Tarbert (Scottish Gaelic: An Tairbeart) is a place name in Scotland and Ireland.
Places named Tarbert are characterised by a narrow strip of land, or isthmus.
All placenames that variously show up as tarbert, tarbat or tarbet in their anglicised form derive from either the Irish or Scottish Gaelic an tairbeart, commonly translated as "the isthmus" today.
[2] Both these words derive from two Old Irish elements, tar "across" and a nominalised form of the verb ber "to carry".
In English language spellings the first syllable "tar" has generally remained constant but the second syllable "bert" has variously been spelled as "bart", "bert" "bat", "bad" etc.