002-04:00

Sanday, Orkney. One of the islands. See it at ://www.sandayorkney.co.uk/ It is small - 19 square miles - with some 550 people, see ://www.sanday.co.uk/. A very small community, accessible by yet another ferry.
See the beach at ://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GejvYv5jqlQ/ And the lighthouse, at ://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I6iVGosFwLg

Fair use thumbnail from sO.geograph.org.uk/
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We had been looking for another distant relative, the McConaghy physician Dr. James Foster McConaghy, in the graveyards of Orkney and other lists; but now learn that he practised at Sanday for 10 years. See Ireland Road Ways, McConaghy Roots. He was given a silver tribute salver by the Sanday community, and its wording shows that he was much admired.

Dr. James Foster McConaghy, tribute salver, Sanday, Orkney, 1881

The engraving reads:

"To James Foster McConaghy, A.M., M.A., G.M., M.D.

In grateful remembrance

Of his high moral character,

His skill as a physician,

And his kindness to the poor.

From

The inhabitants of

Sanday, Orkney,

Where he practised for a period of ten years.

Sanday

16th January 1881"

He then went back to London for the sake of the children's education, and after his death, the family went on to Australia. so there are pieces to fit - need to refresh recollection on past delvings.

Here is part of the note we received from someone googling James, and whose mother bought the silver salver from silver vaults in London.

"Attached are some pictures which I hope are of interest to you.

"There is unlikely to be a connection between our families as my wife
remembers buying this plate with her mother at the silver vaults in London
around 1969.

"There is therefore 85 years of unaccounted history and I guess that the
plate may have been sold to fund the children's education in London or more
likely to fund their (either the boys or the girls) emigration to Australia.
No one would have taken an item as beautiful as this in their luggage in
those days. It certainly sets the record straight as to the good doctor's
character and makes the Hamilton position untenable !

The plate took pride of place on my mother-in-law's dining room dresser up
to her death in January this year. I had the idea of googling James Foster
McConaghy and you now know everything.

"I have included a picture of the hallmarks on the back which confirm the
plate is of sterling silver, manufactured in London by Martin Hall and
Company with a date letter of 1883. I presume William Sturrock of Edinburgh
will have been commissioned to engrave the plate.

"For a small island community such as Sanday to have commissioned this plate
shows the high esteem they must have held for their GP. I have just been on
the Sanday tourist site and see they are recruiting for a GP. Some things
never change!"

(signed)

Thank you.

Hallmarks, James McConaghy silver tribute salver, Sanday, Orkney, 1881

The Orkneyinga Saga - History of the Earls of Orkney. Rune Ing.

2008-03-12T17:29:00.004-04:00

Orkneyinga

Rune "Ing"

Leader, Conqueror, Fertility, Harmony?

The Norse colonized Orkney, with Harald Fairhair. Read the history of the colonization from Norway at ://www.orkneyjar.com/history/vikingorkney/index.html. The Earldoms were established about 850 AD.The runes that carry their stories include "Ing", or Ingvarr, meaning phallus, name of a god of fertility and conquering, or also called Yngvi, see ://www.arild-hauge.com/efuthark.htm/ See that site for clicks to runes of individual Scandinavian or Germanic peoples. Or Ingwaz, a rune of harmony. See Learning the Futhark, at http://www.runes.info/pieces/runepiece09.htm

Beginning with 874 AD, then read the list of the rulers of Orkney, fertile or conquering or harmonious, Ings all, in the Orkneyinga, and known as the Earls, at ://www.orkneyjar.com/history/vikingorkney/earls.htm. That list stops at 1231, and another takes over, "the Angus line" until 1321. After that, the Sinclair line 1379-1471, see ://sinclair.quarterman.org/who/earls_of_orkney.html

Events of the earliest times: the Norse took Rouen, France (now) in about 841; and established a settlement at Dublin in 853. Great period of Norse expansion. In 885, the Norse besieged Paris. Read the entire timeline at ://www.orkneyjar.com/history/timeline.htm.

That Orkneyjar website is excellent - hop from one topic to another. Then, read details of the lives and deaths of the Earls (much murder) at http://www.geocities.com/missourimule_2000/earlsoforkney.html.

This brings us to the Orkneyinga Saga, an actual document that lays out the lives of Earls from 900-1200 AD. The places where events occurred are still traceable, and you can follow with your guide pamphlet. The Saga is also in paperback (://www.amazon.com/Orkneyinga-Saga-History-Penguin-Classics/dp/0140443835).

At the Bishop's palace in particular, see the corridor where the assassin ducked into the shadows in front of the group, then leaped in behind the Bishop as he passed, and then ducked aside again. The Bishop, as I recall, immediately struck the man behind him, thinking that was the assailant, and it wasn't.

There are some 14 Saga sites.

Standing Stones of Stennis; Ring of Brodgar; Scapa Flow;

2007-10-13T10:42:00.002-04:00

Standing Stones, Stennis, Orkney; Ring of Brodgar, Orkney

Layers of culture. Standing stones. Ancient: Neolothic, Picts, Norse, Scots.

Scapa Flow. These lovely waterways also were the scenes of World War tragedies - //www.orcadian.co.uk/features/20thcentury/7.htm- October 13, 1939. Scapa Flow, the anchorage thought to be secure, was breached by the Germans and a battleship, The Royal Oak, lost. I believe this is Scapa Flow, but there are so many waterways I cannot be sure.

The site says that the first German bomb landing on British soil was here, at Hoy, Orkney. The "Old Man of Hoy" is a famous rock seastack, a sole upcropping chimney in the sea. Do an images search, or go to //www.orkney-seastacks.co.uk/oldman.htm

All in a name: "Orkney" is also The Orkney Islands, or The Orkneys. See easy source for this kind of noncontroversial subject at //en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orkney_Islands. The Wikipedia site is an excellent information and photo overview.

Read the news and find that the communities that are near these ancient places face the same issues as more accessible places - see http://www.orcadian.co.uk/archive/index.html. Wind turbines, football, drugs.

Standing Stones o' Stennis

2006-12-31T10:29:00.002-05:00

Standing Stones o 'Stenness. See the Timeline that puts them at 2800 BC, at ://www.orkneyjar.com/history/timeline.htm. The pyramids in Egypt were constructed about 2700 BC.

Standing Stones of Stenness, Orkney

The Standing Stones at Stenness are especially fine one because of the preservation - less trompled than Stonehenge, because these are off usual tourist tracks; and see the sea view, the still wild vistas, like those also found on Harris, in the Hebrides. Orkney sites. Good overview at Standing Stones o' Stenness.

See World Heritage writeup at World Heritage.

2006-12-15T20:56:00.000-05:00

Links

Technorati Profile

No third-party direct links in posts. Written web addresses instead. Regrets. Until the issues noted at www.bitlaw.com, in the internet and copyright areas are resolved (please, somebody - unleash the web somehow), we are not doing the blue underline quick-links.

Orkney; view near Kirkwall

2006-11-21T16:28:00.002-05:00

Orkney view, near Kirkwall

Orkney, near Kirkwall.

Orkney views are not as rough as I expected. People said that the Shetlands were mountainous, but these are agricultural, flattish, rocky shale, and lovely, but not fierce. This is Norse by settlement, and many places have Norse names. In the tales of King Arthur, as I remember, there was King Lot and his wife, Queen Morgause from Orkney. Long way to Cornwall.

The area is some 70 islands in all. And the Neolithic sites inland are part of the World Heritage sights. Being off the usual tourist track means they are less well known, but probably better preserved. There are also artist colonies here - lovely silk screening, for example.

Kirkwall is another main city, in addition to Stromness. There is an airport there. A good website for Kirkwall is www.undiscoveredscotland.co.uk/kirkwall/kirkwall/index.

More blogs about Orkney Road Ways.

Anchoring your road trips - Graveyards

2006-11-20T14:38:00.002-05:00

What do you do when you land, with car, off a ferry in a totally unknown place. We aim immediately out of the town, to anywhere for coffee, a look at the guidebook, and any place names from family - graveyards. See Geneologies: Graveyards and marriage/ death records. See www.genuki.org.uk/big/sct/OKI/ for Orkney records.

We were looking for distant relatives who lived here in the 19th Century for a time. We found them later at Sanday, but spent enjoyable hours in churchyards, up and down roads. There is a calming effect of graveyards.

Dr. James McConaghy: We were looking for family here, who moved from Scotland's in the 1800, the husband (a doctor), died, and the wife and children went to Australia. Trail then lost. We had not done any Orkney family-tracking source-work before leaving the US, however, because we never dreamed we'd end up here. So we did what we could by car, trooping around the graveyards and hoping to get lucky, rather than stay a day in records offices.

That was excellent. Graveyard wandering is pensive and the clues to life and death are like our own. Looking for names gave us exercise and gave us an anchor for stopping at every church yard we could - and strolling or running wildly through (if noone was around) to spot the names. One thing about driving yourself is this: you need to get up and run around.

2006-11-20T14:23:00.001-05:00

Ring of Brodgar, Standing Stones, Orkney

Ring of Brodgar Standing Stones www.scotland-inverness.co.uk/stones.htm. For an overview of the islands that comprise Orkney, see www.undiscoveredscotland.co.uk/usmapindexes/orkney. There is a map of the Orkney Islands there. Click on the towns and place names for the best overview.

These date from 2500-2000 BCE, see ://www.orkneyjar.com/history/brodgar/

We put the car on the Scrabness Ferry from Scotland mainland, and went the route past Hoy (that is a tall stovepipe stone formation called the Old Man of Hoy) to the town of Stromness. We had no reservations, so were on line at the ferry at 5:30 AM. Fun once in a while, and great food on the ferries. Huge breakfasts,with the addition of baked beans to the fried eggs, sausage, bacon, grilled tomatoes, mushrooms, breads. Big ferries, lots to walk around and see, or just nap.

Standing stones: if you get your pictures mixed, internet photos help identify. See that fine site for an overview of much of Orkney, at www.orkneyjar.com/history/brodgar/. There are some 27 of an original 60 stones originally set in the ground there, for more on the Ring of Brodgar. It is considered a "henge" because of the outer earthwork area, a large ditch. The alignments were important.

World Heritage at Orkney

2006-08-29T12:04:00.001-04:00

Overview: This is a World Heritage Site, see www.orkneyjar.com/history/worldheritagesite/index. Artists, sculptors, crafts. We missed the St. Magnus Festival, that started in 1977 by Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, see Financial Times June 7-8, 2008, at page 12 Life and Arts section.

We thought we would see barrens and isolated people - not so. See also www.hi-arts.co.uk/Default. That shows artists in Orkney. The rest of the address is: aspx.LocID-hianewlx6.RefLocID-hiacg5002.Lang-EN.htm;%20%3Ca%20.

See also www.tcweb.co.uk/art-in-orkney/page1. for specific artists' works.

Orkney artists' colonies. Orkney silkscreening. St. Magnus. ://www.stmagnusfestival.com. See lovely silk squares, shawls, painters, sculptors. Programs encourage artists to settle there. Crafters: you will enjoy it here. See the variety of crafts at www.scotexchange.net/news_item.htm?newsID=39492

St. Magnus Cathedral - founded by viking Earl Rognvald in 1137, to honor his uncle, Magnus Erlandson, Earl of Orkney, see ://gouk.about.com/od/picturegalleries/ig/Orkney-in-Pictures/St-Magnus-Cathedral.htm/

Scrabster to Kirkwall.

2006-07-06T16:28:00.002-04:00

Scrabster to Kirkwall. See map at www.orkneyjar.com/orkney/map. The benefit of a car.

Getting there - There is an airport at Kirkwall, see www.undiscoveredscotland.co.uk/kirkwall/kirkwall/index. We went by car ferry from Scrabster, Scotland. See www.scrabster.co.uk/ for Scrabster. Scrabster is near John o'Groats, the most northern tip of Scotland mainland. John o'Groats corresponds in the north to Land's End at the south, the tip of Cornwall, England. Seeing the British Isles from literal top to bottom.

If you have no reservations for the Scrabster ferry, get on line in the car at the ferry about 5:30 A.M. We were lucky - fine, big ferry with full Scottish breakfast -- baked beans, eggs, meats, mushrooms, tomatoes, breads, porridge. We waddled off. On the way, the ferry passes the Old Man of Hoy - a big rock. There was an old magical battle fought at Hoy, where the dead were revived to fight again. See orkneyaccommodation.co.uk/old_man_of_hoy. There you will find the Old Man of Hoy. The formation is called a seastack - see www.orkney-seastacks.co.uk/oldman.

The Old Man of Hoy is a favorite for climbers, but you will be on your own. See www.readingmountaineeringclub.org.uk/images/Hoy/image. Climbing the Old Man.

For getting around Orkney without a car, see www.orkneyjar.com.

Skara Brae settlement

2006-07-06T16:23:00.001-04:00

Skara Brae. People there for 6000 years. Until you are there, it is hard to appreciate just how old the cultures are that still show on Orkney. Look at this timeline, and see that Skara Brae settlement and the standing stones of Stenness was there 500 years before the pyramids in Egypt.

See www.orkney.org/tradition/timeline for a view of the history here, stretching so far back. Go to www.undiscoveredscotland.co.uk/kirkwall/kirkwall/index. for more on Kirkwall.

Get an overview of the historical sights at www.orkney.org/tradition/sites. See its museums at www.orkney.org/museums/index. Next time, I would get to the Orkneys fast, and spend a week there and on up to the Shetlands . See what we missed at www.undiscoveredscotland.co.uk/areashet/index. Shetland Islands. We broke our own rule. We saw a ferry sign to the Shetlands and did not hop on. No time! No time!

Bishop's Palace - ruin with tales

2006-07-06T16:19:00.001-04:00

A ruin not to miss. See the Bishop's Palace at www.orkneyjar.com/history/bishop.

This is a skeleton now, but one of the stories was a murder after services, where the assassin walked in front of the doomed after nightfall, in a small procession, and ducked into a wall cavity. As soon as the doomed man behind him passed(a King? A Bishop?), the assassin then immediately darted out again, stabbing the King/Bishop, and then ducked back again in the dark. The King/Bishop turned, and mistook the person behind him for the assassin, big melee and many deaths. Gives a whole scary flavor of reality to ruins.

There is a fine visitor's center with exhibits, and films. This was one of the stories, as I recall. Trying to find it and fix any wrong details. The fun of the research later.

NORSE SURNAMES, The SkarfR. Old Norse Cormorants on Water, Cliffs, and in (family) Trees

2005-07-05T11:28:00.001-04:00

Names. Important. Name a cow and she gives more milk, and those who study that fact get a Nobel Prize for Veterinary Science 2010, see ://www.vetsweb.com/news/ig-nobel-prize-naming-cows-raises-milk-yield-518.html/

Name us Skarf, as in the not-admirable Otkell Son of Skarf, and we look up more. The form SkarfR with the capital R at the end is also written in OW. Norse, Old Norse as Skarfr, and refers to skarfr -- "bird, green cormorant (Phalacrocorax pelagicus)" Also found as scraef, or scraeb; see Cormorant entering the English language in 1320, ://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Changes_to_Old_English_vocabulary/.

In the Runes, it becomes, accusative case (this is not our field) skarf, or s:karf\; with the spaces, punctuation symbols and slash. Find it at ://www.vikinganswerlady.com/ONMensNames.shtml/. Scroll down to SkarfR. Source there is given as NR s.n. SkarfR. NR means Lena Peterson's Nordiskt runnamnslexikon, a 2002 Dictionary of Names from Old Norse Runic Inscriptions, and see further identification at vikinganswerlady.com. The Nordiskt runnamnslexikon is not in English, so we are stumped.

It is also a by-name. Initial research is where the name, for us, ended up: In Ireland, see Scarf-Scharfe-Scharf. In Burnt Njall's Saga, where appears the in-admirable Otkell Son of Skarf, the motto on the old frontispiece for the Njall side is "But a short while is hand fain of blow." Fain means a warding off, a forbidding, contented, satisfied, constrained - not long before the hand blows yet again.

After that, a name that comes from Cormorant seems tame. It gets worse.

Skari is a young sea-gull.

Now we look at the Cormorant, with Skarfskerry just across the water in northern Scotland, the flat coastal farmland past the Highlands.

Cormorants have differing crests. They are black, a little coloring around the bill. The Phalacrocorax aurius has two crests, a double-crested cormorant. Those are little tufts that appear on the heads of both sexes in mating season These flourish in North America. They have taken over some small islands in Long Island Sound, and their droppings smother part of Maine. Poor snowy egrets, pretty as they are, find themselves pushed off. Bluefish and flounder numbers dwindle. It is a crime here to kill migratory birds, but folks have set out to do just that. A Michigan vigilante group killed 500, no action taken. There are indeed new rules now, allowing culling - read, egg-oiling and nest destruction.

There are 27-38 species, related to pelicans, frigate birds, anhingas - says March 2009's Natural History magazine, at page 255 (the source of the info so far). Richard J. King wrote it. Some cormorants can't fly - they are on the Galapagos. There are pygmy cormorants in Eastern Europe.

The Great Cormorants, like our double-crester: They can dive over 100 feet down in the water. In the Southern Hemisphere, they go down 475 feet. They build nests most anywhere - rocks, sand, you name it. They grunt. They do not sing.

Cormorant. There goes one. Look left.

Bible: I read that there is a reference to it as unclean, connected with death. Where? Or Milton, he writes of Satan sitting like a cormorant on the Tree of Life. Raven Ravenous. Shakespeare uses cormorant, the article in Natural History says, four times to mean "voracious."

But they eat less than a pelican; but their problem may be heightened visibility. Docks, bays, see them all over.

NORSE SURNAMES. Scharf - Everywhere the Vikings Went. Scharfe, Skarfr. Cormorant, and Construction roots, Scarff, sgarbh

2005-07-05T09:54:00.001-04:00

Norse roots elsewhere: The cormorant, and construction.

See Ireland, where Sgeir nan Sgarbh, or "skerry of the cormorants", is the Gaelic with the Norse root skarfr. See: A New History of Ireland, at //books.google.com/books?id=SJSDj1dDvNUC&pg=PA632&lpg=PA632&dq=cormorant+in+old+norse&source=bl&ots=Z-SDPG11yu&sig=DuZ6nziQ45ye9TdRW8o6ShyXqpw&hl=en&ei=JzkSTNigB8H7lweF6pjyBw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=3&ved=0CBkQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q&f=false/.

Skarf, scarf. Etymology Old Norse, see Etymology Online Dictionary: Another root line -- construction, not cormorant: good nest-builders?

"connecting joint," 1276, probably from O.N. skarfr "nail for fastening a joint." A general North Sea Gmc. ship-building word (cf. Du. scherf, Swed. skarf, Norw. skarv), the exact relationship of all these is unclear. Also borrowed into Romanic (cf. Fr. écart, Sp. escarba); perhaps ult. from P.Gmc. *skerf-, *skarf- (cf. O.E. sceorfan "to gnaw, bite").

The connections seem to continue between Norse roots and the name Skarf, Scharf, Scharfe. The ending "e" is arbitrary, added by my grandfather in 1890 or so in Ottawa where the family farms were, to distinguish his line from all the others relatives around, and so help out the post office), and other spellings.

See Surname Scharfe, Yorkshire, England - Vikings?. It fits the history. There are also many, many Jewish Scharfs we now find.

See the reference at the localhistories site here to Viking conquest of Orkney. See ://www.localhistories.org/viking.html/; and throughout Europe, Eastern Europe, Russia, trading with the Byzantine Empire. Now to look for Byzantine Scharfs. The name itself would predate the Middle German use of it; so we are not convinced the name was originally germanic; it went where the raiders went. And settled. And intermarried. And simply took. And slaved, and did what they did. Is that so? Would a slave or apprentice of a Viking take in any way the name of the Viking?

See the wingspan of the name - at Scarff spelling form, ://www.ancestry.com/facts/scarff-family-history.ashx/ and ://boards.ancestry.com/surnames.scarff/25/mb.ashx/.

NORSE SURNAMES. Stromness: and family name Norse Origins. Otkell, Son of Skarf

2005-07-05T00:24:00.001-04:00

Stromness; and family name Norse origins.

The main town is Stromness, an old Viking layout with the curved streets to defeat the winds, old cobbles. For more on Stromness, see www.undiscoveredscotland.co.uk/stromness/stromness/index.

Look up your birth name.

We found name-roots in Skarfskerry, Scotland, across the water; and scraeb. See en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Changes_to_Old_English_vocabulary-"

Cormorant was in the Old English vocabulary, 1320 Scrabster, then to Skarfskerry and Skarfr listed in Viking Men's Names at www.vikinganswerlady.com/ONMensNames. Skarfr green cormorant.
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Note to self on progress. Self?

We are reading old sagas.

In the Old Icelandic, for Skarfr, we went to www.northvegr.org/zoega/h369.php; and to the Old Irish (Vikings going a-viking) as Skafr at listserv.heanet.ie/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0307&L=old-irish-l&T=0&P=11459. Old Irish skafr for cormorant also. Icelandic Saga of Burnt Njall: son of Skarf: this is a limited quote for educational purposes that should not offend any copyright.

"...here was a man named Otkell; he was the son of Skarf, the son of Hallkell, who fought with Grim of Grimsness, and felled him on the holm. (1) This Hallkell and Kettlebjorn the Old were brothers.
Otkell kept house at Kirkby; his wife's name was Thorgerda; she was a daughter of Mar, the son of Runolf, the son of Naddad of the Faroe Isles. Otkell was wealthy in goods. His son's name was Thorgeir; he was young in years, and a bold dashing man."

From www.worldwideschool.org/library/books/lit/epics/TheStoryofBurntNjal/chap47.Son of Skarf.
Find a readable total version in paragraph form, see (our excerpt is from section 47. OF OTKELL IN KIRKBY) the Northvegr.org site at ://www.northvegr.org/lore/njal/017.php/.

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Skarfs around in Iceland, then scharfes in Ireland, earliest 1516 - back to Scotland; then off to Australia. What's in a name? John and Ann Scharf immigrated from Kilkenny to Ottawa River Valley, Ontario. Scariff - An Scairbh, Ireland at www.tageo.com/index-e-ei-v-03-d-447477.htm">An Scairbh, County Clare, alt.name Scariff. See also walks.iwai.ie/derg/scariff/ the site for Walks at Scariff. Linking back to ourselves, Ireland Road Ways.

NORSE SURNAMES. Surname roots - skarf, scarf, scharfe, scharf, cormorant, iron-forger

2005-05-05T11:36:00.000-04:00

Finding roots - recreation only. A birth name, Scharfe, with connections to the Shetlands and Iceland. See this fair-use quote (the whole thing is very long) at www.isle-of-man.com/manxnotebook.manxb. Do a search there for skarf. We had thought the name was somehow Irish, because in 1840, a Scharf pair (the e was later added for the convenience of the post office in Ottawa, Canada, to keep the households separate) came to Canada from Kilkenny.

"Scarff.Dr. Vigfusson suggests this name is probably derived (O.N.) skarð, ' a mountain . Then there is a reference to "see Gill"

SKARF is common in local names in Iceland, and we find scarf-gap in Cumberland, so that the surname may have been taken from one of the places so called. Other possible derivations are from skarði, 'hare-lip,' a nickname which was a frequent Danish proper name on Runic stones, or from skarf, 'a cormorant' which is used as a nickname in the Landndmaboc. The cormorant is still called the Scarf' in the Shetlands. SCHARF is found in the Hundred Rolls.

The name is now far less common.

MacSkerffe [1408], Skerf [1417], MacSkarff [1511], Scarff [1620]." [add Scaife? looks similar]

And another: ://www.northvegr.org/lore/landnamabok/019.php:

"45. This word Skard occurs often in the Book of Settlement and is worthy of special note as entering into the origin of many place names. Skard, as a common noun, means (1) a notch or chink in the edge of a thing, (2) a mountain pass, as in the phrase 'vestr yfir skordin' = west over the mountain passes; with this meaning it is used of the place names in the text, and also as the origin of many names in Iceland, e.g., Skard, Skord, Skardverjar = the men from Scard, Skardaleid = the way through Skard or the mountain pass (compare Scarf Gap, a pass in Cumberland). Skardsheidr, Skardsstrond, Vatnsdal's Skard, Ljosavatns Skard, Kerlingar Skard, Haukadale Skard, Geita Skard."

These quoted references are a small portion of the whole, so are fair use. If you disagree, let me know - not looking for difficulties and copyright is impossible to fathom.

For the Norse heading to Ireland, see http://irelandroadways.blogspot.com/2007_11_01_archive.html.