_Arthur's Seat and Salisbury Craigs_ (Vol. iii., p. 119.).--L. M. M. R. is
informed that there is a tradition of King Arthur having defeated the
Saxons in the neighbourhood of this hill, to the top of which he ascended
for the purpose of viewing the country.
In the _Encyclopædia Britannica_ we have another explanation also (_sub
voce_), as follows:--
"Arthur's Seat is said to be derived, or rather corrupted, from A'rd
Seir, a 'place or field of arrows,' where people shot at a mark: and
this not improperly; for, among these cliffs is a dell, or recluse
valley, where the wind can scarcely reach, now called the Hunter's Bog,
the bottom of it being a morass."
The article concludes thus:
"The adjacent crags are supposed to have taken their name from the Earl
of Salisbury; who, in the reign of Edward III., accompanied that prince
in an expedition against the Scots."
But query "a height of earth;" "earthes" (an old form of the genitive), or
"airthes height," not unnaturally corrupted to "Arthur's Seat."