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AFRICA, Affrica: A favorite female name in the twelfth century which continued in use for four or five hundred years later. It is also found at a much earlier date in Ireland: Affrick, abbess of Kildare, died in 739 (Annols of Clonmacnoise). Affreka or Affrica, daughter of Duncan, earl of Fife, became the first wife of Harald, earl of Orkney (Ork. Saga, p. 88; Skene, CS., I, p. 481). Afreka or Affrica, daughter of Fergus, lord of Galloway, married Olaf, king of the Islands, and was mother of Godfrey, ring of Man and the Hebrides, who reigned till 1187 (Early sources, II, p. 467). Aufrikr or Affrica, one of the illegitimate daughters of William the Lion, was married to William de Say (Foedera, I, pt. 2, p. 776). Godfrey, king of Man and the Hebrides, married Findguala, daughter of Muirchartach, king of Ireland, and their daughter Affrika was married to John de Courcy (Chron. Man., I, p. 80). Affrica, daughter of Edgar, son of Duuenald of Stranith, granted to the bishop of Glasgow the church of S. Brigide of Wintertonegan in the valley of the Niht (Nithsdale) in 1227 (REG., p. 120). Effrick, daughter of Coline, lord of Carrick, was mother of Coline or Callen More (HP., II, p. 84), and Eafric or Effric neyn Coigitill wrote a poem on the death of her husband MacNeill of Gigha, c. 1470 (Lismore, p. 96). Effric Makfatrik had sasine of lands of Killenane in Cowal in 1504 and in 1515 (ER., XII, p. 717,719), and as Affrica Makpatrik is again in record in 1525 as daughter of Duncan Macpatric in Cowal (RMS). An Effreta Maclachian is in record in 1570 (Poltalloch writs, p. 144) and Africk McQuhollaster is mentioned in a charter of wadset of 1571 (Scrymgeour family docs., p. 21). The name appears to have been originally that of a river goddess, Afraig (Aithbrecc mod. Gaelic Aithbreac, 'somewhat speckled'), the goddess of the (river-) ford. The name survived into the eighteenth century as Effrick = Oighrig, and absurdly Englished Euphemial. — The Surnames of Scotland (1946) by George Fraser Black (1866-1948)