Angus Og MacDonald

M, #3421, b. circa 1450, d. 1490

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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  • Birth*: Angus was born circa 1450 in Scotland.1,2
  • Marriage*: He married Lady Margaret (?) before 1490.1
  • Death*: Angus died in 1490 in Inverness, Inverness-shire, Scotland.1
  • Biography*: Aonghas Óg (died 1490) was a Scottish nobleman who was the last independent Lord of the Isles. Aonghas became a rebel against both his father and against the Scottish crown, in a civil clan war which would see the end of the independent Lordship of the Isles.

    Biography
    Angus was born the bastard son of John of Islay, Earl of Ross (Eoin). In time, Aonghas would become a rebel against both his father and against the Scottish crown. He is not to be confused with his namesake, Aonghas Óg, Lord of Islay, who fought alongside Robert the Bruce.

    After the discovery in 1476 of a secret treaty made by John of Islay with Edward IV of England by James III of Scotland, James stripped Ross of his earldom, as well as the sheriffdoms of Nairn and Inverness, and the lordships of Kintyre and Knapdale, but confirmed Eoin with the remainder of his lands and the title Lord of the Isles. It appears that Aonghas, as Eoin's heir, was not prepared to accept this settlement. Aonghas campaigned to regain Ross and the other lost dominions. At first he may have been supported by his father, but this did not last. Aonghas married Isobella Campbell daughter of Colin Campbell, 1st Earl of Argyll.

    Eoin, his prestige in tatters, was driven from Islay by his son. Eoin managed to gather support among the MacGill'Eain ("MacLean") kindred of Duart, the MacLeoid kindred of Lewis and Harris, and MacNeill kindred of Barra, as well as the Scottish crown and John Stewart, Earl of Atholl; but Aonghas had the important support of Domhnall Ballach and the rest of the MacDomhnaill kindred.

    Rebellion and war
    Aonghas gathered his forces and those of his allies against the armies of his father, and a great sea battle took place near Tobermory, the Battle of the Bloody Bay, probably in the year 1481, in which Aonghas defeated the galleys of his father's west highland allies. In the same year, another battle took place at Lagabraad, in which Aonghas defeated a royal army led by the Earl of Atholl. According to Hugh MacDonald's History of the MacDonalds, 517 of Atholl's men were slain. Aonghas followed up his victory by retaking control of Dingwall Castle and Easter Ross.

    Aonghas had benefitted from political distractions in the south. By 1483 those distractions were over, and the earl of Atholl and earl of Huntly were able to bring their presence to bear on the north, forcing Aonghas to retreat back to the west. However, the great magnate rebellion of 1488 gave Aonghas another chance to move east and Aonghas was able to seize control of Inverness.

    Death and legacy
    In 1490 Aonghas had his throat cut while he was sleeping. The murderer was his Irish harpist, Dairmaid O'Cairbre, who carried out the act for reasons which remain unclear. Following Aonghas' death, the crown launched a new campaign against the power of the Lord of the Isles, and Aonghas' son Domhnall Dubh was captured by Colin Campbell, 1st Earl of Argyll. Aonghas' death would see the effective end of the independent Lordship of the Isles. Henceforth the power of the Stewarts and the Crown of Scotland would be greatly increased. He also left a daughter named Màiri.3

Family: Lady Margaret (?) b. c 1475

  • Last Edited: 16 Aug 2015

Citations

  1. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.
  2. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_of_Islay,_Earl_of_Ross.
  3. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aonghas_%C3%93g

(?) (?) Earl of Argyll

M, #3422, b. circa 1450

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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  • Birth*: (?) was born circa 1450 in Scotland.1

Family:

  • Last Edited: 1 Apr 2015

Citations

  1. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.

Lady Margaret (?)

F, #3423, b. circa 1475

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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Family: Angus Og MacDonald b. c 1450, d. 1490

  • Last Edited: 16 Aug 2015

Citations

  1. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.

Donald Dubh MacDonald

M, #3424, b. before 1490, d. 1545

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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  • Birth*: Donald was born before 1490 in Scotland.1
  • Death*: Donald died in 1545 in Drogheda, Ireland.1,2
  • Biography*: Domhnall Dubh (died 1545) was a Scottish nobleman. He was the son of Aonghas Óg, chief of Clan Donald (Clann Domhnaill), and claimant to the Lordship of the Isles, which had been held by his grandfather John of Islay, Earl of Ross (Eoin MacDomhnaill). While just an infant, Domhnall Dubh was captured by Cailean I, Earl of Argyll and imprisoned in Innischonnel Castle in Loch Awe. He remained in captivity for most of his life. He died at Drogheda, Ireland, in 1545.

    Early life
    Domhnall Dubh's was born in the late 15th century in the Western isles of Scotland, the son of Aonghas Óg, chief of Clan Donald, and the grandson of John of Islay, Earl of Ross, and Lord of the Isles. In 1476 John of Islay was stripped by the Scottish crown of many of his lands and titles, retaining the title Lord of the Isles, but only at the pleasure of the Crown. Domhnall's father Aonghas, disgusted by this family humiliation, turned against John of islay, rebelling against first his father and then the Scottish crown, both of which he defeated before being murdered by his Irish musician in 1490. Following Aonghas' death in 1490, the crown launched a new campaign against the rebels of the north-west. Domhnall Dubh, who was then just an infant, was captured by Cailean I, Earl of Argyll. Domhnall was imprisoned in Innischonnel Castle in Loch Awe.

    Escape from captivity
    In 1501 Domhnall escaped, with the aid of Torcall MacLeòid, who may have had the connivance of the earl of Argyll. Torcall was looking for a way to resist the power of his enemy Alexander Gordon, the earl of Huntly, who was acting as the King's lieutenant. On August 13, 1502, a royal council decreed that Torcall was guilty of rebellion and had no right to the lands under his possession. Huntly was ordered to gather forces in the north and take possession of the MacLeoid lands. Moreover, the king prepared to deliver Eoin, now a semi-retired courtier, back to the lordship in order to counter the effect given by the presence of Domhnall Dubh. Eoin, however, never made the trip. Eoin took ill and died at Dundee in 1503. Torcall and his ally Lachlan MacGill'Eain of Duart took the offensive against Huntly, and in December 1503 invaded and wrought devastation to Huntly's Lordship of Badenoch. The royal island of Bute was also attacked by the islesmen. The revolt continued until 1506, by which time Lachlan MacGill'Eain had been detached from the cause, and Huntly's forces were able to isolate Torcall and Domhnall in the Outer Hebrides. In September 1506, after just 5 years of freedom, Domhnall was again captured.

    He remained in captivity for 37 years until he was released in 1543. The north-west rose in revolt once more. After securing an alliance with England, Domhnall found himself in with a good chance of resurrecting the Lordship of the Isles. However, this chance was destroyed when Domhnall died at Drogheda, Ireland, in 1545.2
  • Last Edited: 16 Aug 2015

Citations

  1. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.
  2. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domhnall_Dubh

David I (?) King of the Scots1

M, #3425, b. between 1080 and 1085, d. 24 May 1153

David I, King of Scots

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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  • Birth*: David was born between 1080 and 1085 in Scotland.2,3
  • Marriage*: He married Maud (?) of Northumberland, Queen of the Scots, daughter of Waltheof (?) Earl of Northumbria and Huntingdon and Judith (?) of Lens, circa 1114.4
  • Death*: David I (?) King of the Scots died on 24 May 1153 in Scotland.3
  • Burial*: He was buried after 24 May 1153 in Dunfermline Abbey, Dunfermline, Fife, Scotland.3
  • Biography*: David was king from 1124 to 1153.

    He gained the title of Prince David of Cumbria in 1107. As a result of his marriage, David 1st 'the Saint', King of Scotland was styled as Earl of Huntingdon circa 1113. As a result of his marriage, David I 'the Saint', King of Scotland was styled as Earl of Northampton circa 1113. He succeeded to the title of King David 1st of the Scots on 23 April 1124.

    This influential king established a basic form of central government; issued the first royal coinage; built the castle nuclei of Berwick, Edinburgh, and Stirling; and stengthened Angle-Norman aristocratic and feudal influence in Scotland. This followed his early years at the court of England's Henry I, David's brother-in-law, where he was 1st. Earl of Huntingdon. From 1136 David fought for his neice Matilda against Stephen in the English civil wars, and secured parts of Cumberland and Northumberland for himself. He modified Scottish Christianity (5 bishoprics founded) and established great Lowland abbeys on mainstream West European lines. Succeeded by his grandson, Malcolm 4th.

    Early Years

    The early years of David I are the most obscure of his life. Because there is little documented evidence, historians can only guess at most of David's activities in this period.

    Childhood and flight to England

    David was born on a date unknown in 1084 in Scotland. He was probably the eighth son of King Máel Coluim mac Donnchada, and certainly the sixth and youngest produced by Máel Coluim's second marriage to Queen Margaret. He was the grandson of the ill fated King Duncan I.

    In 1093 King Máel Coluim and David's brother Edward were killed at the River Aln during an invasion of Northumberland. David and his two brothers Alexander and Edgar, both future kings of Scotland, were probably present when their mother died shortly afterwards. According to later medieval tradition, the three brothers were in Edinburgh when they were besieged by their uncle, Domnall Bán.

    Domnall became King of Scotland. It is not certain what happened next, but an insertion in the Chronicle of Melrose states that Domnall forced his three nephews into exile, although he was allied with another of his nephews, Edmund. John of Fordun wrote, centuries later, that an escort into England was arranged for them by their maternal uncle Edgar Ætheling.

    Intervention of William Rufus and English exile

    William Rufus, King of England, opposed Domnall's accession to the northerly kingdom. He sent the eldest son of Máel Coluim, David's half-brother Donnchad, into Scotland with an army. Donnchad was killed within the year, and so in 1097 William sent Donnchad's half-brother Edgar into Scotland. The latter was more successful, and was crowned King by the end of 1097.

    During the power struggle of 1093–97, David was in England. In 1093, he may have been about nine years old. From 1093 until 1103 David's presence cannot be accounted for in detail, but he appears to have been in Scotland for the remainder of the 1090s. When William Rufus was killed, his brother Henry Beauclerc seized power and married David's sister, Matilda. The marriage made David the brother-in-law of the ruler of England. From that point onwards, David was probably an important figure at the English court. Despite his Gaelic background, by the end of his stay in England, David had become a full-fledged Normanised prince. William of Malmesbury wrote that it was in this period that David "rubbed off all tarnish of Scottish barbarity through being polished by intercourse and friendship with us"

    Prince of the Cumbrians, 1113–1124

    David's time as Prince of the Cumbrians and Earl marks the beginning of his life as a great territorial lord. His earldom probably began in 1113, when Henry I arranged David's marriage to Maud, 2nd Countess of Huntingdon, who was the heiress to the Huntingdon–Northampton lordship. As her husband, David used the title of Earl, and there was the prospect that David's children by her would inherit all the honours borne by Matilda's father Waltheof. 1113 is the year when David, for the first time, can be found in possession of territory in what is now Scotland.

    Obtaining the inheritance

    David's brother, King Edgar, had visited William Rufus in May 1099 and bequeathed to David extensive territory to the south of the river Forth. On 8 January 1107, Edgar died. It has been assumed that David took control of his inheritance – the southern lands bequeathed by Edgar – soon after the latter's death. However, it cannot be shown that he possessed his inheritance until his foundation of Selkirk Abbey late in 1113. According to Richard Oram, it was only in 1113, when Henry returned to England from Normandy, that David was at last in a position to claim his inheritance in southern "Scotland".

    King Henry's backing seems to have been enough to force King Alexander to recognise his younger brother's claims. This probably occurred without bloodshed, but through threat of force nonetheless. David's aggression seems to have inspired resentment amongst some native Scots. A Gaelic quatrain from this period complains that:

    Olc a ndearna mac Mael Colaim,      It's bad what Máel Coluim's son has done;,
    ar cosaid re hAlaxandir,       dividing us from Alexander;
    do-ní le gach mac rígh romhaind,      he causes, like each king's son before;
    foghail ar faras Albain.       the plunder of stable Alba.

    If "divided from" is anything to go by, this quatrain may have been written in David's new territories in southern Scotland.

    The lands in question consisted of the pre-1975 counties of Roxburghshire, Selkirkshire, Berwickshire, Peeblesshire and Lanarkshire. David, moreover, gained the title princeps Cumbrensis, Prince of the Cumbrians", as attested in David's charters from this era. Although this was a large slice of Scotland south of the river Forth, the region of Galloway-proper was entirely outside David's control.

    David may perhaps have had varying degrees of overlordship in parts of Dumfriesshire, Ayrshire, Dunbartonshire and Renfrewshire. In the lands between Galloway and the Principality of Cumbria, David eventually set up large-scale marcher lordships, such as Annandale for Robert de Brus, Cunningham for Hugh de Morville, and possibly Strathgryfe for Walter Fitzalan.

    In England

    n the later part of 1113, King Henry gave David the hand of Matilda of Huntingdon, daughter and heiress of Waltheof, Earl of Northumberland. The marriage brought with it the "Honour of Huntingdon", a lordship scattered through the shires of Northampton, Huntingdon, and Bedford; within a few years, Matilda bore a son, whom David named Henry after his patron.

    The new territories which David controlled were a valuable supplement to his income and manpower, increasing his status as one of the most powerful magnates in the Kingdom of the English. Moreover, Matilda's father Waltheof had been Earl of Northumberland, a defunct lordship which had covered the far north of England and included Cumberland and Westmorland, Northumberland-proper, as well as overlordship of the bishopric of Durham. After King Henry's death, David would revive the claim to this earldom for his son Henry.

    David's activities and whereabouts after 1114 are not always easy to trace. He spent much of his time outside his principality, in England and in Normandy. Despite the death of his sister on 1 May 1118, David still possessed the favour of King Henry when his brother Alexander died in 1124, leaving Scotland without a king.

    Political and military events in Scotland during David's kingship

    Michael Lynch and Richard Oram portray David as having little initial connection with the culture and society of the Scots; but both likewise argue that David became increasingly re-Gaelicised in the later stages of his reign. Whatever the case, David's claim to be heir to the Scottish kingdom was doubtful. David was the youngest of eight sons of the fifth from last king. Two more recent kings had produced sons. William fitz Duncan, son of King Donnchad I2nd and Máel Coluim, son of the last king Alexander, both preceded David in terms of the slowly emerging principles of primogeniture. However, unlike David, neither William nor Máel Coluim had the support of Henry. So when Alexander died in 1124, the aristocracy of Scotland could either accept David as King, or face war with both David and Henry I.

    Coronation and struggle for the kingdom

    Alexander's son Máel Coluim chose war. Orderic Vitalis reported that Máel Coluim mac Alaxandair "affected to snatch the kingdom from [David], and fought against him two sufficiently fierce battles; but David, who was loftier in understanding and in power and wealth, conquered him and his followers". Máel Coluim escaped unharmed into areas of Scotland not yet under David's control, and in those areas gained shelter and aid.

    In either April or May of the same year, David was crowned King of Scotland (Gaelic: rí(gh) Alban; Latin: rex Scottorum)[34] at Scone. If later Scottish and Irish evidence can be taken as evidence, the ceremony of coronation was a series of elaborate traditional rituals, of the kind infamous in the Anglo-French world of the 12th century for their "unchristian" elements. Ailred of Rievaulx, friend and one-time member of David's court, reported that David "so abhorred those acts of homage which are offered by the Scottish nation in the manner of their fathers upon the recent promotion of their kings, that he was with difficulty compelled by the bishops to receive them".

    Outside his Cumbrian principality and the southern fringe of Scotland-proper, David exercised little power in the 1120s, and in the words of Richard Oram, was "king of Scots in little more than name". He was probably in that part of Scotland he did rule for most of the time between late 1127 and 1130. However, he was at the court of Henry in 1126 and in early 1127, and returned to Henry's court in 1130, serving as a judge at Woodstock for the treason trial of Geoffrey de Clinton. It was in this year that David's wife, Matilda of Huntingdon, died. Possibly as a result of this, and while David was still in southern England, Scotland-proper rose up in arms against him.

    The instigator was, again, his nephew Máel Coluim, who now had the support of Óengus of Moray. King Óengus was David's most powerful vassal, a man who, as grandson of King Lulach of Scotland, even had his own claim to the kingdom. The rebel Scots had advanced into Angus, where they were met by David's Mercian constable, Edward; a battle took place at Stracathro near Brechin. According to the Annals of Ulster, 1000 of Edward's army, and 4000 of Óengus' army – including Óengus himself – died.

    According to Orderic Vitalis, Edward followed up the killing of Óengus by marching north into Moray itself, which, in Orderic's words, "lacked a defender and lord"; and so Edward, "with God's help obtained the entire duchy of that extensive district". However, this was far from the end of it. Máel Coluim escaped, and four years of continuing civil war followed; for David this period was quite simply a "struggle for survival".

    It appears that David asked for and obtained extensive military aid from King Henry. Ailred of Rievaulx related that at this point a large fleet and a large army of Norman knights, including Walter l'Espec, were sent by Henry to Carlisle in order to assist David's attempt to root out his Scottish enemies. The fleet seems to have been used in the Irish Sea, the Firth of Clyde and the entire Argyll coast, where Máel Coluim was probably at large among supporters. In 1134 Máel Coluim was captured and imprisoned in Roxburgh Castle. Since modern historians no longer confuse him with "Malcolm MacHeth", it is clear that nothing more is ever heard of Máel Coluim mac Alaxadair, except perhaps that his sons were later allied with Somerled.

    Pacification of the west and north

    Richard Oram puts forward the suggestion that it was during this period that David granted Walter fitz Alan the kadrez of Strathgryfe, with northern Kyle and the area around Renfrew, forming what would become the "Stewart" lordship of Strathgryfe; he also suggests that Hugh de Morville may have gained the kadrez of Cunningham and the settlement of "Strathyrewen" (i.e. Irvine). This would indicate that the 1130–34 campaign had resulted in the acquisition of these territories.

    How long it took to pacify Moray is not known, but in this period David appointed his nephew William fitz Duncan to succeed Óengus, perhaps in compensation for the exclusion from the succession to the Scottish throne caused by the coming of age of David's son Henry. William may have been given the daughter of Óengus in marriage, cementing his authority in the region. The burghs of Elgin and Forres may have been founded at this point, consolidating royal authority in Moray. David also founded Urquhart Priory, possibly as a "victory monastery", and assigned to it a percentage of his cain (tribute) from Argyll.

    During this period too, a marriage was arranged between the son of Matad, Mormaer of Atholl, and the daughter of Haakon Paulsson, Earl of Orkney. The marriage temporarily secured the northern frontier of the Kingdom, and held out the prospect that a son of one of David's Mormaers could gain Orkney and Caithness for the Kingdom of Scotland. Thus, by the time Henry I died on 1 December 1135, David had more of Scotland under his control than ever before.

    Dominating the north

    While fighting King Stephen and attempting to dominate northern England in the years following 1136, David was continuing his drive for control of the far north of Scotland. In 1139, his cousin, the five-year-old Harald Maddadsson, was given the title of "Earl" and half the lands of the earldom of Orkney, in addition to Scottish Caithness. Throughout the 1140s Caithness and Sutherland were brought back under the Scottish zone of control.

    Sometime before 1146 David appointed a native Scot called Aindréas to be the first Bishop of Caithness, a bishopric which was based at Halkirk, near Thurso, in an area which was ethnically Scandinavian.

    In 1150, it looked like Caithness and the whole earldom of Orkney were going to come under permanent Scottish control. However, David's plans for the north soon began to encounter problems. In 1151, King Eystein 2nd of Norway put a spanner in the works by sailing through the waterways of Orkney with a large fleet and catching the young Harald unaware in his residence at Thurso. Eystein forced Harald to pay fealty as a condition of his release. Later in the year David hastily responded by supporting the claims to the Orkney earldom of Harald's rival Erlend Haraldsson, granting him half of Caithness in opposition to Harald. King Eystein responded in turn by making a similar grant to this same Erlend, cancelling the effect of David's grant. David's weakness in Orkney was that the Norwegian kings were not prepared to stand back and let him reduce their power.2,3

Family: Maud (?) of Northumberland, Queen of the Scots b. c 1074, d. bt 23 Apr 1130 - 22 Apr 1131

  • Last Edited: 10 Jan 2016

Citations

  1. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_I_of_Scotland
  2. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.
  3. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10216.htm#i102157
  4. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10293.htm#i102926
  5. [S218] Stewart Ross, Monarchs of Scotland.

Malcolm IV (?) King of Scots

M, #3426, b. circa 1125

Malcolm IV
(Máel Coluim mac Eanric)
Malcolm, by God's Rule King of the Scots

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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  • Birth*: Malcolm was born circa 1125 in Scotland.2,1
  • Biography*: Malcolm was king from 1153 to 1165.

    Malcolm IV (Mediaeval Gaelic: Máel Coluim mac Eanric; Modern Gaelic: Maol Chaluim mac Eanraig), nicknamed Virgo, "the Maiden" (between 23 April and 24 May 1141 – 9 December 1165), King of Scots, was the eldest son of Henry, Earl of Huntingdon and Northumbria (died 1152) and Ada de Warenne. The original Malcolm Canmore, a name now associated with his great-grandfather Malcolm III (Máel Coluim mac Donnchada), he succeeded his grandfather David I, and shared David's Anglo-Norman tastes.
    Called Malcolm the Maiden by later chroniclers, a name which may incorrectly suggest weakness or effeminacy to modern readers, he was noted for his religious zeal and interest in knighthood and warfare. For much of his reign he was in poor health and died unmarried at the age of twenty-four.

    Earl Henry, possibly seriously ill in the 1140s, died unexpectedly at Newcastle or Roxburgh on 12 June 1152, in a Northumbrian domain which David I and he had attached to the Scots crown in the period of English weakness after the death of Henry I of England. Unlike the death of William Adelin in the White Ship, which had left Henry I without male heirs, Earl Henry had three sons. Thus, although his death damaged David's plans and made disorder after his death more likely, it was not a disaster.

    Malcolm, the eldest of Earl Henry's sons though only eleven years old, was sent by his grandfather on a circuit of the kingdom, accompanied by Donnchad, Mormaer of Fife. Donnchad had been styled rector, perhaps indicating that he was to hold the regency for Malcolm on David's death. Donnchad and Malcolm were accompanied by a large army. Donnchad did not outlive David for long, holding the regency for a year before his death in 1154.

    Rivals and neighbours
    Malcolm's grandfather died at Carlisle on 24 May 1153, and Malcolm was inaugurated as king on 27 May 1153 at Scone at age twelve. The coronation took place before the old king was buried, which might appear hasty, but Malcolm was not without rivals for the kingship.

    The Orkneyinga Saga claims "William the Noble", son of William fitz Duncan, was the man whom "every Scotsman wanted for his king". As William fitz Duncan married Alice de Rumilly c. 1137, young William can only have been a youth, perhaps a child. There is no sign that William made any claims to the throne. He died young, c. early 1160s, leaving his sizable estates to his three sisters. Of William's other sons, Bishop Wimund was already blinded, emasculated and imprisoned at Byland Abbey before David's death, but Domnall mac Uilleim, first of the Meic Uilleim, had considerable support in the former mormaerdom of Moray.

    Another contender, imprisoned at Roxburgh since about 1130, was Máel Coluim mac Alaxandair, an illegitimate son of Alexander I. Máel Coluim's sons were free men in 1153. They could be expected to contest the succession, and did so.

    As a new and young king Malcolm received challenges from his neighbours, with Somerled, King of Argyll, Fergus, Lord of Galloway and Henry II, King of England foremost among them. Only Rognvald Kali Kolsson, Earl of Orkney, was otherwise occupied, on a crusade, and his death in 1158 brought the young and ambitious Harald Maddadsson to sole power in the north.

    The first opposition to Malcolm came in November 1153, from the combination of a neighbour, Somerled of Argyll, and family rivals, the sons of Máel Coluim mac Alaxandair. This had little success as Somerled soon had more pressing concerns: his war with Godred Olafson of Man lasting until 1156 and a possible conflict with Gille Críst, Mormaer of Menteith, over Cowal. Support for the sons of Máel Coluim mac Alaxandair may also have come from areas closer to the core of the kingdom; two conspirators are named by chroniclers, one of whom died in trial by combat in February 1154.

    In 1157, it is reported, King Malcolm was reconciled with Máel Coluim MacHeth, who was appointed to the Mormaerdom of Ross, which had probably been held by his father.

    Malcolm was not only King of Scots, but also inherited the Earldom of Northumbria, which his father and grandfather had gained during the wars between Stephen and Empress Matilda. Malcolm granted Northumbria to his brother William, keeping Cumbria for himself. Cumbria was, like the earldoms of Northumbria and Huntingdon, and later Chester, a fief of the English crown. While Malcolm delayed doing homage to Henry II of England for his possessions in Henry's kingdom, he did so in 1157 at Peveril Castle in Derbyshire and later at Chester. Here Henry refused to allow Malcolm to keep Cumbria, or William to keep Northumbria, but instead granted the Earldom of Huntingdon to Malcolm, for which Malcolm did homage.

    After a second meeting between Malcolm and Henry, at Carlisle in 1158, "they returned without having become good friends, and so that the king of Scots was not yet knighted." In 1159 Malcolm accompanied Henry to France, serving at the siege of Toulouse where he was, at last, knighted. "Whether this was the act of a king of Scots or of an earl of Huntingdon we are not told; it was certainly the act of a man desperate for knightly arms, but that did not make it any more acceptable in Scotland."

    Malcolm returned from Toulouse in 1160. At Perth, Roger of Hoveden reports, he faced a rebellion by six earls, led by Ferchar, Mormaer of Strathearn, who besieged the king. Given that Earl Ferchar heads the list of those named, it is presumed that Donnchad II, Mormaer of Fife, was not among the rebels. John of Fordun's version in the Gesta Annalia appears to suggest a peaceful settlement to the affair, and both Fordun and Hoveden follow the report of the revolt and its ending by stating that the king led an expedition into Galloway where he eventually defeated Fergus, Lord of Galloway and took his son Uchtred as a hostage while Fergus became a monk at Holyrood, dying there in 1161. While it was assumed that the earls included Fergus among their number, and that the expedition to Galloway was related to the revolt, it is now thought that the earls sought to have Malcolm attack Galloway, perhaps as a result of raids by Fergus.

    Some time before July 1163, when he did homage to Henry II, Malcolm was taken seriously ill at Doncaster. Scottish sources report that a revolt in Moray brought Malcolm north, and it is said that he
    “     removed [the men of Moray] from the land of their birth, as of old Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, had dealt with the Jews, and scattered them throughout the other districts of Scotland, both beyond the [Mounth] and this side thereof, so that not even one native of that land abode there.”

    Having made peace with Henry, replaced Fergus of Galloway with his sons, and resettled Moray, only one of Malcolm's foes remained, Somerled, by 1160 king of the Isles as well as of Argyll. In 1164, Somerled led a large army of Islesmen and Irishmen to attack Glasgow and Renfrew, where Walter Fitzalan had newly completed a castle. There Somerled and his son Gillebrigte were killed in battle with the levies of the area, led by the Bishop of Glasgow, probably Herbert of Selkirk at that time. The chronicles of the day attributed the victory to the intercession of Saint Kentigern.

    Death and posterity
    Malcolm died on 9 December 1165 at Jedburgh, aged twenty-four. His premature death may have been hastened by Paget's disease (a chronic disorder that typically results in enlarged and deformed bones). While his contemporaries were in no doubt that Malcolm had some of the qualities of a great king, later writers were less convinced. The compiler of the Annals of Ulster, writing soon after 1165, praises Malcolm:
    “Máel Coluim Cenn Mór, son of Henry, high king of Scotland, the best Christian that was of the Gaidhil [who dwell] by the sea on the east for almsdeeds, hospitality and piety, died.”

    Likewise, William of Newburgh praises Malcolm, "the most Christian king of the Scots", highly in his Historia Rerum Anglicarum.

    Nonetheless, Malcolm was not well regarded in all quarters. The Gesta Annalia remarks
    “[Malcolm] quite neglected the care, as well as governance, of his kingdom. Wherefore he was so hated by all the common people that William, the elder of his brothers - who had always been on bad terms with the English, and their lasting foe, forasmuch as they had taken away his patrimony, the earldom of Northumbria, to wit - was by them appointed warden of the whole kingdom, against the king's will”

    According to legend, he had a daughter who was betrothed to Henry, Prince of Capua, on the latter's deathbed, but this is false as Malcolm had no heirs. His mother formulated a plan for a marriage to Constance, daughter of Conan III, Duke of Brittany, but Malcolm died before the wedding could be celebrated.

    It is difficult, given the paucity of sources, to date many of the reforms of the Scoto-Norman era, but it appears that Malcolm continued the reforms begun by his grandfather and grand-uncles. The sheriffdoms of Crail, Dunfermline, Edinburgh, Forfar, Lanark and Linlithgow appear to date from Malcolm's reign, and the office of Justiciar of Lothian may also date from this period.

    Malcolm founded a Cistercian monastery at Coupar Angus, and the royal taste for continental religious foundations extended to the magnates, as in Galloway, where the Premonstratensians were established at Soulseat by 1161.

    Fictional portrayals
    Malcolm IV has been depicted in historical novels. They include :
    Lord of the Isles (1983) by Nigel Tranter. The main character of the novel is Somerled, Lord of the Isles. The plot follows his military career, rise to power, swearing of fealty to David I of Scotland, and support of a revolt against Malcolm IV. It concludes with the murder of Somerled.

    Tapestry of the Boar (1993) by Nigel Tranter. The main character is Hugh De Swinton, a huntsman at the court of Malcolm IV. He is at first employed to slay wild boars which threaten humans, sheep and cattle of the Scottish countryside. He then serves as a scout to the army of the king during the conflict with Fergus of Galloway. Malcolm IV eventually tasks Hugh with establishing Soutra Aisle, "the first real hospital for the sick and poor in Scotland".2,3
  • Last Edited: 9 Jan 2015

Citations

  1. [S218] Stewart Ross, Monarchs of Scotland.
  2. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.
  3. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malcolm_IV_of_Scotland

William I the Lion (?) King of Scots

M, #3427, b. circa 1150

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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  • Birth*: William was born circa 1150 in Scotland.1
  • Marriage*: He married Ermengarde de Beaumont Queen Consort of Scotland, daughter of Richard I (?) Viscount of Beaumont and Lucie de L'Aigle, on 5 September 1186 in Royal chapel at Woodstock Palace, Woodstock, Oxfordshire, England.2
  • Biography*: William was king from 1165 to 1214.

    William the Lion (Mediaeval Gaelic: Uilliam mac Eanric; Modern Gaelic: Uilleam mac Eanraig), sometimes styled William I, also known by the nickname Garbh, "the Rough", (c 1143 – 4 December 1214) reigned as King of the Scots from 1165 to 1214. His reign was the second longest in Scottish history before the Act of Union with England in 1707, (James VI's was the longest 1567–1625).

    Life
    He became King following his brother Malcolm IV's death on 9 December 1165 and was crowned on 24 December 1165.

    In contrast to his deeply religious, frail brother, William was powerfully built, redheaded, and headstrong. He was an effective monarch whose reign was marred by his ill-fated attempts to regain control of Northumbria from the Normans.

    Traditionally, William is credited with founding Arbroath Abbey, the site of the later Declaration of Arbroath.

    He was not known as "The Lion" during his own lifetime, and the title did not relate to his tenacious character or his military prowess. It was attached to him because of his flag or standard, a red lion rampant (with a forked tail) on a yellow background. This (with the addition of a 'double tressure fleury counter-fleury' border) went on to become the Royal standard of Scotland, still used today but quartered with those of England and of Ireland. It became attached to him because the chronicler John of Fordun called him the "Lion of Justice".

    William was grandson of David I of Scotland. He also inherited the title of Earl of Northumbria in 1152 from his father, Henry of Scotland. However he had to give up this title to King Henry II of England in 1157. This caused trouble after William became king, since he spent a lot of effort trying to regain Northumbria.

    William was a key player in the Revolt of 1173–1174 against Henry II. In 1174, at the Battle of Alnwick, during a raid in support of the revolt, William recklessly charged the English troops himself, shouting, "Now we shall see which of us are good knights!" He was unhorsed and captured by Henry's troops led by Ranulf de Glanvill and taken in chains to Newcastle, then Northampton, and then transferred to Falaise in Normandy. Henry then sent an army to Scotland and occupied it. As ransom and to regain his kingdom, William had to acknowledge Henry as his feudal superior and agree to pay for the cost of the English army's occupation of Scotland by taxing the Scots. The church of Scotland was also subjected to that of England. This he did by signing the Treaty of Falaise. He was then allowed to return to Scotland. In 1175 he swore fealty to Henry II at York Castle.

    The humiliation of the Treaty of Falaise triggered a revolt in Galloway which lasted until 1186, and prompted construction of a castle at Dumfries. In 1179, meanwhile, William and his brother David personally led a force northwards into Easter Ross, establishing two further castles, and aiming to discourage the Norse Earls of Orkney from expanding beyond Caithness.

    A further rising in 1181 involved Donald Meic Uilleim, direct descendant of King Duncan II of Scots. Donald briefly took over Ross; not until his death (1187) was William able to reclaim Donald's stronghold of Inverness. Further royal expeditions were required in 1197 and 1202 to fully neutralise the Orcadian threat.

    The Treaty of Falaise remained in force for the next fifteen years. Then Richard the Lionheart, needing money to take part in the Third Crusade, agreed to terminate it in return for 10,000 silver marks, on 5 December 1189.

    Despite the Scots regaining their independence, Anglo-Scottish relations remained tense during the first decade of the 13th century. In August 1209 King John decided to flex the English muscles by marching a large army to Norham (near Berwick), in order to exploit the flagging leadership of the ageing Scottish monarch. As well as promising a large sum of money, the ailing William agreed to his elder daughters marrying English nobles and, when the treaty was renewed in 1212, John apparently gained the hand of William's only surviving legitimate son, and heir, Alexander, for his eldest daughter, Joan.

    Despite continued dependence on English goodwill, William's reign showed much achievement. He threw himself into government with energy and diligently followed the lines laid down by his grandfather, David I. Anglo-French settlements and feudalization were extended, new burghs founded, criminal law clarified, the responsibilities of justices and sheriffs widened, and trade grew. Arbroath Abbey was founded (1178), and the bishopric of Argyll established (c.1192) in the same year as papal confirmation of the Scottish church by Pope Celestine III.

    William is recorded in 1206 as having cured a case of scrofula by his touching and blessing a child with the ailment whilst at York. William died in Stirling in 1214 and lies buried in Arbroath Abbey. His son, Alexander II, succeeded him as king, reigning from 1214 to 1249.

    Marriage and issue
    Due to the terms of the Treaty of Falaise, Henry II had the right to choose William's bride. As a result, William married Ermengarde de Beaumont, a great-granddaughter of King Henry I of England, at Woodstock Palace in 1186. Edinburgh Castle was her dowry. The marriage was not very successful, and it was many years before she bore him an heir. William and Ermengarde's children were:
    Margaret (1193–1259), married Hubert de Burgh, 1st Earl of Kent.
    Isabel (1195–1253), married Roger Bigod, 4th Earl of Norfolk.
    Alexander II of Scotland (1198–1249).
    Marjorie (1200–17 November 1244), married Gilbert Marshal, 4th Earl of Pembroke.

    Out of wedlock, William I had numerous children, their descendants being among those who would lay claim to the Scottish crown.
    By an unnamed daughter of Adam de Hythus:
    Margaret, married Eustace de Vesci Lord of Alnwick
    By Isabel d'Avenel:
    Robert de London
    Henry de Galightly, father of Patrick Galightly one of the competitors to the crown in 1291
    Ada Fitzwilliam (c.1146-1200), married Patrick I, Earl of Dunbar (1152–1232)
    Aufrica, married William de Say, and whose grandson Roger de Mandeville was one of the competitors to the crown in 1291
    Isabel of Scotland married Robert III de Brus then either Sir William de Ros or Robert Furfan de Ros, Magna Carta Suretor

    Fictional portrayals
    William I has been depicted in a historical novel. :
    An Earthly Knight (2003) by Janet McNaughton. The novel is set in the year 1162. William, younger brother and heir to Malcolm IV of Scotland, is betrothed to Lady Jeanette "Jenny" Avenel. She is the second daughter of a Norman nobleman and the marriage politically advances her family. But she is romantically interested in Tam Lin, a man enchanted by the Fairy Queen.3,4
  • Last Edited: 13 Mar 2015

Citations

  1. [S218] Stewart Ross, Monarchs of Scotland.
  2. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ermengarde_de_Beaumont
  3. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.
  4. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_the_Lion

Alexander II (?) King of Scots

M, #3428, b. circa 1200

Alexander II
King of the Scots

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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  • Birth*: Alexander was born circa 1200 in Scotland.1
  • Marriage*: He married Marie de Coucy Queen Consort of the Kingdom of Scotland, daughter of Enguerrand III (?) Lord of Coucy and Marie de Montmirel-en-Brie, on 15 May 1239 in Roxburgh, Scotland.3
  • Biography*: Alexander was king from 1214 to 1249.

    Alexander II (Mediaeval Gaelic: Alaxandair mac Uilliam; Modern Gaelic: Alasdair mac Uilleim) (24 August 1198 – 6 July 1249) was King of Scots from 1214 to his death.

    Early life
    He was born at Haddington, East Lothian, the only son of the Scottish king William the Lion and Ermengarde of Beaumont. He spent time in England (John of England knighted him at Clerkenwell Priory in 1213) before succeeding to the kingdom on the death of his father on 4 December 1214, being crowned at Scone on 6 December the same year.

    King of Scots
    In 1215, the year after his accession, the clans Meic Uilleim and MacHeths, inveterate enemies of the Scottish crown, broke into revolt; but loyalist forces speedily quelled the insurrection.

    In the same year Alexander joined the English barons in their struggle against John of England, and led an army into the Kingdom of England in support of their cause. This action led to the sacking of Berwick-upon-Tweed as John's forces ravaged the north.

    The Scottish forces reached the south coast of England at the port of Dover where in September 1216, Alexander paid homage to the pretender Prince Louis of France for his lands in England, chosen by the barons to replace King John. But John having died, the Pope and the English aristocracy changed their allegiance to his nine-year-old son, Henry, forcing the French and the Scots armies to return home.

    Peace between Henry III, the French prince and Alexander followed on 12 September 1217 with the treaty of Kingston. Diplomacy further strengthened the reconciliation by the marriage of Alexander to Henry's sister Joan of England on 18 June or 25 June 1221.

    The next year marked the subjection of the hitherto semi-independent district of Argyll. Royal forces crushed a revolt in Galloway in 1235 without difficulty; nor did an invasion attempted soon afterwards by its exiled leaders meet with success. Soon afterwards a claim for homage from Henry of England drew forth from Alexander a counter-claim to the northern English counties. The two kingdoms, however, settled this dispute by a compromise in 1237. This was the Treaty of York which defined the boundary between the two kingdoms as running between the Solway Firth (in the west) and the mouth of the River Tweed (in the east).

    Joan died in March 1238 in Essex, and in the following year, 1239, Alexander remarried. His second wife was Marie de Coucy. The marriage took place on 15 May 1239, and produced one son, the future Alexander III, born in 1241.

    A threat of invasion by Henry in 1243 for a time interrupted the friendly relations between the two countries; but the prompt action of Alexander in anticipating his attack, and the disinclination of the English barons for war, compelled him to make peace next year at Newcastle. Alexander now turned his attention to securing the Western Isles, which still owed a nominal allegiance to Norway. He successively attempted negotiations and purchase, but without success.

    The English chronicler Matthew Paris in his Chronica Majora described Alexander as red-haired:
    "[King John] taunted King Alexander, and because he was red-headed, sent word to him,
    saying, 'so shall we hunt the red fox-cub from his lairs."

    Death
    Alexander attempted to persuade Ewen, the son of Duncan, Lord of Argyll, to sever his allegiance to Haakon IV of Norway. When Ewen rejected these attempts, Alexander sailed forth to compel him, but on the way he suffered a fever at the Isle of Kerrera in the Inner Hebrides. He died there in 1249 and was buried at Melrose Abbey, Roxburghshire. His only legitimate child and son, by his second wife, Alexander III succeeded him as King of Scots. He had a bastard daughter, Marjorie, who married Sir Alan Durward, Justiciar of Scotia (he died 1275), and had issue.

    Wives
    1. Joan of England, (22 July 1210 – 4 March 1238), was the eldest legitimate daughter and third child of John of England and Isabella of Angoulême. She and Alexander II married on 21 June 1221, at York Minster. Alexander was 23. Joan was 11. They had no children. Joan died in Essex in 1238, and was buried at Tarant Crawford Abbey in Dorset.
    2. Marie de Coucy, who became mother of Alexander III of Scotland
    Fictional portrayals[edit]
    Alexander II has been depicted in a historical novel. :
    Sword of State (1999) by Nigel Tranter. The novel depicts the friendship between Alexander II and Patrick II, Earl of Dunbar. "Their friendship withstands treachery, danger and rivalry".1,4
  • Last Edited: 13 Mar 2015

Alexander III (?) King of Scots

M, #3429, b. circa 1225

Alexander III
King of the Scots

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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  • Birth*: Alexander was born circa 1225 in Scotland.1
  • Marriage*: He married Margaret Plantagenet, daughter of Henry III Plantagenet King of England and Eleanor (?) of Provence, on 26 December 1251 in York Minster, York, Yorkshire, England.3
  • Biography*: Alexander was king from 1249 to 1286.

    Alexander III (Medieval Gaelic: Alaxandair mac Alaxandair; Modern Gaelic: Alasdair mac Alasdair) (4 September 1241 – 19 March 1286) was King of Scots from 1249 to his death.

    Life
    Alexander was born at Roxburgh, the only son of Alexander II by his second wife Marie de Coucy. Alexander III was also the grandson of William the Lion. Alexander's father died on 8 July 1249 and he became king at the age of seven, inaugurated at Scone on 13 July 1249.

    The years of his minority featured an embittered struggle for the control of affairs between two rival parties, the one led by Walter Comyn, Earl of Menteith, the other by Alan Durward, Justiciar of Scotia. The former dominated the early years of Alexander's reign. At the marriage of Alexander to Margaret of England in 1251, Henry III of England seized the opportunity to demand from his son-in-law homage for the Scottish kingdom, but Alexander did not comply. In 1255 an interview between the English and Scottish kings at Kelso led to Menteith and his party losing to Durward's party. But though disgraced, they still retained great influence, and two years later, seizing the person of the king, they compelled their rivals to consent to the erection of a regency representative of both parties.

    On attaining his majority at the age of 21 in 1262, Alexander declared his intention of resuming the projects on the Western Isles which the death of his father thirteen years before had cut short. He laid a formal claim before the Norwegian king Haakon. Haakon rejected the claim, and in the following year responded with a formidable invasion. Sailing around the west coast of Scotland he halted off the Isle of Arran, and negotiations commenced. Alexander artfully prolonged the talks until the autumn storms should begin. At length Haakon, weary of delay, attacked, only to encounter a terrific storm which greatly damaged his ships. The Battle of Largs (October 1263) proved indecisive, but even so, Haakon's position was hopeless. Baffled, he turned homewards, but died in Orkney on 15 December 1263. The Isles now lay at Alexander's feet, and in 1266 Haakon's successor concluded the Treaty of Perth by which he ceded the Isle of Man and the Western Isles to Scotland in return for a monetary payment. Norway retained only Orkney and Shetland in the area. In 1284, Alexander invested the title of Lord of the Isles in the head of Clan Donald, Aonghas Mór, and over the next two centuries the Macdonald lords operated as if they were kings in their own right, frequently opposing the Scottish monarch.

    Succession
    Alexander had married Margaret, daughter of King Henry III of England and Eleanor of Provence, on 26 December 1251. She died in 1275, after they had three children.
    Margaret (28 February 1261 – 9 April 1283), who married King Eric II of Norway
    Alexander, Prince of Scotland (21 January 1264 Jedburgh – 28 January 1284 Lindores Abbey); buried in Dunfermline Abbey
    David (20 March 1272 – June 1281 Stirling Castle); buried in Dunfermline Abbey

    According to the Lanercost Chronicle, Alexander did not spend his decade as a widower alone: "he used never to forbear on account of season nor storm, nor for perils of flood or rocky cliffs, but would visit none too creditably nuns or matrons, virgins or widows as the fancy seized him, sometimes in disguise."

    Towards the end of Alexander's reign, the death of all three of his children within a few years made the question of the succession one of pressing importance. In 1284 he induced the Estates to recognize as his heir-presumptive his granddaughter Margaret, the "Maid of Norway". The need for a male heir led him to contract a second marriage to Yolande de Dreux on 1 November 1285.

    But the sudden death of the king dashed all such hopes. Alexander died in a fall from his horse in the dark while riding to visit the queen at Kinghorn in Fife on 18 March 1286 because it was her birthday the next day.[3] He had spent the evening at Edinburgh Castle celebrating his second marriage and overseeing a meeting with royal advisors. He was advised by them not to make the journey over to Fife because of weather conditions, but travelled anyway. Alexander became separated from his guides and it is assumed that in the dark his horse lost its footing. The 44-year old king was found dead on the shore the following morning with a broken neck. Some texts have said that he fell off a cliff. Although there is no cliff at the site where his body was found there is a very steep rocky embankment - which would have been fatal in the dark. After Alexander's death, his strong realm was plunged into a period of darkness that would eventually lead to war with England. He was buried in Dunfermline Abbey.

    As Alexander left no surviving children, the heir to the throne was his unborn child by Queen Yolande. When Yolande's pregnancy ended, probably with a miscarriage, Alexander's granddaughter Margaret became the heir. Margaret died, still uncrowned, on her way to Scotland in 1290. The inauguration of John Balliol as king on 30 November 1292 ended the six years of interregnum when the Guardians of Scotland governed the land.

    The death of Alexander and the subsequent period of instability in Scotland was lamented in an early Scots poem recorded by Andrew of Wyntoun in his Orygynale Cronykil of Scotland.

    Quhen Alysandyr oure kyng was dede,
    That Scotland led in luve and le,
    Away was sons of ale and brede,
    Of wyne and wax of gamyn and gle.
    Oure gold was changed into lede,
    Cryst, born into vyrgynyte,
    Succoure Scotland and remede,
    That stat is in perplexyte.

    In 1886, a monument to Alexander III was erected at the approximate location of his death in Kinghorn.

    Fictional portrayals
    Alexander III has been depicted in historical novels. They include:
    The Thirsty Sword (1892) by Robert Leighton. The novel depicts the "Norse invasion of Scotland" (1262–1263, part of the Scottish–Norwegian War) and the Battle of Largs. It includes depictions of Alexander III and his opponent Haakon IV of Norway.

    Alexander the Glorious (1965) by Jane Oliver. The novel covers the entire reign of Alexander III (1249–1286), "almost entirely from Alexander's viewpoint".

    The Crown in Darkness (1988) by Paul C. Doherty. A crime fiction novel where Hugh Corbett investigates the "mysterious death" of Alexander III (1286). Alexander supposedly suffered a fatal fall from his horse. But there are suspicions of murder. The novel concludes that Alexander was indeed murdered "by a fanatical servant" of Edward I of England. The killer acting according to "Edward's secret desire to overwhelm and control Scotland". Doherty suggests that the personal relations of the two kings were strained by constant arguments, though this in not confirmed by historical sources.

    Insurrection (2010) by Robyn Young. This novel is the first of a series of novels primarily about the life and times of Robert the Bruce. However, it covers Alexander III and the circumstances surrounding his death in some detail.

    Holinshed in his oft fanciful history of England stated that at Alexander III's wedding, a horrible monster, mostly skeleton but with raw flesh, appeared at the end of the procession and caused the wedding to be hurriedly concluded. This was,in tradition, an omen of death.

    Crusader (1991) by Nigel Tranter. This novel follows the minority of Alexander III and his relationship with David de Lindsay. Tranter, who has written scores of historical novels spanning the range of Scotland's history, also wrote "Envoy Extraordinary" (1999) (about Patrick Earl of Dunbar) and "True Thomas" (1981) (about Thomas the Rhymer), both of which take place during the reign of Alexander III and in which Alexander if a featured character.1,4

Family 1: Margaret Plantagenet b. 28 Sep 1240, d. 26 Feb 1275

Family 2:

  • Last Edited: 7 Mar 2016

Margaret (?)

F, #3430, b. circa 1260, d. 1283

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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Family: Eric (?) King of Norway b. 1268, d. 15 Jul 1299

  • Last Edited: 9 Oct 2014

Citations

  1. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.
  2. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_II_of_Norway

Eric (?) King of Norway

M, #3431, b. 1268, d. 15 July 1299

Contemporary bust of Eric II from the Stavanger Cathedral, dated to the 1280s.

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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  • Birth*: Eric was born in 1268 in Norway.2,3
  • Marriage*: He married Margaret (?) in 1281 in Bergen, North Holland, Holland*.2,3
  • Death*: Eric died on 15 July 1299.3
  • Biography*: Eric Magnusson (1268 – 15 July 1299) (Old Norse: Eiríkr Magnússon; Norwegian: Eirik Magnusson) was the King of Norway from 1280 until 1299.

    Background
    Eirik was the eldest surviving son of King Magnus the Lawmender of Norway, and his wife Ingeborg Eriksdatter, daughter of King Eric IV of Denmark. In 1273, when he was 5 years old, he was given the title of king, alongside his father, who planned to hold a coronation for Eirik as his subordinate co-ruler in the summer of 1280. However, King Magnus died before this could be arranged, and Eirik became sole king and was crowned as such in Bergen in the summer of 1280. During his minority, the kingdom was ruled by a royal council consisting of prominent barons and probably also his mother, the dowager queen Ingeborg. After Eirik came of age in 1282, this royal council is still thought to have had a major influence over his reign. His brother, Haakon, was in 1273 given the title "Duke of Norway", and from 1280 ruled a large area around Oslo in Eastern Norway and Stavanger in the southwest, subordinate to King Eirik. The king's main residence was in Bergen in Western Norway.

    Eirik married princess Margaret of Scotland, daughter of King Alexander III of Scotland in Bergen in 1281. Margaret died two years later in childbirth, giving birth to Margaret, Maid of Norway, who became queen of Scotland in 1286 until her death in 1290. Her death sparked the disputed succession which led to the Wars of Scottish Independence. Eirik briefly and unsuccessfully laid claim to the Scottish crown as inheritance from his daughter.

    Eirik later married Isabel Bruce, sister of King Robert I of Scotland. Their marriage did not produce a surviving male heir, though it did produce a daughter, Ingeborg Eriksdottir of Norway, who married Valdemar Magnusson of Sweden, Duke of Finland, in 1312. Ingeborg Eriksdotter was styled Duchess of Öland.

    Reign
    A prominent feature of Eirik's reign was war with Denmark, which was waged on and off from 1287 until 1295. A major motivation for this warfare was Eirik's claim on his mother's Danish inheritance. In 1287, he also entered into an alliance with a group of Danish nobles, most prominently Jacob Nielsen, Count of Halland and Stig Andersen Hvide, who were outlawed in Denmark for allegedly murdering the Danish king Eric V. Eirik gave the outlaws sanctuary in Norway in 1287. King Eirik himself led a large Norwegian fleet which, along with the Danish outlaws, attacked Denmark in 1289, burning Elsinore and threatening Copenhagen. Renewed naval attacks on Denmark were made in 1290 and 1293, before peace was made in 1295.

    Eirik received the nickname "Priest Hater" from his unsuccessful relations with the church.

    As Eirik died without sons, he was succeeded by his brother, as Haakon V of Norway. He was buried in the old cathedral of Bergen, which was demolished in 1531. Its site is marked by a memorial, in present-day Bergenhus Fortress.3

Family: Margaret (?) b. c 1260, d. 1283

  • Last Edited: 8 Sep 2017

Citations

  1. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnus_VI_of_Norway
  2. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.
  3. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_II_of_Norway

Margaret (?) Maid of Norway

F, #3432, b. 1283, d. 1290

Margaret, queen of Scotland and daughter of Norway

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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  • Birth*: Margaret was born in 1283 in Norway*.1,2
  • Death*: Margaret died in 1290 in at sea, returning from Norway.1
  • Biography*: Margaret (9 April 1283 – 26 September 1290) was a Norwegian princess who reigned as Queen of Scots from 1286 until her death. Her death while traveling to Scotland sparked off the disputed succession which led to the Wars of Scottish Independence.

    She was the daughter of King Eric II of Norway and Margaret, daughter of King Alexander III of Scotland. Margaret was born in Tønsberg. Her mother died in childbirth.

    Background
    When the treaty arranging the marriage of Margaret and Eric was signed at Roxburgh on 25 July 1281, Alexander III's younger son David had already died in June 1281, leaving the King of Scots with only one legitimate son, Alexander. Consequently, the treaty included a provision for the children of Margaret and Eric to succeed to the kingdom of the Scots:
    If it happens that the king of Scotland dies without a lawful son, and any of his sons does not leave lawful issue [not sons] and Margaret has children [not sons] by the king of Norway, she and her children shall succeed to the king of Scotland ... or she, even if she is without children, according to Scottish law and custom.

    Alexander III made similar provisions when arranging the marriage of his son Alexander to Margaret, daughter of Guy de Dampierre, Count of Flanders, probably also in 1281. The treaty arranging the marriage, signed in December 1281, included a lengthy and complex document setting out the customs and usages which determined the succession. As well as general statement of principles, the annex includes specific examples of the rights of "A and M" and their children in particular cases. The document, while confusing in places, appears to favour primogeniture for male heirs, or their descendants, and proximity of blood for female heirs and their descendants.

    The younger Alexander died on 28 January 1284, leaving only the king's granddaughter Margaret living out of his descendants. Alexander III summoned all thirteen earls of Scotland, twenty-four barons and the heads of the three main Gaelic kindreds of the West, Alexander of Argyll, Aonghas Mór of Islay and Alan MacRuari of Garmoran. At Scone on 5 February 1284, the signatories agreed to recognise Margaret as "domina and right heir" if neither Alexander had left a posthumous child and the king had left no children at the time of his death. However, it is unlikely that this was intended to allow Margaret to rule alone as queen regnant, but rather jointly with her future spouse, whoever he might be. While unexceptional in the circumstances, this would appear to show that Alexander III had decided on remarriage. He did remarry, to Yolande de Dreux, but died shortly afterwards as the result of an accident on 19 March 1286 without any children by her.

    Lady and Right Heir of Scotland
    After King Alexander III was buried at Dunfermline Abbey on 29 March 1286, the magnates and clerics of the realm assembled at Scone in parliament to select the Guardians of Scotland who would keep the kingdom for the right heir. At this time it was thought that Queen Yolande was pregnant, so that Margaret was not yet the obvious successor. It is uncertain what happened to Yolande's child; most likely she had a miscarriage, although other accounts say that her child was still-born at Clackmannan on St. Catherine's Day (25 November 1286) with the Guardians in attendance to witness the event, just possibly she had a false pregnancy, and there was even one dubious English claim that she was faking pregnancy.

    This, according to the oaths taken, made Margaret the heir at three years of age, but within weeks John Balliol tried to take the crown with the aid of John Comyn, the Red Comyn. The Bruce family captured strongholds in Galloway, and fighting in the name of the Maid of Norway (Margaret), suppressed the rebellion with many important families like the Stewards supporting them. In 1289, the Guardians maintained the peace in Scotland between the competing claims of Margaret, Robert Bruce and John Balliol.

    Far from the Scots displaying any desire to bring Margaret to Scotland, it was Margaret's father Eric who raised the question again. Eric sent official ambassadors to Edward I of England, then in Gascony, in May 1289, with papers referring to Margaret as "queen". Negotiations from this time onwards were between Edward, who returned to England later in the year, and Eric, and excluded the Scots until Edward met with Robert Bruce and some of the Guardians at Salisbury in October 1289. The Scots were in a weak position since Edward and Eric could arrange Margaret's marriage to the future Edward II of England, or some other if they chose, without reference to the Guardians. Accordingly the Guardians signed the Treaty of Salisbury, which agreed that Margaret would be sent to Scotland before 1 November 1290, and that any agreement on her future marriage would be deferred until she was in Scotland.

    That marriage of Edward, Prince of Wales, was in King Edward's mind is clear from the fact that a papal dispensation was received from Pope Nicholas IV ten days after the treaty was signed. Thought to show bad faith on Edward's part, the Papal Bull did not contract a marriage, only permit one should the Scots later agree to it. Edward, like Eric, was now writing of Queen Margaret, anticipating her inauguration and the subsequent marriage to his son.

    Edward and the Guardians continued their negotiations, based on the collective assumption that Margaret would be queen and the young Edward king, but all these plans, and those of King Alexander, were brought to nothing by the death of Margaret in the Orkney Islands on 26 September 1290 while voyaging to Scotland. Her remains were taken to Bergen and buried beside her mother in the stone wall, on the north side of the choir, in Christ's Kirk at Bergen.

    Her death left no obvious heir to the Scottish throne and the matter of succession was resolved in the Great Cause of 1291–2.

    Although derived from a text written more than a century later, it is thought by some historians that the earliest Scots verse written in Scotland dates from this time:
    Quhen Alexander our kynge was dede,
    That Scotland lede in lauche and le,
    Away was sons of alle and brede,
    Of wyne and wax, of gamyn and gle.
    Our gold was changit into lede.
    Christ, born in virgynyte,
    Succoure Scotland, and ramede,
    That stade is in perplexite.

    The ballad Sir Patrick Spens has sometimes been supposed to be connected to Margaret's ill-fated voyage. Some years later a woman appeared claiming to be her, known as the False Margaret; she was executed by Haakon V, King Eric's brother and successor, in 1301.

    Status as monarch
    As Margaret was never crowned or otherwise inaugurated, and never set foot on what was then Scots soil during her lifetime, there is some doubt about whether she should be regarded as a Queen of Scots. This could ultimately be a matter of interpretation. Most lists of the monarchs of Scotland do include her, but a few do not. Some contemporary documents, including the Treaty of Salisbury did describe her as "queen", but it has been argued that she should not properly be considered a monarch.

    Due to lack of a clear historical precedent in Scotland's history as a fully separate country before the Union of the Crowns in 1603, there was only one occasion when a similar situation arose, i.e. on the death of the monarch the heir was outside the country and not available to be crowned more or less immediately. This was when, on the death of Robert III in 1406, his heir, who became James I, was a prisoner in England. James was eventually released and crowned in 1424. In the intervening period official documents simply referred to him as the "heir," and the Regent Albany issued coins in his own name. Nevertheless, James's reign is now usually considered to start in 1406, not 1424. If considered to have been monarch, Margaret is the first queen regnant within the British Isles.3
  • Last Edited: 21 Dec 2016

Citations

  1. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.
  2. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_II_of_Norway
  3. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret,_Maid_of_Norway.

David (?) Earl of Huntingdon1

M, #3433, b. between 1143 and 1152, d. 17 June 1219

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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  • Birth*: David was born between 1143 and 1152 in England.2,3
  • Marriage*: He married Matilda (?) of Chester, Countess of Huntingdon circa 1206 in England.4
  • Death*: David died on 17 June 1219 in Yardle, Northamptonshire, England.5,3
  • Burial*: He was buried after 17 June 1219 in Sawtrey Abbey, Hampshire, England.3
  • Biography*: He succeeded to the title of Earl of Doncaster on 12 June 1152. He succeeded to the title of Earl of Carlisle on 12 June 1152. He succeeded to the title of 9th Earl of Huntingdon on 12 June 1152. He succeeded to the title of Earl of Northumberland on 12 June 1152. He gained the title of Earl of Garioch circa 1180. He gained the title of Earl of Lennox in 1205. He gained the title of Earl of Cambridge in 1205. In 1215/16 he was deprived of all of his English honours, but was restored to them on 13 March 1218.

    David of Scotland (Medieval Gaelic: Dabíd) (c.?1144 – 17 June 1219) was a Scottish prince and Earl of Huntingdon. He was a claimant to the Scottish throne.

    Life
    He was the youngest surviving son of Henry of Scotland, 3rd Earl of Huntingdon and Ada de Warenne, a daughter of William de Warenne, 2nd Earl of Surrey, and Elizabeth of Vermandois. His paternal grandfather was David I of Scotland. Huntingdon was granted to him after his elder brother William I of Scotland ascended the throne. David's son John succeeded him to the earldom.

    In the litigation for succession to the crown of Scotland in 1290–1292, the great-great-grandson Floris V, Count of Holland of David's sister, Ada, claimed that David had renounced his hereditary rights to the throne of Scotland. He therefore declared that his claim to the throne had priority over David's descendants. However, no explanation or firm evidence for the supposed renunciation could be provided.

    Marriage and issue
    On 26 August 1190 David married Matilda of Chester (1171 – 6 January 1233), daughter of Hugh de Kevelioc, 3rd Earl of Chester. He was almost thirty years Matilda's senior. The marriage was recorded by Benedict of Peterborough.

    David and Matilda had seven children:
    Margaret of Huntingdon (c. 1194 – c. 1228), married Alan, Lord of Galloway, by whom she had two daughters, including Dervorguilla of Galloway.
    Robert of Huntingdon (died young)
    Ada of Huntingdon, married Sir Henry de Hastings, by whom she had one son, Henry de Hastings, 1st Baron Hastings.
    Matilda (Maud) of Huntingdon (-aft.1219, unmarried)
    Isobel of Huntingdon (1199–1251), married Robert Bruce, 4th Lord of Annandale, by whom she had two sons, including Robert de Brus, 5th Lord of Annandale.
    John of Scotland, Earl of Huntingdon (1207 – 6 June 1237), married Elen ferch Llywelyn. He succeeded his uncle Ranulf as Earl of Chester in 1232, but died childless.
    Henry of Huntingdon (died young)

    Earl David also had three illegitimate children:
    Henry of Stirling
    Henry of Brechin
    Ada, married Malise, son of Ferchar, Earl of Strathearn

    After the extinction of the senior line of the Scottish royal house in 1290, when the legitimate line of William the Lion of Scotland ended, David's descendants were the prime candidates for the throne. The two most notable claimants to the throne, Robert Bruce, 5th Lord of Annandale (grandfather of King Robert I of Scotland) and John of Scotland were his descendants through David's daughters Isobel and Margaret, respectively.

    Possible Robin Hood connection
    pDavid is a possible inspiration figure for the Robin Hood legend because the legend plays at the same time as David lived in the 1190s. Another similarity is the Earl of Huntingdon question, because a historian names Robin Hood as a possible Earl of that area. Also both had taken part in the Third Crusade and by 1194 David had taken part at the siege of Nottingham Castle where the High Sheriff of Nottinghamshire and Derby County was taken captive. His son Robert who died young was also a possible inspiration for Robin Hood.

    In popular culture
    Sir Walter Scott's 1825 novel The Talisman features Earl David in his capacity as a prince of Scotland as a crusader on the Third Crusade. For the majority of the novel, Earl David operates under an alias: Sir Kenneth of the Couchant Leopard. Earl David's adventures are highly fictionalized for this novel.

    The television series Robin of Sherwood features Earl David of Huntingdon. The first reference to Earl David (by name only) is in the episode "The Prisoner", in which Prince John states that Earl David is a "dissident" who opposes Prince John's possible succession as King Richard's heir should Richard die without a legitimate heir of his body. The earl himself appears in the first part of "Herne's Son" in which he is not referred to directly as David; his character is the father of Robert of Huntingdon, the second son of Herne to feature in the series adopting the alias of Robin Hood. In the episode "Rutterkin", the earl appears again with a fictitious brother named Edgar, and though he is again not referred to directly as David, it is definitively stated that the earl is the brother of the king of Scotland (as Earl David was the brother of King William The Lion of Scotland). ("The Prisoner", "Herne's Son" and "Rutterkin" were all written by Richard Carpenter.) Earl David was played by Michael Craig.

    Earl David features briefly in the 2013 Robin Hood novel The Arrow of Sherwood by Lauren Johnson. He is depicted at the siege of Nottingham Castle in support of King Richard in 1194.3,6

Family 1:

Family 2: Matilda (?) of Chester, Countess of Huntingdon b. 1171, d. 6 Jan 1233

  • Last Edited: 7 Dec 2017

Citations

  1. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matilda_of_Chester,_Countess_of_Huntingdon.
  2. [S218] Stewart Ross, Monarchs of Scotland.
  3. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10248.htm#i102479
  4. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10248.htm#i102478
  5. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.
  6. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_of_Scotland,_Earl_of_Huntingdon.
  7. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10775.htm#i107743
  8. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David,_Lord_of_Brechin.

Margaret (?) of Huntingdon1

F, #3434, b. circa 1207

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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Family: Alan de Galloway Lord of Galloway b. c 1170, d. 1234

  • Last Edited: 22 Jan 2015

Citations

  1. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dervorguilla_of_Galloway
  2. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.
  3. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_of_Galloway

Devorguilla de Galloway1

F, #3436, b. circa 1210

Dervorguilla of Galloway

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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  • Married Name: Her married name was de Balliol.
  • Birth*: Devorguilla was born circa 1210 in Galloway, Scotland.2,4
  • Marriage*: She married John de Balliol circa 1223 in Scotland.2,5
  • Biography*: Dervorguilla of Galloway (c. 1210 – January 28, 1290) was a 'lady of substance' in 13th century Scotland, the wife from 1223 of John, 5th Baron de Balliol, and mother of John I, a future king of Scotland.

    The name Dervorguilla or Devorgilla was a Latinization of the Gaelic Dearbhfhorghaill (alternative spellings, Derborgaill or Dearbhorghil).

    Family
    Dervorguilla was one of the three daughters and heiresses of the Gaelic prince Alan, Lord of Galloway. She was born to Alan's second wife Margaret of Huntingdon, who was the eldest daughter of David of Scotland, 8th Earl of Huntingdon and Matilda (or Maud) of Chester. David in turn was the youngest brother to two Kings of Scotland, Malcolm IV and William the Lion. Thus, through her mother, Dervorguilla was descended from the Kings of Scotland, including David I.

    Dervorguilla's father died in 1234 without a legitimate son (he had an illegitimate son Thomas). According to both Anglo-Norman feudal laws and to ancient Gaelic customs, Dervorguilla was one of his heiresses, her two sisters Helen and Christina being older and therefore senior. This might be considered an unusual practice in England, but it was more common in Scotland and in Western feudal tradition. Because of this, Dervorguilla bequeathed lands in Galloway to her descendants, the Baliol and the Comyns. Dervorguilla's son John of Scotland was briefly a King of Scots too, known as Toom Tabard (Scots: 'puppet king' literally "empty coat").

    Life
    The Balliol family into which Devorguilla married was based at Barnard Castle in County Durham, England. Although the date of her birth is uncertain, her apparent age of 13 was by no means unusually early for betrothal and marriage at the time.

    In 1263, her husband Sir John was required to make penance after a land dispute with Walter Kirkham, Bishop of Durham. Part of this took the very expensive form of founding a College for the poor at the University of Oxford. Sir John's own finances were less substantial than those of his wife, however, and long after his death it fell to Devorguilla to confirm the foundation, with the blessing of the same Bishop as well as the University hierarchy. She established a permanent endowment for the College in 1282, as well as its first formal Statutes. The college still retains the name Balliol College, where the history students' society is called the Devorguilla society and an annual seminar series featuring women in academia is called the Dervorguilla Seminar Series. While a Requiem Mass in Latin was sung at Balliol for the 700th anniversary of her death, it is believed that this was sung as a one-off, rather than having been marked in previous centuries.

    Devorguilla founded a Cistercian Abbey 7 miles south of Dumfries in South West Scotland, in April 1273. It still stands as a picturesque ruin of red sandstone.

    When Sir John died in 1269, his widow, Dervorguilla, had his heart embalmed and kept in a casket of ivory bound with silver. The casket travelled with her for the rest of her life. In 1274–5 John de Folkesworth arraigned an assize of novel disseisin against Devorguilla and others touching a tenement in Stibbington, Northamptonshire. In 1275–6 Robert de Ferrers arraigned an assize of mort d'ancestor against her touching a messuage in Repton, Derbyshire. In 1280 Sir John de Balliol's executors, including his widow, Devorguilla, sued Alan Fitz Count regarding a debt of £100 claimed by the executors from Alan. In 1280 she was granted letters of attorney to Thomas de Hunsingore and another in England, she staying in Galloway. The same year Devorguilla, Margaret de Ferrers, Countess of Derby, Ellen, widow of Alan la Zouche, and Alexander Comyn, Earl of Buchan, and Elizabeth his wife sued Roger de Clifford and Isabel his wife and Roger de Leybourne and Idoine his wife regarding the manors of Wyntone, King’s Meaburn, Appleby, and Brough-under-Stainmore, and a moiety of the manor of Kyrkby-Stephan, all in Westmorland. The same year Devorguilla sued John de Veer for a debt of £24. In 1280–1 Laurence Duket arraigned an assize of novel disseisin again Devorguilla and others touching a hedge destroyed in Cotingham, Middlesex. In 1288 she reached agreement with John, Abbot of Ramsey, regarding a fishery in Ellington.

    In her last years, the main line of the royal House of Scotland was threatened by a lack of male heirs, and Devorguilla, who died just before the young heiress Margaret, the Maid of Norway, might, if she had outlived her, have been one of the claimants to her throne. Devorguilla was buried beside her husband at New Abbey, which was christened 'Sweetheart Abbey', the name which it retains to this day. The depredations suffered by the Abbey in subsequent periods have caused both graves to be lost.

    Successors[edit]
    Dervorguilla and John de Balliol had issue:
    Sir Hugh de Balliol, who died without issue before April 10, 1271.
    Alan de Balliol, who died without issue.
    Sir Alexander de Balliol, who died without issue before November 13, 1278.
    King John of Scotland, successful competitor for the Crown in 1292.
    Cecily de Balliol, who married John de Burgh, Knt., of Walkern, Hertfordshire.
    Ada de Balliol, who married in 1266, William de Lindsay, of Lamberton.
    Margaret (died unmarried)
    Eleanor de Balliol, who married John II Comyn, Lord of Badenoch.
    Maud, who married Sir Bryan FitzAlan, Lord FitzAlan, of Bedale, Knt., (d. June 1, 1306), who succeeded the Earl of Surrey as Guardian and Keeper of Scotland for Edward I of England.

    Owing to the deaths of her elder three sons, all of whom were childless, Dervorguilla's fourth and youngest surviving son John of Scotland asserted a claim to the crown in 1290 when queen Margaret died. He won in arbitration against the rival Robert Bruce, 5th Lord of Annandale in 1292, and subsequently was king of Scotland for four years (1292–96).

    Aunt and niece
    She should not be confused with her father's sister, Dervorguilla of Galloway, heiress of Whissendine, who married Nicholas II de Stuteville. Her daughter Joan de Stuteville married 1stly Sir Hugh Wake, Lord of Bourne and 2ndly Hugh Bigod (Justiciar). Her other daughter Margaret married William de Mastac but died young.5

Family: John de Balliol b. c 1200

  • Last Edited: 1 Apr 2015

John de Balliol

M, #3437, b. circa 1200

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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Family: Devorguilla de Galloway b. c 1210

  • Last Edited: 31 Dec 2014

Citations

  1. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.
  2. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dervorguilla_of_Galloway

John de Balliol

M, #3438, b. circa 1250

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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  • Birth*: John was born circa 1250 in Scotland.1
  • Biography*: John was King of Scots from 1292 to 1296.1
  • Last Edited: 14 Dec 2012

Citations

  1. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.

Isabella (?) of Huntingdon1

F, #3439, b. circa 1206, d. circa 1251

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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  • Birth*: Isabella was born circa 1206 in England.2,4
  • Marriage*: She married Robert de Brus 4th Lord of Annandale circa 1219 in Scotland.2,1,5
  • Married Name: As of circa 1230,her married name was de Brus.2,1
  • Burial*: Isabella (?) of Huntingdon was buried circa 1251 in Saltre Abbey, Stilton, Gloucestershire, England.3
  • Death*: She died circa 1251 in Scotland.3
  • Biography*: Isobel of Huntingdon (1183–1251) was the daughter of David of Scotland, 8th Earl of Huntingdon and Matilda of Chester. She married Robert Bruce, 4th Lord of Annandale and through her came the claims firstly of her son in 1290 and later in the beginning of 14th century of her great-grandson Robert Bruce, 7th Lord of Annandale, to the Scottish throne. Her above-mentioned son Robert Bruce, 5th Lord of Annandale was regent and recognized heir presumptive of Scotland in the years just before her death.6

Family: Robert de Brus 4th Lord of Annandale b. c 1195, d. bt 1226 - 1233

  • Last Edited: 30 Jan 2015

Citations

  1. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10248.htm#i102474
  2. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.
  3. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10248.htm#i102478
  4. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10248.htm#i102474
    http://www.thepeerage.com/p10248.htm#i102478
  5. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_de_Brus,_4th_Lord_of_Annandale.
  6. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isobel_of_Huntingdon

Robert de Brus 4th Lord of Annandale1,2

M, #3440, b. circa 1195, d. between 1226 and 1233

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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  • Birth*: Robert was born circa 1195 in Annandale, Scotland.4,1,2
  • Marriage*: He married Isabella (?) of Huntingdon circa 1219 in Scotland.4,1,2
  • Death*: Robert de Brus 4th Lord of Annandale died between 1226 and 1233 in Scotland.3
  • Burial*: He was buried between 1226 and 1233 in Gisborough Priory or Sawtry Abbey, Scotland.2
  • Biography*: Robert IV de Brus, the Noble (ca. 1195–1226) was a 13th-century 4th Lord of Annandale.

    He was the son of William de Brus, 3rd Lord of Annandale and Christina or Beatrice de Teyden.

    Robert IV married ca. 1219 Isabella, the second daughter of David of Scotland, 8th Earl of Huntingdon, by which marriage he acquired the manors of Writtle and Hatfield Broadoak, Essex in England. They had his heir and successor, and a daughter:
    Robert V de Brus.
    Bernard de Brus

    He died sometime between 1226 and 1233, and was buried in Gisborough Priory or in Sawtry Abbey.

    He gained the title of Lord of Annandale. He has an extensive biographical entry in the Dictionary of National Biography.3,2

Family: Isabella (?) of Huntingdon b. c 1206, d. c 1251

  • Last Edited: 22 Mar 2016

Citations

  1. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10248.htm#i102474
  2. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_de_Brus,_4th_Lord_of_Annandale.
  3. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10248.htm#i102477
  4. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.

Robert de Brus 5th Lord of Annandale1

M, #3441, b. 1220, d. 31 March 1295

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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  • Birth*: Robert was born in 1220 in Scotland.2,1
  • Marriage*: He married Isabella de Clare, daughter of Gilbert de Clare 4th Earl of Hertford, 5th Earl of Gloucester and Lady Isabella Marshal, on 12 May 1240 in England.1
  • Marriage*: Robert de Brus 5th Lord of Annandale married Christina de Ireby, daughter of Sir William de Ireby and Christian de Hodeholme, on 3 May 1273 in Hoddam, Glasgow, Lanarkshire, Scotland.1
  • Death*: Robert died on 31 March 1295 in Lochmaben Castle, Scotland.2,1
  • Burial*: He was buried on 17 April 1295 in Guisborough Priory, Guisborough, Yorkshire, England.1
  • Biography*: Robert V de Brus (Robert de Brus), 5th Lord of Annandale (ca. 1210 – 31 March or 3 May 1295), was a feudal lord, Justice and Constable of Scotland and England, a Regent of Scotland, and a competitor for the Scottish throne in 1290/92 in the Great Cause. His grandson Robert the Bruce eventually became King of Scots.

    Early life
    Robert was son of Robert Bruce, 4th Lord of Annandale and Isobel of Huntingdon. Widely known as Robert the Noble, he was also grandson of David of Scotland, 8th Earl of Huntingdon and Matilda de Kevilloc of Chester, Great-grandson of Henry of Scotland, Earl of Huntingdon and Northumberland and Ada de Warenne and Great-great grandson of King David I of Scotland and Maud, Countess of Huntingdon.

    In addition to Annandale, Robert was Lord of Hartlepool (otherwise known as Hartness) in county Durham and Writtle and Hatfield Broadoak in Essex, England. His first wife brought to him the village of Ripe, in Sussex, and his second wife the Lordship of Ireby in Cumberland.

    His possessions were later increased following the defeat of Simon de Montfort at the Battle of Evesham (1265), via a series of grants that included the estates of the former rebel barons Walter de Fauconberg and John de Melsa. Henry III also re-appointed Robert a Justice, and Constable of Carlisle Castle and keeper of the Castle there in 1267, a position he had been dismissed from in 1255, for his support during the rebellion. Robert probably joined the princes Edward and Edmund on their 1270/74 crusade, as his sons failed to attend.

    In 1271, Robert obtained the hand of Marjorie of Carrick, the young widowed heiress of Niall of Carrick, 2nd Earl of Carrick for his son, also called Robert de Brus.

    Robert Bruce was Regent of Scotland some time during minority of his second cousin King Alexander III of Scotland (1241–1286) and was occasionally recognised as a Tanist of the Scottish throne. He was the closest surviving male relative to the king: Margaret of Huntingdon's issue were all females up until birth of Hugh Balliol sometime in the 1260s. When Alexander yet was childless, he was officially named as heir presumptive, but never gained the throne as Alexander managed to beget three children. The succession in the main line of the House of Dunkeld became highly precarious when towards the end of Alexander's reign, all three of his children died within a few years. The middle-aged Alexander III induced in 1284 the Estates to recognise as his heir-presumptive his granddaughter Margaret, called the "Maid of Norway", his only surviving descendant. The need for a male heir led Alexander to contract a second marriage to Yolande de Dreux on 1 November 1285. All this was eventually in vain. Alexander died suddenly, in a fall from his horse, when only 45 years old, in 1286. His death ushered in a time of political upheaval for Scotland. His three-year old granddaughter Margaret, who lived in Norway, was recognised as his successor. However, the then 7-year old heiress Margaret died, travelling towards her kingdom, on the Orkney Islands around 26 September 1290. With her death, the main royal line came to an end and thirteen claimants asserted their rights to the Scottish Throne.

    The Great Cause
    After this extinction of the senior line of the Scottish royal house (the line of William I of Scotland) David of Huntingdon's descendants were the primary candidates for the throne. The two most notable claimants to the throne, John Balliol and Robert himself represented descent through David's daughters Margaret and Isobel respectively.
    Robert Bruce pleaded tanistry and proximity of blood in the succession dispute. He descended from the second daughter of David of Huntingdon, whereas John Balliol descended from the eldest, and thus had the lineal right. However, Robert was a second cousin of kings of Scotland and descended in 4th generation from King David I of Scotland, whereas John Balliol was a third cousin of kings and descended in 5th generation from King David I, the most recent common ancestor who had been Scottish king. The ensuing 'Great Cause' was concluded in 1292. It gave the Crown of Scotland to his family's great rival, John Balliol. The events took place as follows:
    Soon after the death of young queen Margaret, Robert Bruce raised a body of men with the help of the Earls of Mar and Atholl and marched to Perth with a considerable following and uncertain intentions. Bishop William Fraser of St. Andrews, worried of the possibility of civil war, wrote to Edward I of England, asking for his assistance in choosing a new monarch.

    Edward took this chance to demand sasine of the Scottish royal estate, but agreed to pass judgment in return for recognition of his suzerainty. The guardians of Scotland denied him this, but Robert Bruce was quick to pay homage. All the claimants swore oaths of homage, and John Balliol was the last to do so. The guardians were forced to concede and were thus reinstated by Edward.

    Judgment processed slowly. On 3 August 1291 Edward asked both Balliol and Bruce to choose forty auditors while he himself chose twenty-four, to decide the case. After considering all of the arguments, in early November the court decided in favour of John Balliol, having the superior claim in feudal law, not to mention greater support from the kingdom of Scotland. In accordance with this, final judgement was given by Edward on 17 November. On 30 November, John Balliol was crowned as King of Scots at Scone Abbey. On 26 December, at Newcastle upon Tyne, King John swore homage to Edward I for the kingdom of Scotland. Edward soon made it clear that he regarded the country as his vassal state. The Bruce family thus lost what they regarded as their rightful place on the Scottish throne.

    Later years
    Robert, 5th Lord of Annandale resigned the lordship of Annandale and his claim to the throne to his eldest son Robert de Brus. Shortly afterwards, in 1292, the younger Robert's wife Marjorie of Carrick died and the earldom of Carrick, which Robert had ruled jure uxoris, devolved upon their eldest son, also called Robert, the future King.
    In 1292, Robert V de Brus held a market at Ireby, Cumberland, in right of his wife. The following year he had a market at Hartlepool, county Durham within the liberties of the Bishop of Durham.

    Sir Robert de Brus died at Lochmaben Castle and was buried at Gisborough Priory in Cleveland.

    Family and children
    He married firstly on 12 May 1240 Lady Isabella de Clare (2 November 1226 – after 10 July 1264), daughter of Gilbert de Clare, 4th Earl of Hertford and 5th Earl of Gloucester and Lady Isabel Marshal, with issue:
    Isabel de Brus (1249 – c. 1284), married (as his first wife) Sir John FitzMarmaduke, Knt., of Horden, Eighton, Lamesley, Ravensholm, and Silksworth, County Durham, Sheriff of North Durham, and Joint Warden beyond the Scottish Sea between the Firth of Forth and Orkney. He fought on the English side at the Battle of Falkirk, 22 July 1298, and was present at the Siege of Caerlaverock Castle in 1300. In 1307 he was commanded to assist the Earl of Richmond in expelling Robert de Brus and the Scottish rebels from Galloway. In 1309 his armour and provisions in a vessel bound for Perth were arrested off Great Yarmouth. He was governor of St. John's Town (Perth) in 1310 until his death. Isabel was buried at Easington, County Durham.
    Robert VI the Bruce, 6th Lord of Annandale, Earl of Carrick (1253–1304)
    William de Brus, married Elizabeth de Sully, without issue
    Sir Bernard de Bruce, of Connington, married firstly Alicia de Clare and married secondly Constance de Morleyn, and had:
    Sir John Bruce, of Exton, married and had:
    Jane Bruce, married Sir Nicholas Green
    Richard de Brus (died ca. 26 January 1287), unmarried and without issue
    He married, secondly on 3 May 1275 at Hoddam, in the Diocese of Glasgow, Christina (died ca. 1305 or 1305), daughter and heiress of Sir William de Ireby, of Ireby, Cumbria. They had no issue.

    He gained the title of Lord of Annandale.2 On 19 April 1267 he swore fealty to the King and Prince Edward. On 5 June 1291 he agreed to be bound by the decision of the King for the crown of Scotland (which he was a competitor for). However the King decided against him on 6 November 1292. He has an extensive biographical entry in the Dictionary of National Biography.1,3

Family 1:

Family 2: Isabella de Clare b. 2 Nov 1226, d. a 10 Jul 1264

  • Last Edited: 1 Apr 2017

Citations

  1. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10248.htm#i102474
  2. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.
  3. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_de_Brus,_5th_Lord_of_Annandale.
  4. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patrick_III,_Earl_of_Dunbar.

Robert de Brus Le vieil, First Lord of Brus1

M, #3442, b. July 1243, d. before 4 April 1304

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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  • Birth*: Robert was born in July 1243 in Scotland.2,1
  • Marriage*: He married Margaret (?) Countess of Carrick, daughter of Neil (?) 2nd Earl of Carrick and Margaret Stewart, in 1271 in Turnberry Castle, Turnberry, Aryeshire, Scotland.4
  • Death*: Robert died before 4 April 1304 in Scotland.2,4
  • Burial*: He was buried before 5 April 1304 in Abbey of Holm Cultram, Scotland.1
  • Biography*: Sir Robert VI de Brus (July 1243 – soon bef. 4 March 1304), 6th Lord of Annandale (dominus vallis Anandie), jure uxoris Earl of Carrick (1271–1292), Lord of Hartness, Writtle and Hatfield Broad Oak (Wretele et Hatfeud Regis), was a cross-border lord, and participant of the Second Barons' War, Welsh Wars, and First War of Scottish Independence.
    Of Scoto-Norman heritage, through his father he was a third-great grandson of David I, as well as claiming Richard (Strongbow) de Clare, 2nd Earl of Pembroke, King of Leinster and Governor of Ireland, and William Marshal, 1st Earl of Pembroke (described as the "best knight that ever lived.") in addition to Henry I of England amongst his ancestors.

    Life
    The son and heir of Robert de Brus, 5th Lord of Annandale and Lady Isabella de Clare, daughter of the Earl of Gloucester and Hertford, his birth date is generally accepted, but his place of birth is less certain. It has been speculated that he, rather than his first son, was born on the family estate at Writtle, Essex.

    Legend tells that the 27-year-old Robert de Brus was a handsome young man participating in the Ninth Crusade. When Adam de Kilconquhar, one of his companions-in-arms, fell in 1270, at Acre, Robert was obliged to travel to tell the sad news to Adam's widow Marjorie of Carrick. The story continues that Marjorie was so taken with the messenger that she had him held captive until he agreed to marry her, which he did in 1271. However, since the crusade landed in Acre on 9 May 1271, and only started to engage the Muslims in late June, the story and his participation in the Ninth Crusade are generally discounted.

    What is recorded, is that in:
    1264 He has to ransom his own father, after his capture, along with Henry III, Richard of Cornwall, and Edward I at the Battle of Lewes, Sussex.
    1271 He marries, without Scottish Royal consent, Marjory, countess of Carrick. As a result she temporarily loses her castle and estates, regained on payment of a fine.
    1274 Jul–Sep He is present, along with Alexander III of Scotland, his Queen Margaret, their children and 100 Scottish lords and knights at the Coronation and accompanying celebrations of Edward I, at the Palace of Westminster.
    1278 He swears fealty to Edward I, on behalf of Alexander III at Westminster.
    Accompanies Alexander III to Tewkesbury
    1281 He is part of the delegation to Guy of Dampierre, Count of Flanders, to arrange the marriage of the Lord Alexander.
    1282 He participates and is paid for his services in Edward's Conquest of Wales.
    1283 June, he is summoned by writ to Shrewsbury, for the trial of Dafydd ap Gruffydd.
    1285 Jun 1 – Earl & Countess, at Turnberry, grant the men of Melrose abbey certain freedoms, according to English law.
    1286 He is witness, along with his son Robert, to the grant of the church of Campbeltown to Paisley Abbey.
    1290 He is party to the Treaty of Birgham.
    He supports his father's claim to the vacant throne of Scotland, left so on the death of Margaret I of Scotland in 1290. The initial civil proceedings, known as The Great Cause, awarded the Crown to his fathers 1st cousin once removed, and rival, John Balliol.
    1291 He swears fealty to Edward I as overlord of Scotland.
    1292 His wife Marjorie dies.
    November, his father, Robert de Brus, 5th Lord of Annandale – the unsuccessful claimant – resigns his Lordship of Annandale, and claim to the throne to him, allegedly to avoid having to swear fealty to John.[4] In turn he passes his late wife's Earldom of Carrick, in fee, on to his son Robert.
    1293 January 1 – His warrener at Gt. Baddow, a Richard, is caught poaching venison at Northle.
    1293 He sets sail for Norway, for the marriage of his daughter Isabel to King Eric II of Norway, the father of the late Queen Margaret I of Scotland, son-in-law of King Alexander III, and a candidate of the Great Cause.
    1294/5 He returns to England.
    1295 His father dies.
    6 Oct, swears fealty to Edward and is made Constable and Keeper of Carlisle Castle, a position his father previously held.
    Refuses a summons to the Scottish host.
    Annandale is seized, by King John Balliol, and given to John 'The Red' Comyn, Lord of Badenoch.
    Confirms, to Gisborough Priory, the churches of Annandale and Hart. Witnessed by Walter de Fauconberg and Marmaduke de Thweng.
    Exchanges common pasture, for land held by William of Carlisle at Kinmount.
    Exchanges land in Estfield, for a field adjacent to the prior of Hatfield Regis's manor at Brunesho End Broomshawbury.
    Grants Robert Taper, and his wife Millicent, a messuage in Hatfield Regis, and via a separate grant 5.5 acres (22,000 m2) of arable land 1-acre (4,000 m2) of meadow, in Hatfield Regis, for 16s annual rent.
    Grants John de Bledelowe, the former lands / tenement of Richard de Cumbes, in Hatfield Regis, for 1d annual rent.
    Alters the terms of a grant to Richard de Fanwreyte, of Folewelleshaleyerde, Montpeliers, Writtle, from services to an annual rent. Witnesses includes two of Roberts Cook's at Writtle.
    Alters the terms of a grant to Stephen the Tanner, of Folewelleshaleyerde, Montpeliers, Writtle, from services to an annual rent. Witnesses includes two of Roberts Cook's at Writtle.
    Alters the terms of a grant to Willam Mayhew, of the tenement Barrieland, Hatfield Regis, to an annual rent of 5s and some services.
    1296 Jan, He is summoned to attend to the King Edward at Salisbury
    26 March, his garrison repels an attack, led by John Comyn, the new Lord of Annandale, across the Solway on Carlisle Castle. Robert forces the raiders to retreat back through Annandale to Sweetheart Abbey.
    28 April, he again swears fealty to Edward I and fights for Edward, at the Battle of Dunbar Castle.
    August, with his son Robert he renews the pledge of homage and fealty to Edward, at the 'victory parliament’ in Berwick.
    Edward I denies his claim to the throne and he retires to his estates in Essex.
    29 August – At Berwick, agrees the dower lands of his widowed step mother, Christina.
    Annandale is re-gained.
    Marries an Eleanor.
    1298
    7 Jan – Transfers a grant of land at Hatfield Regis, from Walter Arnby to his son William.
    29 May – Grants a John Herolff a half virgate of land in Writtle.
    1299
    1 February – Rents lands at Hatfield Regis, Essex to a John de Bledelowe, for 4s annual rent.
    4 August – While resident at Writtle, he Rents lands at Hatfield Regis, Essex to a Nicholas de Barenton, for 21s annual rent.
    1301 November 26 – Grants, Bunnys in Hatfield Broad Oak and Takeley, to an Edward Thurkyld.
    After 1301, Enfeoffments Writtle, in part, to a John de Lovetot and his wife Joan.
    1304 Easter, dies en route to Annandale and is buried at Holm Cultram Abbey, Cumberland.
    Following his death his Eleanor remarries, before 8 February 1306 (as his 1st wife) Richard Waleys, Lord Waleys, and they had issue. She died shortly before 8 September 1331.

    Shortly after the Battle of Stirling Bridge (1297), Annandale was laid waste as retaliation to younger Bruce's actions.

    Yet, when Edward returned to England after his victory at the Battle of Falkirk, which one source accords to Robert turning the Scottish flank:
    Fordun, John "Chronica Gentis Scotorum (Chronicle of the Scottish nation)", 1363, Translated from the Latin text by Felix J. H. Skene. Ed. by William F. Skene. 1872:
    CI - Battle of Falkirk. : — In the year 1298, the aforesaid king of England, taking it ill that he and his should be put to so much loss and driven to such straits by William Wallace, gathered together a large army, and, having with him, in his company, some of the nobles of Scotland to help him, invaded Scotland. He was met by the aforesaid William, with the rest of the magnates of that kingdom ; and a desperate battle was fought near Falkirk, on the 22d of July. William was put to flight, not without serious loss both to the lords and to the common people of the Scottish nation. For, on account of the ill-will, begotten of the spring of envy, which the Comyns had conceived towards the said William, they, with their accomplices, forsook the field, and escaped unhurt. On learning their spiteful deed, the aforesaid William, wishing to save himself and his, hastened to flee by another road. But alas ! through the pride and burning envy of both, the noble Estates (communitas) of Scotland lay wretchedly overthrown throughout hill and dale, mountain and plain. Among these, of the nobles, John Stewart, with his Brendans ; Macduff, of Fife ; and the inhabitants thereof, were utterly cut off. But it is commonly said that Robert of Bruce, — who was afterwards king of Scotland, but then fought on the side of the king of England — was the means of bringing about this victory. For, while the Scots stood invincible in their ranks, and could not be broken by either force or stratagem, this Robert of Bruce went with one line, under Anthony of Bek, by a long road round a hill, and attacked the Scots in the rear ; and thus these, who had stood invincible and impenetrable in front, were craftily overcome in the rear. And it is remarkable that we seldom, if ever, read of the Scots being overcome by the English, unless through the envy of lords, or the treachery and deceit of the natives, taking them over to the other side.

    This is contested as no Bruce appears on the Falkirk roll, of nobles present in the English army, and ignoring Blind Harry's 15th claim that Wallace burned Ayre Castle in 1297, two 19th Century antiquarians: Alexander Murison and George Chalmers have stated Bruce did not participate in the battle and in the following month decided to burn Ayr Castle, to prevent it being garrisoned by the English. Annandale and Carrick were excepted from the lordships and lands which Edward assigned to his followers, the father having not opposed Edward and the son being treated as a waverer whose allegiance might still be retained.

    Robert at that time was old and ill, and there are reports that he wished his son to seek peace with Edward. If not his son's actions could jeopardise his own income, which was primarily derived from his holdings south of the border (est. £340 vs £150). The elder Bruce would have seen that, if the rebellion failed and his son was against Edward, the son would lose everything, titles, lands, and probably his life.

    It was not until 1302 that Robert's son submitted to Edward I. The younger Robert had sided with the Scots since the capture and exile of Balliol. There are many reasons which may have prompted his return to Edward, not the least of which was that the Bruce family may have found it loathsome to continue sacrificing his followers, family and inheritance for King John. There were rumours that John would return with a French army and regain the Scottish throne. Soulis supported his return as did many other nobles, but this would lead to the Bruces losing any chance of gaining the throne themselves. He died in Palestine and was buried at Holm Cultram Abbey.

    Family
    His first wife was Margery of Carrick, 3rd Countess of Carrick (11 Apr 1254–November 1292), the daughter and heiress of Niall, 2nd Earl of Carrick. Carrick was a Gaelic Earldom in Southern Scotland. Its territories contained much of today's Ayrshire and Dumfriesshire. The couple married at Turnberry Castle in 1271 and held the principal seats of Turnberry Castle and Lochmaben.

    Their children were:
    Isabel Bruce (b. c. 1272); married King Eric II of Norway in 1293; d. 1358 in Bergen, Norway.
    Christina Bruce (b. c. 1273, Seton, East Lothian); married, firstly, Sir Christopher Seton. Married, secondly, Gartnait, Earl of Mar, in 1292 in Kildrummy, Aberdeenshire. Married, thirdly, Sir Andrew Murray, 20 September 1305, d. 1356/7, in Scotland. By her second marriage, she was the mother of Domhnall II, Earl of Mar.
    Robert I of Scotland (11 July 1274 – 7 June 1329); married, firstly, Isabella of Mar; married, secondly, Elizabeth de Burgh.
    Neil de Brus (Niall or Nigel; b. c. 1276); taken prisoner at Kildrummie, hanged, drawn and quartered at Berwick-upon-Tweed in September 1306.
    Edward Bruce (b. c. 1279); crowned 2 May 1316, 'King of Ireland'. Killed in battle, 5 October 1318.[9] Possible marriage to Isabel, daughter of John de Strathbogie, 9th Earl of Atholl-parents of Alexander Bruce, Earl of Carrick; Edward obtained a dispensation for a marriage to Isabella of Ross, daughter of Uilleam II, Earl of Ross, on 1 June 1317.
    Mary Bruce (b. c. 1282); married, firstly, Sir Neil Campbell; married, secondly, Sir Alexander Fraser of Touchfraser and Cowie.
    Margaret Bruce (b. c. 1283); married Sir William Carlyle.
    Sir Thomas de Brus (b. c. 1284); taken prisoner in Galloway, hanged, drawn and quartered 9 February 1307, Carlisle, Cumberland.
    Alexander de Brus (b. c. 1285); hanged, drawn and quartered 9 February 1307, Carlisle, Cumberland.
    Elizabeth Bruce (b. c. 1286); married Sir William Dishington of Ardross, Fife.
    Matilda/Margery Bruce (b. c. 1287); married Hugh / Aodh, Earl of Ross, in 1308 Orkney Isles, died after September 1323.
    He had no children from his second wife, Eleanor N (died btw 13 April and 8 September 1331).5

Family: Margaret (?) Countess of Carrick b. c 1250, d. b 9 Nov 1292

  • Last Edited: 15 Feb 2015

Citations

  1. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10776.htm#i107755
  2. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.
  3. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10248.htm#i102474
  4. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10209.htm#i102089
  5. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_de_Brus,_6th_Lord_of_Annandale.
  6. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10788.htm#i107878
  7. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10790.htm#i107896
  8. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10787.htm#i107865

Kenneth MacAlpin King of the Scots

M, #3443, b. 810, d. 859

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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  • Birth*: Kenneth was born in 810 in Isle of Iona, Argyllshire, Scotland.1,2,3
  • Burial*: He was buried in 859 in Isle of Iona, Argyllshire, Scotland.2
  • Death*: He died in 859 in Forteviot, Perthshire, Scotland.2
  • Biography*: Kenneth was King of the Scots from 843 to 860.

    He succeeded to the title of King Kenneth I of Galloway on 20 July 834. He gained the title of King Kenneth I of Dalriada in 841. He gained the title of King Kenneth I of the Picts between 843 and 844. He gained the title of King Kenneth I of Scotland in 846.

    He has an extensive biographical entry in the Dictionary of National Biography.

    Kenneth I, MacAlpine d. 860, king of the Scots, was son of Alpin, king of the Dalriad Scots. His father, according to the Chronicle of Huntingdon, which Fordoun follows, was slain in battle with the Picts on 20 July 834, and was at once succeeded by Kenneth as king, apparently only in Galloway. According to the same authority Kenneth became king of the Dalriad Scots about ten years later; in the seventh year after his father's death, 841 (not 839, as in Skene, Celtic Scotland, p. 308), he compelled Danish pirates who had seized the Picts' territory to fly, and in the twelfth year of his reign (846), two years after succeeding to the Dalriad monarchy, he finally defeated the Picts and confirmed his rule over Alban, the name given to the united kingdom of the Scots and Picts. The marauding Danish vikings whom he drove from the coasts were perhaps the followers of Ragnar Lodbrog, called by Irish annalists Vegesius (Wars of the Gaedhill and the Gael, Todd's edition), who founded a Scandinavian kingdom in Dublin about 830 and died 845; but this is doubted by recent Scandinavian scholars. The Chronicle adds that he reigned in all twenty-eight years—sixteen years over the Picts and Dalriad Scots together—which would make the end of his reign 862. The Pictish Chronicle, which dates only a century and a half after the event, implies that Kenneth's reign over Dalriada began in 842, and over the Picts in 844. But the difference in the dates between the Huntingdon and Pictish Chronicles is unimportant, and leaves no reasonable doubt on the point, cardinal for Scottish history, that Kenneth united the kingdoms of the Scots and Picts in the middle of the ninth century, a union effected by his conquest of the Picts. Skene points out that Kenneth and one or two of his successors are called in the Irish annals kings of the Picts, and that from his father's name (Alpin) being Pictish rather than Scottish, he may have had Pictish blood. But the evidence that Kenneth was a Dalriad king is really conclusive.

    The expulsion, or, as the Pictish Chronicle calls it, the deletion of the Picts, may be something of an exaggeration; but the almost total disappearance of the Pictish dialect of Gaelic, save in the place-names, the names of the old Pictish kings, and a few other words which puzzle the philologist, indicates either a complete conquest and the superinduction of the Gaelic of the west upon the Pictish Gaelic of central and northern Scotland, or a divergence of dialect so slight that the adoption of the speech of the conquerors by the conquered was almost an imperceptible transition.

    The Scots of Dalriada seem to have found in Kenneth a Scottish Alfred. Besides expelling the Danes and conquering the Picts of the central districts (the men of Fortrenn), Kenneth invaded Saxony, ie. Lothian, or the northern parts of Northumbria, six times, burning Dunbar and Melrose. By a bold stroke of policy he moved the chief seat of his kingdom from Argyll and the Isles (Dalriada), no longer tenable against the Danes, to Scone, which became the Scottish capital, so far as that word is applicable to the principal royal fort. In 851 he removed some of the relics of Columba still left in Iona to the church which he built at Dunkeld, possibly on the site of an earlier church founded by Constantine MacFergus [see Constantine], a Pictish king. Dunkeld became the chief ecclesiastical seat of the new kingdom; and this removal of Columba's relics, taken in connection with the statement of the Pictish Chronicle that the Picts were punished by God for despising the mass and precept of the Lord, and also for refusing to acknowledge others as their equals, probably indicates that an ecclesiastical revolution was associated with the civil—perhaps the restoration of the Columbite clergy, who had been expelled by the Picts in the beginning of the eighth century. Kenneth died of a tumour in 860 at Forteviot, and was buried at Iona.

    If this be the true reconstruction of this obscure period in the annals of Scotland, it is not wonderful that Kenneth should have been looked back upon as the founder of the Scottish dynasty, and that the verses which Wyntoun quotes as existing in his time (c. 1395) should have been inscribed on his tomb at Iona:Primus in Albania fertur regnasse KynedusFilius Alpini prelia multa gerens.
    Expulsis Pictis regnaverat octo bis annisEt post Forteviot mortuus ille fuit.

    It was from Scone and Dunkeld that the Scottish monarchy gradually expanded, and the first important step was taken by Kenneth in giving his kingdom a firmer hold on the central highlands, where it was secure from permanent conquest, either by the Danes or the English. The laws which Fordoun ascribed to Kenneth MacAlpine, and Hector Boece printed at length, are supposititious, and were ascribed to him because it was thought a great king must be a great lawgiver.

    One of Kenneth's daughters married Cu (E. W. Robertson) or Run (Skene's reading of the name in the Pictish Chronicle), a prince of the Strathclyde Britons, an alliance which foreshadowed a later union with the south-western district of Scotland; another married Olaf the White, the Norse king of Dublin; and a third married Ædh Finnliath, king of Ireland (Celtic Scotland, i. 313). Kenneth's kingdom passed for three years into the hands of his brother, Donald V, who was succeeded in 863 by his son, Constantine I, after whose death in 877 Ædh, another son of Kenneth, reigned, or attempted to reign, for a single year, when he was killed by his rival Gregory the Great (d. 889).1,4,3
  • Last Edited: 24 Nov 2014

Citations

  1. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.
  2. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10291.htm#i102901
  3. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_MacAlpin
  4. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10291.htm#i102901
    http://www.thepeerage.com/e113.htm
  5. [S218] Stewart Ross, Monarchs of Scotland.
  6. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10289.htm#i102892

Alpin of Kintyre (?) King of the Scots1

M, #3444, b. 778, d. 20 July 834

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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  • Birth*: Alpin was born in 778 in Scotland*.2,3
  • Death*: He died on 20 July 834 in Galloway, Scotland*; Killed fighting the Picts.1
  • Biography*: He gained the title of King Alpin of Scotland in 843. He gained the title of King Alpin of Kintyre.

    Alpín mac Echdach
    From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
    Alpín mac Eochaid may refer to two persons. The first person is a presumed king of Dál Riata in the late 730s. The second is the father of Kenneth MacAlpin (Cináed mac Ailpín). The name Alpín is taken to be a Pictish one, derived from the Anglo-Saxon name Ælfwine; Alpín's patronymic means son of Eochaid or son of Eoch.

    Alpín father of King Kenneth

    Irish annals such as the Annals of Ulster and the Annals of Innisfallen name Kenneth's father as one Alpín. This much is reasonably certain.

    The Chronicle of the Kings of Alba usually begins with Kenneth, but some variants include a reference to Kenneth's father: "[Alpín] was killed in Galloway, after he had entirely destroyed and devastated it. And then the kingdom of the Scots was transferred to the kingdom [variant: land] of the Picts."

    John of Fordun (IV, ii) calls Kenneth's father "Alpin son of Achay" (Alpín son of Eochu) and has him killed in war with the Picts in 836; Andrew of Wyntoun's version mixes Fordun's war with the Picts with the Chronicle version which has him killed in Galloway.

    Alpín of Dál Riata

    The genealogies produced for Kings of Scots in the High Middle Ages traced their ancestry through Kenneth MacAlpin, through the Cenél nGabráin of Dál Riata to Fergus Mór, and then to legendary Irish kings such as Conaire Mór and the shadowy Deda mac Sin.

    These genealogies, perhaps oral in origin, were subjected to some regularisation by the scribes who copied them into sources such as the Chronicle of Melrose, the Poppleton Manuscript and the like. Either by accident, or by design, a number of kings were misplaced, being moved from the early 8th century to the late 8th and early 9th century.

    The original list is presumed to have resembled the following:
    1. Eochaid mac Domangairt
    2. Ainbcellach mac Ferchair
    3. Eógan mac Ferchair
    4. Selbach mac Ferchair
    5. Eochaid mac Echdach
    6. Dúngal mac Selbaig
    7. Alpín
    8. Muiredach mac Ainbcellaig
    9. Eógan mac Muiredaig
    10. Áed Find
    11. Fergus mac Echdach
    After modification to link this list of kings of Dál Riata to the family of Kenneth MacAlpin, the list is presumed to have been in this form:
    1. Eochaid mac Domangairt
    2. Ainbcellach mac Ferchair
    3. Eógan mac Ferchair
    8. Muiredach mac Ainbcellaig
    9. Eogan mac Muiredaig
    10. Áed Find
    11. Fergus mac Echdach
    4. Selbach mac Ferchair (called Selbach mac Eógain)
    5. Eochaid mac Echdach (called Eochaid mac Áeda Find)
    6. Dúngal mac Selbaig (name unchanged)
    7. Alpín (called Alpín mac Echdach)

    However, the existence of the original Alpín is less than certain. No king in Dál Riata of that name is recorded in the Irish annals in the early 730s. A Pictish king named Alpín, whose father's name is not given in any Irish sources, or even from the Pictish Chronicle king-lists, is known from the late 720s, when he was defeated by Óengus mac Fergusa and Nechtan mac Der-Ilei. For the year 742, the Annals of Ulster are read as referring to the capture of "Elffin son of Crop" (the former reading had besieged rather than captured). Whether Álpin son of Crup is related to the Álpin of the 720s is unknown.1,4

Family:

  • Last Edited: 22 Sep 2017

Citations

  1. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10291.htm#i102905
  2. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.
  3. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10291.htm#i102905
    http://www.thepeerage.com/p10209.htm#i102086
  4. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alp%C3%ADn_mac_Echdach
  5. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10291.htm#i102901

Donald I MacAlpin King of the Scots

M, #3445, b. circa 812, d. 13 April 862

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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  • Birth*: Donald was born circa 812 in Scotland*.1,2
  • Death*: He died on 13 April 862 in Scotland*.2
  • Biography*: Domnall mac Ailpín (Modern Gaelic: Dòmhnall mac Ailpein, anglicised sometimes as Donald MacAlpin, and known in most modern regnal lists as Donald I); (812 – 13 April 862) was king of the Picts from 858 to 862. He followed his brother Kenneth I to the Pictish throne.

    Reign
    The Chronicle of the Kings of Alba says that Domnall reigned for four years, matching the notices in the Annals of Ulster of his brother's death in February 858 and his own in April 862. The Chronicle notes:
    In his time the Gaels with their king made the rights and laws of the kingdom, [that are called the laws] of Áed, Eochaid's son in Forteviot.

    The laws of Áed Find are entirely lost, but it has been assumed that, like the laws attributed to Giric and Constantine II (Causantín mac Áeda), these related to the church and in particular to granting the privileges and immunities common elsewhere. The significance of Forteviot as the site of this law-making, along with Kenneth's death there and Constantine's later gathering at nearby Scone, may point to this as being the heartland of the sons of Alpín's support.

    The Chronicle of Melrose says of Domnall, "in war he was a vigorous soldier ... he is said to have been assassinated at Scone." No other source reports Domnall's death by violence.

    The Prophecy of Berchán may refer to Domnall in stanzas 123–124:
    Evil will be Scotland's lot because of [the death of Kenneth MacAlpin]; long will it be until his like will come. Long until the king takes [sovereignty], the wanton son of the foreign wife. He will be three years in the kingdom and three months (although thou countest them). His tombstone will be above Loch Awe. He dies of disease.

    Although Domnall is generally been supposed to have been childless, it has been suggested that Giric was a son of Domnall, reading his patronym as mac Domnaill rather than the commonly supposed mac Dúngail. This, however, is not widely accepted.

    Domnall died, either at the palace of Cinnbelachoir (location unknown), or at Rathinveralmond (also unknown, and may be the same place, presumed to be near the junction of the Almond and the Tay, near Scone). He was buried on Iona.1,2
  • Last Edited: 29 Nov 2014

Citations

  1. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.
  2. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domnall_mac_Ailp%C3%ADn

Constantine I (?) King of the Scots1

M, #3446, b. 836, d. 877

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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  • Birth*: Constantine was born in 836 in Scotland.2,3
  • Burial*: He was buried in 877 in Isle of Iona, Argyllshire, Scotland.3
  • Death*: He died in 877 in Inverdorat, the Black Cove, Angus, Scotland; Killed in action against the Danes.3
  • Biography*: Constantine I was King of the Scots from 863.

    He gained the title of King Constantine of Alba. He gained the title of King Constantine of the Picts and Scots. He succeeded to the title of King Constantine I of Scotland in 863.

    Most of his reign was spent in beating off Viking assults or attempting to extend his authority southwards. Although he ordered the murder of King Artgal (his brother in law and the refugee ruler of Strathclyde) in 871, sometimes he bought peace with his enemies by paying tribute. King of the Scots and Picts for 14 years and was killed in a battle with the Danes at Inverdovat.

    He has an extensive biographical entry in the Dictionary of National Biography.

    Constantine I d. 879, son of Kenneth Macalpine, king of Scotland or Alba, the country north of the Forth and Clyde, whose chief seat was Scone, succeeded his uncle Donald in 863. His reign was one of the first when the attacks of the Normans attained a formidable height, threatening the destruction of the Celtic and Saxon kingdoms. Two years after his accession Olaf the White, king of Dublin, wanted the country of the Picts, and occupied it from the Kalends of January to the feast of St. Patrick, ie. 17 March. According to the Pictish Chronicle, Olaf was slain by Constantine when on a raid in the following year, but the Annals of Ulster relate that he destroyed Alrhyth (Dumbarton), after a four months' siege, in 870, and retired in 871 to Dublin with two hundred ships and a great body of men, Anglo-Britons and Picts. After this he disappears from the Irish annals, so that his death may possibly have been antedated by some years in the account of the Pictish Chronicle.

    Ivar, another of the Norse Vikings of Dublin, who had fought along with Olaf, died about the same time, but Scotland was still exposed to incursions from other leaders of the same race. Thorstein the Red, a son of Olaf, by Audur, the wealthy daughter of Ketill Flatnore, attacked the northern districts, and, according to the Icelandic Landnamabok, conquered Katanes and Suderland, Ross and Norway, and more than half Scotland. But his kingdom, which, perhaps, was acquiesced in by Constantine, who had slight hold of the northern parts, was brief, and he was slain by the men of Alba by a stratagem or treachery in 875. In the South Halfdane the Danish leader who led the northern of the two bands (Guthrum, Alfred's opponent commanded the other), into which the formerly united host of that people was divided, ravaged the east coast of Britain, laid waste Northumbria, and destroyed the Picts (of Galloway?) and the people of Strathclyde.

    Two years later another band of Danes, the Irish Dubhgall, or Black Strangers, having been driven from Ireland by the Fingall, or White Strangers, made a sudden descent on Scotland by way of the Clyde and, penetrating into the interior, defeated the Scots at Dollar, from which they passed to Inverdovat, in the parish of Forgan in Fife, where Constantine was slain (877). Tradition points to the long black cave, near Crail, as the scene of his death.2,4

Family:

  • Last Edited: 1 Oct 2014

Citations

  1. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/…
  2. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.
  3. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10289.htm#i102892
  4. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10289.htm#i102892
    http://www.thepeerage.com/e131.htm
  5. [S742] The Peerage, online thepeerage.com, http://www.thepeerage.com/p10289.htm#i102891

Aedh (?) King of Scots1

M, #3447, b. circa 850

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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  • Name Variation: Aedh (?) King of Scots was also known as Aodh King of the Scots.
  • Birth*: Aedh was born circa 850 in Scotland.2
  • Biography*: Aodh was King of the Scots from 877 to 878.

    Áed mac Cináeda (died 878) was a son of Cináed mac Ailpín ("Kenneth MacAlpin"). He became king of the Picts in 877 when he succeeded his brother Constantine I. He was nicknamed Áed of the White Flowers, the Wing-footed (Latin: alipes) or the white-foot (Latin: albipes).

    The Chronicle of the Kings of Alba says of Áed: "Edus [Áed] held the same [i.e. the kingdom] for one year. The shortness of his reign has bequeathed nothing memorable to history. He was slain in the civitas of Nrurim." Nrurim is unidentified.

    The Annals of Ulster say that in 878: "Áed mac Cináeda, king of the Picts, was killed by his associates." Tradition, reported by George Chalmers in his Caledonia (1807), and by the New Statistical Account (1834–1845), has it that the early-historic mound of the Cunninghillock by Inverurie is the burial place of Áed. This is based on reading Nrurim as Inruriu.

    A longer account is interpolated in Andrew of Wyntoun's Orygynale Cronykil of Scotland. This says that Áed reigned one year and was killed by his successor Giric in Strathallan and other king lists have the same report.

    It is uncertain which, if any, of the Prophecy of Berchán's kings should be taken to be Áed. William Forbes Skene presumed that the following verses referred to Áed:
    129. Another king will take [sovereignty]; small is the profit that he does not divide. Alas for Scotland thenceforward. His name will be the Furious.

    130. He will be but a short time over Scotland. The will be no [word uncertain] unplundered. Alas for Scotland, through the youth; alas for their books, alas for their bequests.
    131. He will be nine years in the kingdom. I shall tell you—it will be a tale of truth—he dies without bell, with communion, at evening, in a fatal pass.

    Áed's son, Constantín mac Áeda, became king in 900. The idea that Domnall II of Strathclyde was a son of Áed, based on a confusing entry in the Chronicle of the Kings of Alba, is contested.2,1

Family:

  • Last Edited: 22 Jan 2015

Citations

  1. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%81ed_mac_Cin%C3%A1eda
  2. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.

daughter MacAlpin

F, #3448, b. circa 820

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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  • Last Edited: 7 Mar 2015

Citations

  1. [S218] Stewart Ross, Monarchs of Scotland.
  2. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.

Run (?) King of Strathclyde

M, #3449, b. circa 825, d. circa 878

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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  • Birth*: Run was born circa 825 in Scotland.1,2,3
  • Marriage*: He married daughter MacAlpin circa 850.1
  • Death*: Run (?) King of Strathclyde died circa 878 in Scotland.3
  • Biography*: Run (died c. 878) was probably a ruler of Alt Clut (modern Dumbarton Rock, Scotland) and Strathclyde (the "Clyde Valley"), a Brythonic kingdom in the Hen Ogledd or "Old North" of Britain. The dates of his reign are uncertain, but he probably ruled from the death of his father Artgal in 872 until around 878, when his son Eochaid ascended the throne.

    The Harleian genealogies name Run as the son of Artgal, who ruled Strathclyde until his death in 872. Run is in fact the last figure in his line appearing in the Welsh genealogy, probably indicating that the pedigree was his own. Run was married to the daughter of Kenneth MacAlpin (Cináed mac Ailpín), and was thus brother-in-law to Constantín mac Cináeda, King of the Picts at the time. According to the Irish annals, Constantín consented to Artgal's death in 872. If Run's marriage had occurred or been arranged by that time, this may have provided Constantín a claim over Strathclyde. The marriage produced Eochaid, who, with Giric, possibly held overlordship of Scotland after the death of Run's brother-in-law, Áed mac Cináeda, until their deposition by King Donald II (Domnall mac Causantín). To what extent Run ever ruled independently of his Scottish overlords is unknown, and that he reigned at all is just an educated guess, although the Chronicle of the Kings of Alba does specify that his son Eochaid ruled as "King of the Britons". The church of Saint Constantine at Govan was likely founded during Run's reign, or soon after.

    Run's death is unrecorded, but it was probably in 878 when Eochaid became king.3
  • Last Edited: 7 Mar 2015

Citations

  1. [S218] Stewart Ross, Monarchs of Scotland.
  2. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.
  3. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Run_of_Alt_Clut

Eochaidh (?) King of the Scots

M, #3450, b. circa 850

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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  • Name Variation: Eochaidh (?) King of the Scots was also known as Eochad (?)
  • Birth*: Eochaidh was born circa 850 in Scotland.1,2
  • Biography*: Eochaidh was King of the Scots from 878 to 889.

    Eochaid mac Run, known in English simply as Eochaid, may have been king of the Picts from 878 to 889. He was a son of Run, King of Strathclyde, and his mother may have been a daughter of Kenneth MacAlpin (Cináed mac Ailpín). His kingship is usually portrayed as some form of joint rule with Giric.

    The evidence for Eochaid's rule as king of the Picts rests on the Chronicle of the Kings of Alba, where it is written:
    And Eochodius son of Run king of the Britons, grandson of Kenneth by his daughter, reigned for 11 years; although others say that Ciricium (Giric) son of another reigned at this time, because he became Eochaid's foster-father and guardian.

    And in his second year Aed son of Niall [Aed Finliath] died.

    And in his ninth year, on the very day of St. Cirici (Cyrus), an eclipse of the sun occurred. Eochaid and his foster father was now expelled from the kingdom.
    This is the record of Eochaid's reign, such as it is. The death of Aed Finliath son of Niall Caille is dated to 20 November 879, and the solar eclipse to 16 June 885. The chronicler's "although others say" shows that the confusion concerning Eochaid is nothing new.

    Some variants of the Chronicle of the Kings of Alba king lists do not include Eochaid. The Duan Albanach omits both Eochaid and Giric, jumping from "Aodh, of the white flowers" (King Áed mac Cináeda) to "Domhnal, son of Cusaintin the fair" (Donald II, son of Constantine I (Domnall mac Causantín)). The Duan also omits earlier kings, such as Selbach mac Ferchair, although whether these omissions are by accident or design is unknowable. David Dumville's suggestion that the surviving record may be corrupted by cases of damnatio memoriae is unprovable, but should be borne in mind. Andrew of Wyntoun's Orygynale Cronykl of Scotland (c. 1420) and George Buchanan's Rerum Scoticarum Historia (1579) know of Giric, but not of Eochaid.

    American Celticist Benjamin Hudson, relying on the Prophecy of Berchán in his 1996 book of the same name, is confident that Eochaid can be identified and that he was indeed a Scottish or Pictish king. The Prophecy is not without its critics, and the entry which is assumed to identify Eochaid, calling him the Briton of the Clyde, refers to his mother as "the woman of Dún Guaire (Bamburgh)", which raises unanswered questions.

    David Dumville, relying on the Chronicle alone, appears to accept that Eochaid was king, while Archie Duncan, arguing from the same source, flatly rejects the idea that Eochaid was king and attributes the supposed joint reign to Giric, and to Giric alone. There is evidence independent of the Chronicle of the Kings of Alba and the related king lists which may argue for Giric's kingship, but none for Eochaid. The quoted Chronicle entry could have Eochaid removed, and still be readable, whereas it would not remain so without Giric, whose name day is mentioned as the date of the solar eclipse.


    In short, there is no consensus as to whether Eochaid was king of the Picts or king of Strathclyde or no king at all.1,3
  • Last Edited: 9 Oct 2014

Citations

  1. [S217] Ronald Williams, The Lords of the Isles.
  2. [S218] Stewart Ross, Monarchs of Scotland.
  3. [S746] Wikipedia, online http://Wikipedia.com, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eochaid,_son_of_Rhun.