In a previous post I identified Blaeu's Dunamich as Dun an Sticer, arguing that somewhere between Pont's survey c 1600 and the production of Blaeu's Atlas of 1654, Pont's Dun a Mhic Phail became Blaeu's Dun a Mich. This predicated the fact that Pont named the dun after the nearest township, ScG Baile Mhic' Phail = Township of the son of Paul. There is no local tradition as to who Paul was so an element of mystery remains.
However the name currently used in Dun an Sticer. There is a typically gruesome Hebridean tale associated with it and provides evidence that the site was occupied in c1602. Certainly there is a more modern rectangular building placed inside the circular Iron Age broch structure.
The Canmore record for the site is extensive and ends with a survey completed in 2012. The last paragraph reads: "References to the story of Hugh, son of Archibald the Clerk, taking refuge at Dun an Sticer about 1601-1602 (OS Name Book 6, 78 (1877); Beveridge 1911) do not necessarily provide a date for the rectangular buildings on the island. Indeed, the substantial nature of the group and the evidence which demonstrates that the principal structure has been altered, probably on a number of occasions, may well indicate that the buildings are earlier, possibly originating in the medieval period."
The Royal Commission consistently use the spelling Dun an Sticer whilst the first edition OS mapping had used Sticir. The OS name book seems to have added the ScG an = the at a late stage as can be seen from the image of the entry.
Dun an Sticer is traditionally translated as Fort of the Skulker, from the ScG stiog referring to the story about the capture of Hugh. ScG Stiog = to skulk and so ScG stiogadh = skulker if my very limited grasp of ScG grammar is correct.
However with the broch site being built in the Iron Age, there is every chance that there was a name that predated the c1602 incident and so there is a possibility that the ScG interpretation of fort of the skulker is a folk etymology.
An alternative ScG interpretation could come from ScG stiogha = path, from the loan word ON stigr. Fort of the path does make some sort of sense with the fort guarding the route from the obvious harbour, Port nan Long, on to the rich band of machair to the south. There is perhaps here a similarity with Kallin on Grimsay, another excellent natural harbour, which is marked as Stig on the early maps.
Stiogha (or something derived from it) occurs regularly in ScG place names with, for example, Cox recording ten in the Carloway region of Lewis.
The area is rich in Norse place-names and so an ON etymology must be a good possibility. There are other Dun place names on Uist where the ScG Dun has been placed in front of an ON name. Dun Torcusay would be an example.
Icelandic þekja = thatched roof with Icelandic þekjur = thatched rooves would be a good description of the site. Henderson recognizes the transition from ON þ to ScG st and so Ic þekjur become stekjur and hence to sticer relatively straightforwardly. This link takes you to a page giving the pronunciation of the Ic þekja.. The Norwegian version of Ic þak, No tak occurs is several place-names such as Takset.
One can imagine the history of the place-name then as follows. The Norse arrive and the broch still has a roof and they call it þekjur. It would have been a prominent building in the landscape. After the Norse left, the Gaels do not understand the meaning of þekjur but use stekjur as the name. and since there is a dun there, they call the fort Dun Stekjur. This evolves to Dun Sticir with the story of Hugh, the skulker to provide a meaning for the name. The OS name book tries then to tidy the grammar by adding the ScG an to from Dun an Sticir and then finally in the modern era the name changes to Dun an Sticer
One other small piece of evidence for the interpretation of it as a name with roots in ON is the name of the loch in which the dun sits. If the Gaels understood the name as just referring to the dun, then one would reasonably expect them to call that loch Loch Dun Sticir or some variant thereof, following for example Loch Dun Mhurchaidh on Benbecula. The fact the loch is called Loch an Sticir (note that it has not had the i changed to an e for some reason!) would indicate that the Gaels thought the Sticir referred to the area rather than just the dun and to refer to an area as "the skulker" seems unlikely.