FOOTNOTES:

FOOTNOTES:[1]Amm. Marc.l. 28, c. 8. In a treatise, “de situ Britanniæ,” palmed off upon Richard of Cirencester, the district beyond the northern wall is erected into a province, and calledVespasiana, a name which in itself is a palpable blunder of the age which attributed every Roman relic in Scotland to the time of Agricola. The work abounds in internal evidence of its falsity. Vespasiana is said to have received the name in honour of the Flavian family, and in compliment to Domitian “in whose reign it was conquered” (l. 2, c. 6, s. 50), and withMæatato have been lost under Trebellius, the successor of Lucullus, who had been put to death by Domitian (l. 2, c. 2, s. 16): but of these two provinces, which must have been created by his own father-in-law, Tacitus, writing during the reign of Trajan, displays a profound ignorance. Valentia again, the creation of Theodosius, about 369, is said to have been made a consular province by Constantine, who died two and thirty years before! (l. 1, c. 6, s. 3.) Such are a few specimens of the stupid blunders of its fabricator Mr. Bertram.[2]Nen. Geneal.The See of Dôl, in Brittany, dates its rise from the flight of Bishop Samson from York.[3]Nen. Geneal.—Llywarch,Marwnad UrienandTaliesin, quoted byCarte, vol. i. p. 209, and byTurner, Ang. Sax., bk. 2, c. 4. A translation of the latter poem will be found inCamb. Reg.v. 3, p. 433, fully justifying the regrets of Turner “that any historical poem should be translated into verse.” A tract of hill and moor, stretching from Derbyshire into Scotland, is often known in the early chroniclers as “Desertum,” the waste or desert. The battle in which Ida fell was probably the famous “battle of Badon,” which, according to Taliesin, “avenged the blood of the lords of the north,” and Urien was, I suspect, the “good and valiant uncle,” for opposing whom Gildas blames Maelgwn Gwynnedd.[4]Tigh.502, 574.Adam. Vit. Col. (Reeves), App. 2, p. 435.Bed. Ecc. Hist., l. 3, c. 3. According to Beda, the grant of Iona was made by the Pictish king, and the question is a matter of dispute—as what question in early Scottish history is not? Dr. Reeves, the learned editor of Adamnan, is inclined to a compromise, Conal granting, and Bruidi confirming, the grant.[5]An. F. M. (O’Donovan), 554, and Note; andAdam. Vit. Col. (Reeves),passim. The great family of theHy Nialsupplied theArdrighsor kings paramount of Ireland, uninterruptedly from the dawn of authentic history, until their power was shaken by the Northmen. The northern branch was subdivided into theCinel EoganandCinel Conal, more familiarly, but less accurately, known as Tyrone and Tirconnell; the southern intoClan ColmanandSiol Aodh Slane.[6]Tigh.563.Bed. Hist. Ecc., l. 3, c. 4, 5, 26.Adam. Vit. Col. (Reeves), l. 1, c. 37; l. 2, c. 35.Craig Phadrickis supposed by Dr. Reeves to represent theRathof Bruidi. The southern Picts had been already converted by Ninian, a British bishop, according to Beda (l. 3, c. 4); and if the conjecture is correct which assigns this conversion to the early part of the fifth century, it must have been effected during their temporary occupation of the province of Valentia. If reliance can be placed on traditional chronology, the migration ofCynedda Gwladig, the ancestor of the “noble tribes” of Wales, fromManau Guotodin—supposed to mean the “Debateable Land” between Picts, Scots, Angles, and Britons [Adam. Vit. Col. (Reeves), p. 371, d.]—must have taken place about the same period, and was caused, probably, by the encroachments of the Picts.[7]Beda—as above.[8]Bed. Hist. Ecc., l. 5, c. 24.Tigh.717. The foundation of Abernethy is ascribed by the chronicle of the Picts to a Nectan, who lived 300 years before this reign, but I suspect the later builder of the “stone church” was the real founder. Innes (Ap. ii, v.) quotes from the book of Paisley, “In illa ecclesiâ (Abernethy), fuerunt tres electiones factæ quando non fuit nisi unus solus episcopus in Scociâ. Tunc enim fuit ille locus principalis regalis et pontificalis per aliqua tempora tocius regni Pictorum.” As the “primacy” originally vested in Iona, passed subsequently to Dunkeld and St. Andrews, neither of which were in existence before the early part of the ninth century, it may be inferred that, during the intervening period, it remained with Abernethy. It was usually vested in theCowarb, or representative of the original founder; and its leading privileges were theLex, or right toCanandCuairt—tribute and free quarters—and other dues.[9]Bed. Hist. Ecc., l. 3, c. 1, 3.[10]Bed. Hist. Ecc., l. 2, c. 5; l. 3, c. 24; l. 4, c. 2, 12.Edd. Vit. Wilf., c. 19. Thetenero adhuc regnoof Eddius is changed by Malmesbury (de Gest. Pont.) intoteneram infantiam reguli, an expression scarcely applicable to Egfrid, who was twenty-five when he ascended the throne. Thus inaccuracies creep into history.[11]Bed. Hist. Ecc., l. 4, c. 26.Nen. Geneal. Tigh.686.An. Ult.685. According to Nennius, no Saxon tax-gatherer ever again took tribute from the Picts. Tribute and a foreign bishop—or abbot—were the true tests of dependence at this period.Tulachamanseems to have been the place often known asRath-inver-aman—“the fort at the mouth of the river Almond,” where vestiges of it are I believe still traceable.Dun Ollaigwas probably a place at which Talorcan ofAthollwas killed some years later.[12]Tigh.726, 728, 729.An. Ult.728.Bed. Hist. Ecc. Contin.740, 750.[13]Adam. Vit. Col. (Reeves), p. 370, note A, p. 435.[14]Bed. Hist. Ecc., l. 1, c. 34.Uladhmay be said to have had three meanings—1. Legendary Uladh, the northern kingdom of Ireland answering very nearly to modern Ulster; 2. Historical Uladh, the province lying to the eastward of Lough Neagh, and the rivers Bann and Newry; 3. Uladh proper, the southern and principal portion of the historical province, answering to the diocese of Down. The other historical divisions were,Iveaghon the south-west, answering to the diocese of Dromore, andDal-Araidheon the north, the “district of theAirds,” or hill-country, equivalent to the diocese of Connor.Dalaraidemust not be confounded withDalriada. It was gradually restricted to the northern portion, known asTuisceartor the north.[15]Tigh.723, 726, 734.An. Ult.730, 732, 733, 735, 742. I have touched very slightly upon the annals of Dalriada, a very vexed question, which bears about as much upon the general history of Scotland, as the early annals of Sussex might do upon the general history of England.[16]Bed. Hist. Ecc., l. 1, c. 34; l. 2, c. 4.Nen. Geneal.[17]Caledonia, b. 2, c. 2. One of the localities in which a battle was fought during the Northumbrian civil wars in this century is called bySim. Dun.,Eildon; by the Saxon chronicler,Edwin’s Cliff. Edwin’sburghin Lothian has long supplanted any earlier name which the locality may have borne, but upon the borders of Selkirk forest, and in the neighbourhood of the Catrail, the BritishEildonhas long outlived the Anglian monarch’sCliff.[18]Bed. Hist. Ecc., l. 2, c. 20; l. 3, c. 1, 24.Tigh.631, 632.Nen. Geneal.Egfrid gave to St. Cuthbert Carlisle, with a circuit of fifteen miles, Creke with three miles—in short, all the open country in the north of Cumberland which was thus interposed between that district and Strath Clyde; whilst his donations of South Gedlet and Cartmel “with its Britons,” in the north of Lancashire, together with his grants on the Ribble and elsewhere to Wilfrid, shew that the greater part of Lancashire must have intervened between the Britons of English Cumbria and North Wales. Manchester and Whalley, or Billingaheth, were also in the Northumbrian territories.Sim. Dun. Hist. Dun., l. 1, c. 9.Hist. St. Cuth., p. 69.Edd. Vit. Wilf., c. 17.Chron. Sax.798, 923. Nennius states that Cadwallader died of the great plague in Oswy’s reign, which can only refer to the pestilence of 664, though he has been purposely confounded with the West Saxon Ceadwalla, who died at Rome in 688. In spite of the assertion of Gildas, that all the records of his countrymen had perished, it was maintained that he had written a history and then destroyed it (Gild. Capit.20); and Walter Mapes, bringing a book (as he said) from Brittany, where no other copy has ever been found, gave it to Geoffrey of Monmouth to translate. The work is called in Welsh theBrut Tyssilio, and is attributed to a certain Tyssilio living in the seventh century, who writes familiarly ofScotland,Moray, andNormandy, and brings the “Twelve Peers of France” to Arthur’s Coronation! Granting the existence of these Twelve Peers, how could Tyssilio, living in the seventh century, have been familiar with the institution of Charlemagne, who died in the ninth? In the nineteenth century theBruthas been “done into English” with some very marvellous notes, in which the curious inquirer will find Cæsar refuted by Tyssilio, and Homer corrected by Dares Phrygius![19]Bed. Hist. Ecc., l. 4, c. 26; l. 5, c. 12, 23;Do. contin., 750.Sim. Dun., 756.[20]I allude to theLex Aodh Fin, meaning, apparently, the right of Aodh and his family toCanandCuairt, which were amongst the leading privileges of royalty. The following may explain the succession at this period—Fergus Feredach | | Fergus /--------------\ /-------------\ | Angus Bruidi Kenneth Alpin /--------------------\ d. 761 761–3 763–75 775–8 Eoganan---d. Constantine Angus | ============= | 789–820 820–34 Talorcan Bargoit Conal MacTeige | | | 778–82 | 784–9 Alpin Drost Eoganan | /-------------\ | 834–6 836–9 Drost Feredach Bruidi Kenneth 782–4 839–42 842–3 843[21]Innes, bk. 1, art. 8.Caledonia, bk. 2, c. 6, p. 302, note A, with other authorities cited by both. The marriage of Kenneth’s grandfather with a sister of Constantine and Angus rests solely on tradition, but it appears the most probable solution of his peaceful accession to the throne. The examples of Talorcan, son ofEanfred, perhaps also of his cousin Bruidi son ofBili, which is a British name, shews that the alien extraction of the father was no bar to the succession of the son. Such a succession would be exactly in accordance with the old custom mentioned by Beda, that “in cases of difficulty” the female line was preferred to the male;i.e., a near connection in the female line to a distant male heir. From not attending to the expression “in cases of difficulty,” the sense of Beda’s words has been often misinterpreted.[22]The name of Heathored occurs as the last amongst the bishops of Whithern inFlor. Wig. App., and his predecessor Badwulf is alluded to bySim. Dun.under 796. The topography of Galloway and the language once spoken by the Galwegians (who acknowledged aKenkinny—Cen-cinnidh—not aPen-cenedl) distinguish them from the British race of Strath Clyde—theWalensesof the early charters as opposed to theGalwalenses. Beda, however, knew of no Picts in the diocese of Candida Casa (v. Appendix K), and consequently they must have arrived at some later period, though it would be difficult to point with certainty to their original home. Some authorities bring them from Dalaraide, making themCruithneor Irish Picts; and the dedication of numerous churches in Galloway to saints popular in the north-east ofUladhseems to favour their conjecture. The name of Galloway is probably traceable to its occupation byGall, in this case Anglian strangers.[23]An. Ult.793, 813.Sim. Dun.793.Innes, Ap. No. V.Myln, Vit. Ep. Dunk. Ford, l. 4, c. 12. This is the earliest historical appearance of theVikingson the Scottish coasts. The name has no connection withking, being derived fromVika bay,Vikinga baysman. By northern law, every freeman was bound to be enrolled in aHafn, and to contribute towards building and manning a ship for the royal service, the office ofStyresmanbeing always hereditary in the family of anOdal-Bonder. Thus, the royal ship, authorized to kill, burn, and destroy in lawful warfare, sailed from theHafn, whilst the rover on his own account, stigmatized in “degenerate days” as a pirate, put off from theVikor open bay. He was as little likely to sail from a royalHafn, as a Highland chieftain bent upon acreaghto issue from the royal castle of Inverness. Hence perhaps the name.[24]It must always be remembered, that the change of name fromPicttoScotwas originally merely the substitution of one arbitrarily applied name for another—a change in the names used by chroniclers and annalists, not by the people themselves. The names ofPictiandScotimay be compared with those ofGermaniandAlamanni, given arbitrarily to the people who called themselves by names which have now becomeDeutschandSchwabe.[25]Cæs. de B. G., l. 1, c. 16; l. 2, c. 4; l. 3, c. 17; l. 5, c. 11, 22, 25, 54; l. 6, c. 32; l. 7, c. 4, 32, 33,63.Tac. Germ., c. 12, 42.Am. Marc., l. 31, c. 3.Bed. Hist. Eccl., l. 5, c. 10.Vergobretusis evidently the Latin form ofFear-go-breith, “the Man of law,” theBreithimh,Brehon, orBreen; the Celtic judge,Toshach, is derived from the same root as the LatinDux; the Thessalian Τάγος and the GermanTogabear the same meaning. It is the title that appears on several of the early British coins under the Latin form ofTascio.[26]Cæs de B. G., l. 6, c. 10, 11. Thefactiowas evidently the result of Celticpolicy, not of Celtictemperament, as has been too often represented. The policy may have gradually influenced the temperament rather than the temperament the policy.[27]Cæs. de B. G., l. 7, c. 88; l. 8, c. 12.[28]“Legibus æduorum, iis qui summum magistratum obtinuerent excedere ex finibus non liceret.”—Cæs. de B. G., l. 7, c. 33.[29]“Convictolitanem, qui per sacerdotes more civitatis ... esset creatus.”—Cæs. de B. G., l. 7, c. 33.[30]Some such a character still exists in Japan, which is under the divided rule oftwoemperors; one a sacred puppet, nominally the head of the empire, but practically kept aloof from all mundane matters; the other known as theZiogoon, or general, and the real ruler of the empire. This example of adouble headto an empire certainly bears some resemblance to the divided authority of the old Celtic system, or rather to what that divided authority might have become under certain circumstances.[31]δημοκρατοῦνταί τε ὡς πλήθει is the expression of Dio (inSevero). Strabo (l. 4, p. 197) describes the Gallic states as Aristocracies, annually choosing “in ancient times”—i.e., before the Roman Conquest—a ruler ἡγημόνα, and a general στρατηγὸν; in other words, aVergobreithand aToshach.[32]Leg. Gwyn., l. 2, c. 18. The words of Bruce’s charter (Thanes of Cawdor) are “Ita tamen quod terra quam Fergusius dictus Demster tenet ibidem respondeat eidem Willelmo (Thano de Calder) de firma quam reddere consuevit.” It is doubtful whetherVercingetorixwas a name or a title, likeBrennus.Cynghedin Welsh means aconvention; gorsezcynghedcynnal, a convention held upon urgency.Ver-cinget-o-rixmight thus mean “the man chosen king in the convention.” The authority of the Anglo-Saxon princes, sometimes known asBretwaldas, probably resembled that of the earlier Celtic Toshach—they were supremeHeretogasrather than supremekings. Cæsar calls VercingetorixImperator; commander-in-chief.[33]The verses ascribed to Columba will be found in the various “Chronicles of the Picts,” of Innes, Pinkerton, and the “Irish Version of Nennius,”J. A. S.Therevin Murev, Fortrevis probably to be derived fromreimor “realm,” the names meaning “the realms along the sea (Murray,Muireimor Armorica), and along the Forth.”Ath-Fodla is equivalent to “Fodlaon this sideof the Mounth,” exactly answering to the situation of Atholl, immediately to the southward of the Grampian range. Northwards of Atholl the country is still known asBadenoch, “the district of the groves,” a name singularly inapplicable to its present state, answering probably toFidach.Fodh, a word evidently derived from the same source as the ScandinavianOdh, and meaning “earth, land,” is probably at the foot ofFodhla(Fodh-lad), orFo’la, which seems to have answered amongst the Gael very much toGwlad.Fodhalso means “learning in Gaelic.” The close connection between “mystic lore,” or “divination,” and the possession of land, was not confined to the Gael; it thoroughly pervaded the early Scandinavians.[34]Camb. Descr.l. 1, c. 4.Col. de Reb. Alb., p. 19, 20.Innes, “Sketches, etc.,” p. 365et seq.In the middle of the seventeenth century, the second son of the Earl of Argyle was fostered by Campbell of Glenurchy, ancestor of the Breadalbane family. “In the Lowlands,” says Mr. Innes, “the practice was evidently common under the civil law.” In fact, fosterage was not peculiar to the Highlanders and Celtic people in particular, though, like many other old customs, it remained in force amongst them long after it had disappeared elsewhere. By Ini’s Law (63), thefostererwas one of the three dependants whom the Gesithcundman might take with him under any circumstances. The system was admirably adapted for implanting the members of a dominant amongst a subordinate race, who, in the course of a few generations, must have thus become united in the ties of interest and affection with the ruling “caste.” No such ties bound thevilleinto his feudal lord; and the evils and advantages arising out of each system were totally different. It was this custom which above all others tended to render the Anglo-Norman lords “beyond the pale,”Hibernis Hiberniores. As much devotion was shewn to aGeraldineas to aMacArthy.[35]Adam.Vit. St. Col., l. 3, c. 5. It was theVergobreith, not theToshach, who was “consecrated” by the Druids,v.p. 28, n.†. Giraldus Cambrenses has left an extraordinary description of the barbarous rites with which the inauguration of the princes of Cinel Conal was celebrated. He wrote from hearsay, and very probably heightened the colouring of a picture that was exaggerated in the first instance; for he fully participated in that rooted antipathy which seems to have long existed between the Welsh and the Irish. Still the words of Ailred shew that certain barbarous ceremonies on such occasions lingered amongst the Scottish Gael in the twelfth century, shocking the more fastidious ideas of David after he had “rubbed off his Scottish rust.” “Unde et obsequia illa quæ a gente Scottorum in novella regum promotione more patrio, exhibentur ita exhorruit ut ea vix ab episcopis suscipere cogeretur” (Twysden, p. 348). The conspicuous part still assigned at coronations to the Scottish “Stone of Destiny” is as well known as are the numerous tales and fables connected with it. In his “Essay on Tara” Mr. Petrie impugns the identity of the stone in St. Edward’s chair with the genuineLia Fail, upon which the Ardrighs of Ireland were inaugurated at Tara; where, in his opinion, the mystic stone of the “Tuath de Danan” still remains in spite of the claims of the Dalriads and the fables of the Connaughtmen. It indeed seems extraordinary that a small and migratory tribe from the north of Antrim should have been permitted to carry off with them the “sacred stone” of the Irish kings, and I am inclined to look upon the ScottishLia Failas the stone upon which thePictishkings and their successors were consecrated, its only migration, unless it was removed fromDunfothirtoScone, having been undertaken at the order of Edward the First; though after the Gaelic people of Scotland had identified their own ancestry with that of the MacAlpin line of princes theLia Failnecessarily became mixed up with the supposed wanderings of the latter.[36]The early Frank kings used to migrate in this way frommanortomanor, and the custom long prevailed amongst the Scandinavians. It was the origin of the “sorning,” a word derived from the same source as the Frenchsejourner, and “Waldgastnung,” so often prohibited in the old laws of Scotland and the north. The Anglo-Saxons were perfectly well acquainted with the same custom, and lands were held for a certain number of “night’sfeorm”—so many nights’ free quartersoriginally,—the name of the tenure being at length permanently transferred to thetenantandtenement. Hence our wordsFarmerandFarm.[37]Most of the materials for this sketch have been taken from “Martin’s Western Isles,” the “Irish Annals,” and the “Works of the Irish Archæological Society,” particularly the “Hy Fiachrach,” where the subject is ably illustrated by Mr. O’Donovan inAppendix L. The “Circuit of Murketagh” contains an interesting account of the manner in which hostages and tribute were exacted, and the different methods of proceeding with kinsmen, allies, and rivals. The theory ofTanistryextended to ecclesiastical offices, and we meet withTanistbishops andAdbharabbots; the former signifying, apparently, the successoractuallychosen, the latter oneeligibleto be chosen. Thus, and in many other ways, the old Celtic principle of division appears to have gradually pervaded their branch of the church. Even the careful separation of sacerdotalauthorityfrom practicalpowerseems to have clung to the Gaelic people for some time after their conversion; for while the Hy Nial for centuries monopolized the supreme power, thePrimacywas the exclusive appanage of the Clan Colla,a race excluded from the throne.[38]A king of Atholl was amongst the rivals who succumbed to Angus (Tigh.739), and from the foundation of Dunkeld and St. Andrews by Constantine and the second Angus, it may be gathered that the provinces connected with those monasteries were “in the crown.” In the Irish annalsFortreimis latterly almost synonymous with the kingdom of the Picts. Its capital,Dun-Fothir, was evidently the ScottishTara, andDundurnin the north perhaps the ScottishCashel. Moray and Mærne seem to have long been the leading subdivisions of the north, but it would be difficult to name the corresponding divisions of the south. Abernethy appears to have been connected with Strathearn, Dunkeld with Atholl, and St. Andrews with Fife.[39]Lodbroka Quida. Str., 12. The epithet of “the Hardy” is applied to Kenneth in theDuan. The old chronicle continues to apply the name ofPictaviato Scotland proper, orAlban, andSaxoniato the Lothians; whilst the Ulster annals call the MacAlpin dynasty “Kings of the Picts” to the close of the century.[40]Innes App., No. 3.[41]This expression, the “laws of Aodh,” may have found its way into the chronicle without the transcriber being aware of its meaning. In the Irish annals thelex Patriciiorlex Columbæalludes to the right of visitation and other dues belonging to the representatives orCowarbsof those saints; and the confirmation of the “lex Aodh Fin” by the Gael may mean the recognition of the claims of his descendants, the MacAlpin family, toCanandCuairtover the provinces of the Picts. Royallawwas identical with royalsupremacy.[42]Their first arrival, or rather permanent settlement, is placed by theAn. Ult.in 839. The district ofFingallmay derive its name fromFinegall, “the stranger clans,” as well as fromFin-gall, “the white strangers.”[43]The Fingall are sometimes supposed to have been Norwegians and the Dugall Danes, a fanciful distinction apparently, as Thorstein Olaveson was king of the Dugall (An. Ult.874), and his father Olave was undoubtedly a Norwegian. The Hy Ivar, chiefs of the Dugall, were undoubtedly a Danish race, for the Northmen who slew Elli at York in 867 were Dugall, and known asScaldingsorSkioldungrof the royal race of Denmark.An. Ult.866.Twysden, p. 70.[44]A. F. M., 847, 849, 850, 851. Olave “took hostages from every clan, and tribute from the Gael.”[45]Innes App., No. 3.An. Ult.865, 869, 870, 872.Sim. Dun. de Gestis, 866.Ware. Antiq. Hib., c. 24. Ivar was unquestionably the Inguar of early English history, and perhaps Olave was the Ubba; for in the Langfedgatel quoted by Lappenberg (Eng. under Ang. Sax., vol. i., p. 114, n. 4), Olave is substituted for Uffo, evidently the same name as Ubba. TheChron.3 ascribes the death of Olave to Constantine, whilst the Landnamaboc says he was killed in Ireland.[46]An. Ult.856. Laxdæla Saga and Landnamaboc inCol. de Reb. Alb., p. 65 to 69. TheGallgaelmust be distinguished from their rivals theOirir-Gael, or Gael of the coasts (i.e., ofArgyle). Mr. Skene (Highlanders, pt. 2, c. 2) considers them to have been identical, on the strength of a passage which, I think, scarcely bears him out. When the fleet of Turlough O’Connor ravaged Tir Conal and Inch Eogan in 1154 (A. F. M.), the clan Eogan sent to hire “Longus Gallgaidhel, Arann, Cinntire, Manann et Cantair Alban” ships of the Gallgael, Arran, Kintyre, Man, and “the coasts of Alban,”i.e.Oirir-Gael. Gallgael must here mean the Islesmen. The Orkneyinga Saga (Antiq. Celt.-Scan., p. 180) calls the Caithness men Gaddgedlar or Gallgael; in short, it was the name of the two races when blended, and in later days there was a continual struggle for superiority between the Oirir-Gael and the Gallgael—represented by the families of Somarled and of the later kings of Man,—in which the former were ultimately successful, uniting at length under one head the dominion of Argyle and the Isles. There is a slight discrepancy in the accounts of Ketil contained in the Sagas. He was leader of the Gallgael when Harfager was an infant, and appears to have succeeded Godfrey MacFergus, whose name betokens a mixed descent, and who died in 853 (A. F. M., 851). The Gallgael possessed the islands before the time of Harfager.[47]Ekkialsbakka, according to Mr. Skene “the Mounth;” according to Johnstone, the Ochil Hills, appears to be rightly translated by Mr. Laing (Heimskringla, vol. 1., p. 291); “the banks of the Ekkial, or Oikell, a river which still marks the limits of Sutherland, the ancientSudrlandof the Orkney Jarls.[48]Antiq. Celt.-Scand.(Landnamaboc), p. 20, 21.[49]Chron. Sax.875. Halfdan was a brother of Ivar. According toSim. Dun. Hist. Dun., l. 2, c. 13, he was driven from Northumbria very soon after he settled there, and perished miserably, slain by “his own people.” He was probably the Albdan Toshach of the Dugall, who was killed in battle by the Fingall in 877 at Loch Cuan, or Strangford Lough.An. Ult.876.[50]CompareAn. Ult.874 withChron.3,Innes’ Ap.“Thorstein ruled as king over these districts, Caithness and Sutherland, Ross, Moray, and more than the half of Scotland”—Landnamaboc. “Thorstein at length became reconciled with the King of Scots, and obtained possession of the half of Scotland, over which he became king.”—Laxdæla Saga(Col. de Reb. Alb., p. 66 to 69). Such were the results of Thorstein’s victory, which were evidently admitted by the old chronicle in its brief notice, “Normanni annum integrum degerunt in Pictavia.” The half of Scotland plainly refers to the ancient territories of the Northern Picts.[51]This account of the wars of Sigurd and Thorstein is taken from the Sagas already quoted, the Ulster annals and Chron. 3 in Innes’s Appendix. They must have occurred between the deaths of Olave, about 871, and of his son in 875; and the decisive conflict between the Picts and Dugall in 875, when the former were defeated with great slaughter (An. Ult.), the battles of Dollar and Coach-Cochlum, two years before the death of Constantine,i.e., in the same year; and finally the death of Oistin or Thorstein MacOlave, placed by the Ulster annals under the same date, all mark the year 875 to have been the era of his brief triumph. All accounts agree that Thorstein perished by unfair means. “He was betrayed by the Scots and slain in battle.”—Landnamaboc.“The Scots did not keep the treaty long, but betrayed him in confidence”—Laxdæla Saga.These authorities are confirmed by the Ulster annals, which record the death of Thorstein Olavesonper dolum.[52]Innes’, App.5.Wynton, bk. 6, c. 8.Fordun, l. 4, c. 16. Macpherson, in his “Geographical Illustrations of Scottish History,” explains theWerdofathaof the Register of St. Andrews and Wynton to meanWem-du-fada, “the long black cave,” in which Constantine is supposed to have suffered the cruel death of “the spread eagle.” The period of this reign is easily ascertained. Under the first year the Chronicle No. 3 places the death of Malsechnal, king of Ireland; and as that king died on Tuesday 20th November (A.F.M.), his death must have occurred in 863. The same chronicle records the death of Aodh MacNial, king of Ireland, which happened in 879, under the second year of Eocha and Cyric (Grig), thus placing their accession, and consequently the death of Constantine’s brother Aodh, in 878. As the reign of Aodh lasted for only a year, that of his brother must have begun in 863 and ended in 877.[53]Cyric (or Ciric, the same as the French St. Cyr) was the original name, which has been corrupted into Grig, Girg, and Gregory the Great. It seems to be a different name fromGregor, which is apparently the ScandinavianGriotgar. Eccles Girg or Grig is the modernCyruskirk. Dundurn or Dunadeer, in the Garioch, appears long to have held the same place amongst the Northern Picts as Dunfothir or Forteviot in the South,i.e., it was the capital of the leading province.Caledonia, bk. 3, c. 7, p. 383, note I.[54]Innes, Ap. 3, 5.Fordun, l. 4, c. 16.An. Ult.877. Eocha is described as thealumnusof Cyric, who was evidently the real king of Scotland for the time.[55]Innes, Ap. 5.Wynton, bk. 6, c. 9. It was probably to the gratitude of the monks, the only chroniclers of the age, that Cyric was partly indebted for some of his posthumous fame as Gregory the Great, an universal conqueror. The line of Aodh appears to have been connected withAtholl, which may account for the deposition of Dunkeld from its prominent position.[56]Innes, Ap. 3. The title ofCivitas Regalisis given to Scone early in the next reign. Thepalatium, or royal residence of Kenneth, was at Forteviot, the ancient Pictish capital.[57]Innes, Ap. 3 and 5.Wynton, bk. 6, c. 9.Fordun, l. 4, c. 17, 18; l. 11 c. 40, 59. Wynton, Fordun, and theChron. Ryth.at the end of theChron. Mel.—the same evidently as that quoted by Wynton—agree in giving eighteen years to Cyric, and placing his death at Dundurn, Dornedeore, or Dunadeer, in the Garioch. The reigns of the three kings extended over twenty-two years, from 878 to 900, the dates in the Ulster annals of the deaths of Aodh and Donald; and as Eocha reigned for eleven years (Chron.5), Donald must have succeeded in 889. The Chron. No. 3 places an eclipse on St. Ciric’s Day (16th June) under the ninth year of Eocha and Cyric. This actually occurred on 16th June 885, in theeighthyear of their reign; and allowing for the trifling inaccuracy of a year, it is evidently the eclipse referred to. From confounding St. Ciric with St. Siriac, on whose day (8th August 891) an eclipse also happened, both Pinkerton and Chalmers have misdated all these reigns.[58]Innes, Ap. 3, 5.An. Ult.899.Fordun, l. 4, c. 20. Either this king, or one of his predecessors, must have been the sufferer at Mundingdene, a mile south of Norham, when the obedience of Guthred, son of Hardicanute (rather a mythical personage), to the dictates of Abbot Edred’s vision, in restoring the lands of St. Cuthbert between Tyne and Wear to the Church, was rewarded by the intervention of the Saint in behalf of the sacred territory, when it was invaded by a band of Scots, who were miraculously engulphed in the yawning earth!Sim. Dun. Hist. Dun., l. 2, c. 14.Leland, vol. i. p. 329. It is a pity the miracle was not repeated a few years later, when Reginald Hy Ivar divided these very lands amongst his pagan followers. What with thesac,socandinfangthief, granted by Guthred in the ninth century, the fine of 96 Anglo-Norman pounds, and the near vicinity of the Scots to St. Cuthbert’s territory, the story affords a very fair specimen of the inventions by which the monks occasionally tried to give a title to lands which they often really possessed rightfully, though without legal proof of such right. A miracle or a victory, especially if either were at the expense of the Scots, lent an air of sanctity or authority to the fabrication, which it would have been impious or unpatriotic to doubt.[59]Innes, Ap. 3.An. Ult.903. As the annals call the victors “the men of Fortren,” I have rendered theSraith Eremiof Pinkerton’s version ofChron.3, Strathearn.[60]Innes, Ap. 3. It probably resembled those meetings of the Anglo-SaxonWitan, at which the ecclesiasticalDooms, so often preceding the secularDoomsin the Anglo-Saxon laws, were promulgated, and may have had some reference to the recent elevation of the See of St. Andrews to the primacy.[61]An. Ult.871. According to this authority, Constantine “procured” the death of Artga.[62]An. Ult.876, 877.An. Camb.andBrut y Tywys, 880.Caradoc, Hist. Wales, p. 38.Caledonia, vol. i., bk. 3, c. 5, p. 355. Chalmers gives the name of Constantine to their first leader, whilst, according to Caradoc, Hobart was their chief when they reached Wales. To some old tradition of this migration, and to the encroachments of the Galwegians, theInquisitio Davidisprobably alludes:—“Diversæ seditiones circumquaque insurgentes non solum ecclesiam et ejus possessiones destruxerunt verum etiam totam regionem vastantes ejus habitatores exilio tradiderunt”Reg. Glasg.In fact it would appear as if a Scottish party had dated its rise from the days of Kenneth MacAlpin, and secured a triumph by the expulsion of its antagonists, on the accession of Eocha to the Scottish throne, and by the election of Donald in the reign of the second Constantine.[63]Innes, Ap. 3. Donald and Eocha, or Eogan, were the invariable family names (with only one exception) of the princes of Strath Clyde, until the extinction of the race in the time of Malcolm II.[64]An. Ult.901–903. The Egill’s Saga (Antiq. Celt.-Scand.p. 32), in describing Olave the Red, calls him “the son of a native Scot, by a descendant of Ragnar Lodbroc,” meaning by the expression “a native Scot,” that his father was of Scottish descent by both parents. This description cannot apply to Olave’s father Sitric and his brothers, the well-known grandsons of Ivar, whose children could not possibly have been of pure Scottish descent. It is remarkable, however, that the name of thefatherof Sitric and his brothers is never mentioned by the Irish annalists, who invariably call them Hy Ivar, orgrandsonsof Ivar (for theHyhad not yet become a family prefix), whilst they also frequently allude to Godfrey and Sitric, the sons of Ivar, and their descendants, who never attained to the same celebrity as the others. These latter more famous Hy Ivar appear to have been in some way connected with the Western Isles, where their descendants were long regarded in the light of a royal race. The first appearance of Reginald Hy Ivar is in a naval battle off the Isle of Man; and as his family had no footing at that time either in England, Scotland, or Ireland, he must have recruited his fleet from amongst the Gall-Gael. Nearly thirty years later the son of Reginald was driven from the same Western Islands, which he probably had inherited in his childhood (for Reginald and his brothers were young), when the English and Irish possessions of his father fell to the share of his uncles Sitric and Godfrey. (An. Ult.942.An. F. M.940.) After the death of Godfrey Mac Fergus in 853, who figures in the genealogy of Somarled, lord of theOirir-Gael, and must have been (from his name) of Scottish descent by the father’s side, the Isles next appear under the rule of Caittil or Ketil, a Norwegian, but as his sons settled in Iceland after the expedition of Harfager (Landnamabok), he could not have transmitted his power to his descendants; and the Sagas say that the Isles then fell into the hands of Scottish and Irish Vikings. If one of these Vikings, a Scottish lord of the Gall-Gael or Oirir-Gael, had married Ivar’s daughter, the description in the Egill’s Saga would exactly apply to himself, his wife, and his sons, and it would be only necessary to suppose that the writer of the Saga, aware of Olave’s descent from a Scottish Viking and a grand-daughter of Ragnar Lodbroc, made him by mistake thesoninstead of thegrandsonof the Scot. This supposition would equally account for the connection of the Hy Ivar with the Isles, and the ignorance of the Irish annalists respecting their father’s name.

[1]Amm. Marc.l. 28, c. 8. In a treatise, “de situ Britanniæ,” palmed off upon Richard of Cirencester, the district beyond the northern wall is erected into a province, and calledVespasiana, a name which in itself is a palpable blunder of the age which attributed every Roman relic in Scotland to the time of Agricola. The work abounds in internal evidence of its falsity. Vespasiana is said to have received the name in honour of the Flavian family, and in compliment to Domitian “in whose reign it was conquered” (l. 2, c. 6, s. 50), and withMæatato have been lost under Trebellius, the successor of Lucullus, who had been put to death by Domitian (l. 2, c. 2, s. 16): but of these two provinces, which must have been created by his own father-in-law, Tacitus, writing during the reign of Trajan, displays a profound ignorance. Valentia again, the creation of Theodosius, about 369, is said to have been made a consular province by Constantine, who died two and thirty years before! (l. 1, c. 6, s. 3.) Such are a few specimens of the stupid blunders of its fabricator Mr. Bertram.

[2]Nen. Geneal.The See of Dôl, in Brittany, dates its rise from the flight of Bishop Samson from York.

[3]Nen. Geneal.—Llywarch,Marwnad UrienandTaliesin, quoted byCarte, vol. i. p. 209, and byTurner, Ang. Sax., bk. 2, c. 4. A translation of the latter poem will be found inCamb. Reg.v. 3, p. 433, fully justifying the regrets of Turner “that any historical poem should be translated into verse.” A tract of hill and moor, stretching from Derbyshire into Scotland, is often known in the early chroniclers as “Desertum,” the waste or desert. The battle in which Ida fell was probably the famous “battle of Badon,” which, according to Taliesin, “avenged the blood of the lords of the north,” and Urien was, I suspect, the “good and valiant uncle,” for opposing whom Gildas blames Maelgwn Gwynnedd.

[4]Tigh.502, 574.Adam. Vit. Col. (Reeves), App. 2, p. 435.Bed. Ecc. Hist., l. 3, c. 3. According to Beda, the grant of Iona was made by the Pictish king, and the question is a matter of dispute—as what question in early Scottish history is not? Dr. Reeves, the learned editor of Adamnan, is inclined to a compromise, Conal granting, and Bruidi confirming, the grant.

[5]An. F. M. (O’Donovan), 554, and Note; andAdam. Vit. Col. (Reeves),passim. The great family of theHy Nialsupplied theArdrighsor kings paramount of Ireland, uninterruptedly from the dawn of authentic history, until their power was shaken by the Northmen. The northern branch was subdivided into theCinel EoganandCinel Conal, more familiarly, but less accurately, known as Tyrone and Tirconnell; the southern intoClan ColmanandSiol Aodh Slane.

[6]Tigh.563.Bed. Hist. Ecc., l. 3, c. 4, 5, 26.Adam. Vit. Col. (Reeves), l. 1, c. 37; l. 2, c. 35.Craig Phadrickis supposed by Dr. Reeves to represent theRathof Bruidi. The southern Picts had been already converted by Ninian, a British bishop, according to Beda (l. 3, c. 4); and if the conjecture is correct which assigns this conversion to the early part of the fifth century, it must have been effected during their temporary occupation of the province of Valentia. If reliance can be placed on traditional chronology, the migration ofCynedda Gwladig, the ancestor of the “noble tribes” of Wales, fromManau Guotodin—supposed to mean the “Debateable Land” between Picts, Scots, Angles, and Britons [Adam. Vit. Col. (Reeves), p. 371, d.]—must have taken place about the same period, and was caused, probably, by the encroachments of the Picts.

[7]Beda—as above.

[8]Bed. Hist. Ecc., l. 5, c. 24.Tigh.717. The foundation of Abernethy is ascribed by the chronicle of the Picts to a Nectan, who lived 300 years before this reign, but I suspect the later builder of the “stone church” was the real founder. Innes (Ap. ii, v.) quotes from the book of Paisley, “In illa ecclesiâ (Abernethy), fuerunt tres electiones factæ quando non fuit nisi unus solus episcopus in Scociâ. Tunc enim fuit ille locus principalis regalis et pontificalis per aliqua tempora tocius regni Pictorum.” As the “primacy” originally vested in Iona, passed subsequently to Dunkeld and St. Andrews, neither of which were in existence before the early part of the ninth century, it may be inferred that, during the intervening period, it remained with Abernethy. It was usually vested in theCowarb, or representative of the original founder; and its leading privileges were theLex, or right toCanandCuairt—tribute and free quarters—and other dues.

[9]Bed. Hist. Ecc., l. 3, c. 1, 3.

[10]Bed. Hist. Ecc., l. 2, c. 5; l. 3, c. 24; l. 4, c. 2, 12.Edd. Vit. Wilf., c. 19. Thetenero adhuc regnoof Eddius is changed by Malmesbury (de Gest. Pont.) intoteneram infantiam reguli, an expression scarcely applicable to Egfrid, who was twenty-five when he ascended the throne. Thus inaccuracies creep into history.

[11]Bed. Hist. Ecc., l. 4, c. 26.Nen. Geneal. Tigh.686.An. Ult.685. According to Nennius, no Saxon tax-gatherer ever again took tribute from the Picts. Tribute and a foreign bishop—or abbot—were the true tests of dependence at this period.Tulachamanseems to have been the place often known asRath-inver-aman—“the fort at the mouth of the river Almond,” where vestiges of it are I believe still traceable.Dun Ollaigwas probably a place at which Talorcan ofAthollwas killed some years later.

[12]Tigh.726, 728, 729.An. Ult.728.Bed. Hist. Ecc. Contin.740, 750.

[13]Adam. Vit. Col. (Reeves), p. 370, note A, p. 435.

[14]Bed. Hist. Ecc., l. 1, c. 34.Uladhmay be said to have had three meanings—1. Legendary Uladh, the northern kingdom of Ireland answering very nearly to modern Ulster; 2. Historical Uladh, the province lying to the eastward of Lough Neagh, and the rivers Bann and Newry; 3. Uladh proper, the southern and principal portion of the historical province, answering to the diocese of Down. The other historical divisions were,Iveaghon the south-west, answering to the diocese of Dromore, andDal-Araidheon the north, the “district of theAirds,” or hill-country, equivalent to the diocese of Connor.Dalaraidemust not be confounded withDalriada. It was gradually restricted to the northern portion, known asTuisceartor the north.

[15]Tigh.723, 726, 734.An. Ult.730, 732, 733, 735, 742. I have touched very slightly upon the annals of Dalriada, a very vexed question, which bears about as much upon the general history of Scotland, as the early annals of Sussex might do upon the general history of England.

[16]Bed. Hist. Ecc., l. 1, c. 34; l. 2, c. 4.Nen. Geneal.

[17]Caledonia, b. 2, c. 2. One of the localities in which a battle was fought during the Northumbrian civil wars in this century is called bySim. Dun.,Eildon; by the Saxon chronicler,Edwin’s Cliff. Edwin’sburghin Lothian has long supplanted any earlier name which the locality may have borne, but upon the borders of Selkirk forest, and in the neighbourhood of the Catrail, the BritishEildonhas long outlived the Anglian monarch’sCliff.

[18]Bed. Hist. Ecc., l. 2, c. 20; l. 3, c. 1, 24.Tigh.631, 632.Nen. Geneal.Egfrid gave to St. Cuthbert Carlisle, with a circuit of fifteen miles, Creke with three miles—in short, all the open country in the north of Cumberland which was thus interposed between that district and Strath Clyde; whilst his donations of South Gedlet and Cartmel “with its Britons,” in the north of Lancashire, together with his grants on the Ribble and elsewhere to Wilfrid, shew that the greater part of Lancashire must have intervened between the Britons of English Cumbria and North Wales. Manchester and Whalley, or Billingaheth, were also in the Northumbrian territories.Sim. Dun. Hist. Dun., l. 1, c. 9.Hist. St. Cuth., p. 69.Edd. Vit. Wilf., c. 17.Chron. Sax.798, 923. Nennius states that Cadwallader died of the great plague in Oswy’s reign, which can only refer to the pestilence of 664, though he has been purposely confounded with the West Saxon Ceadwalla, who died at Rome in 688. In spite of the assertion of Gildas, that all the records of his countrymen had perished, it was maintained that he had written a history and then destroyed it (Gild. Capit.20); and Walter Mapes, bringing a book (as he said) from Brittany, where no other copy has ever been found, gave it to Geoffrey of Monmouth to translate. The work is called in Welsh theBrut Tyssilio, and is attributed to a certain Tyssilio living in the seventh century, who writes familiarly ofScotland,Moray, andNormandy, and brings the “Twelve Peers of France” to Arthur’s Coronation! Granting the existence of these Twelve Peers, how could Tyssilio, living in the seventh century, have been familiar with the institution of Charlemagne, who died in the ninth? In the nineteenth century theBruthas been “done into English” with some very marvellous notes, in which the curious inquirer will find Cæsar refuted by Tyssilio, and Homer corrected by Dares Phrygius!

[19]Bed. Hist. Ecc., l. 4, c. 26; l. 5, c. 12, 23;Do. contin., 750.Sim. Dun., 756.

[20]I allude to theLex Aodh Fin, meaning, apparently, the right of Aodh and his family toCanandCuairt, which were amongst the leading privileges of royalty. The following may explain the succession at this period—Fergus Feredach | | Fergus /--------------\ /-------------\ | Angus Bruidi Kenneth Alpin /--------------------\ d. 761 761–3 763–75 775–8 Eoganan---d. Constantine Angus | ============= | 789–820 820–34 Talorcan Bargoit Conal MacTeige | | | 778–82 | 784–9 Alpin Drost Eoganan | /-------------\ | 834–6 836–9 Drost Feredach Bruidi Kenneth 782–4 839–42 842–3 843

[21]Innes, bk. 1, art. 8.Caledonia, bk. 2, c. 6, p. 302, note A, with other authorities cited by both. The marriage of Kenneth’s grandfather with a sister of Constantine and Angus rests solely on tradition, but it appears the most probable solution of his peaceful accession to the throne. The examples of Talorcan, son ofEanfred, perhaps also of his cousin Bruidi son ofBili, which is a British name, shews that the alien extraction of the father was no bar to the succession of the son. Such a succession would be exactly in accordance with the old custom mentioned by Beda, that “in cases of difficulty” the female line was preferred to the male;i.e., a near connection in the female line to a distant male heir. From not attending to the expression “in cases of difficulty,” the sense of Beda’s words has been often misinterpreted.

[22]The name of Heathored occurs as the last amongst the bishops of Whithern inFlor. Wig. App., and his predecessor Badwulf is alluded to bySim. Dun.under 796. The topography of Galloway and the language once spoken by the Galwegians (who acknowledged aKenkinny—Cen-cinnidh—not aPen-cenedl) distinguish them from the British race of Strath Clyde—theWalensesof the early charters as opposed to theGalwalenses. Beda, however, knew of no Picts in the diocese of Candida Casa (v. Appendix K), and consequently they must have arrived at some later period, though it would be difficult to point with certainty to their original home. Some authorities bring them from Dalaraide, making themCruithneor Irish Picts; and the dedication of numerous churches in Galloway to saints popular in the north-east ofUladhseems to favour their conjecture. The name of Galloway is probably traceable to its occupation byGall, in this case Anglian strangers.

[23]An. Ult.793, 813.Sim. Dun.793.Innes, Ap. No. V.Myln, Vit. Ep. Dunk. Ford, l. 4, c. 12. This is the earliest historical appearance of theVikingson the Scottish coasts. The name has no connection withking, being derived fromVika bay,Vikinga baysman. By northern law, every freeman was bound to be enrolled in aHafn, and to contribute towards building and manning a ship for the royal service, the office ofStyresmanbeing always hereditary in the family of anOdal-Bonder. Thus, the royal ship, authorized to kill, burn, and destroy in lawful warfare, sailed from theHafn, whilst the rover on his own account, stigmatized in “degenerate days” as a pirate, put off from theVikor open bay. He was as little likely to sail from a royalHafn, as a Highland chieftain bent upon acreaghto issue from the royal castle of Inverness. Hence perhaps the name.

[24]It must always be remembered, that the change of name fromPicttoScotwas originally merely the substitution of one arbitrarily applied name for another—a change in the names used by chroniclers and annalists, not by the people themselves. The names ofPictiandScotimay be compared with those ofGermaniandAlamanni, given arbitrarily to the people who called themselves by names which have now becomeDeutschandSchwabe.

[25]Cæs. de B. G., l. 1, c. 16; l. 2, c. 4; l. 3, c. 17; l. 5, c. 11, 22, 25, 54; l. 6, c. 32; l. 7, c. 4, 32, 33,63.Tac. Germ., c. 12, 42.Am. Marc., l. 31, c. 3.Bed. Hist. Eccl., l. 5, c. 10.Vergobretusis evidently the Latin form ofFear-go-breith, “the Man of law,” theBreithimh,Brehon, orBreen; the Celtic judge,Toshach, is derived from the same root as the LatinDux; the Thessalian Τάγος and the GermanTogabear the same meaning. It is the title that appears on several of the early British coins under the Latin form ofTascio.

[26]Cæs de B. G., l. 6, c. 10, 11. Thefactiowas evidently the result of Celticpolicy, not of Celtictemperament, as has been too often represented. The policy may have gradually influenced the temperament rather than the temperament the policy.

[27]Cæs. de B. G., l. 7, c. 88; l. 8, c. 12.

[28]“Legibus æduorum, iis qui summum magistratum obtinuerent excedere ex finibus non liceret.”—Cæs. de B. G., l. 7, c. 33.

[29]“Convictolitanem, qui per sacerdotes more civitatis ... esset creatus.”—Cæs. de B. G., l. 7, c. 33.

[30]Some such a character still exists in Japan, which is under the divided rule oftwoemperors; one a sacred puppet, nominally the head of the empire, but practically kept aloof from all mundane matters; the other known as theZiogoon, or general, and the real ruler of the empire. This example of adouble headto an empire certainly bears some resemblance to the divided authority of the old Celtic system, or rather to what that divided authority might have become under certain circumstances.

[31]δημοκρατοῦνταί τε ὡς πλήθει is the expression of Dio (inSevero). Strabo (l. 4, p. 197) describes the Gallic states as Aristocracies, annually choosing “in ancient times”—i.e., before the Roman Conquest—a ruler ἡγημόνα, and a general στρατηγὸν; in other words, aVergobreithand aToshach.

[32]Leg. Gwyn., l. 2, c. 18. The words of Bruce’s charter (Thanes of Cawdor) are “Ita tamen quod terra quam Fergusius dictus Demster tenet ibidem respondeat eidem Willelmo (Thano de Calder) de firma quam reddere consuevit.” It is doubtful whetherVercingetorixwas a name or a title, likeBrennus.Cynghedin Welsh means aconvention; gorsezcynghedcynnal, a convention held upon urgency.Ver-cinget-o-rixmight thus mean “the man chosen king in the convention.” The authority of the Anglo-Saxon princes, sometimes known asBretwaldas, probably resembled that of the earlier Celtic Toshach—they were supremeHeretogasrather than supremekings. Cæsar calls VercingetorixImperator; commander-in-chief.

[33]The verses ascribed to Columba will be found in the various “Chronicles of the Picts,” of Innes, Pinkerton, and the “Irish Version of Nennius,”J. A. S.Therevin Murev, Fortrevis probably to be derived fromreimor “realm,” the names meaning “the realms along the sea (Murray,Muireimor Armorica), and along the Forth.”Ath-Fodla is equivalent to “Fodlaon this sideof the Mounth,” exactly answering to the situation of Atholl, immediately to the southward of the Grampian range. Northwards of Atholl the country is still known asBadenoch, “the district of the groves,” a name singularly inapplicable to its present state, answering probably toFidach.Fodh, a word evidently derived from the same source as the ScandinavianOdh, and meaning “earth, land,” is probably at the foot ofFodhla(Fodh-lad), orFo’la, which seems to have answered amongst the Gael very much toGwlad.Fodhalso means “learning in Gaelic.” The close connection between “mystic lore,” or “divination,” and the possession of land, was not confined to the Gael; it thoroughly pervaded the early Scandinavians.

[34]Camb. Descr.l. 1, c. 4.Col. de Reb. Alb., p. 19, 20.Innes, “Sketches, etc.,” p. 365et seq.In the middle of the seventeenth century, the second son of the Earl of Argyle was fostered by Campbell of Glenurchy, ancestor of the Breadalbane family. “In the Lowlands,” says Mr. Innes, “the practice was evidently common under the civil law.” In fact, fosterage was not peculiar to the Highlanders and Celtic people in particular, though, like many other old customs, it remained in force amongst them long after it had disappeared elsewhere. By Ini’s Law (63), thefostererwas one of the three dependants whom the Gesithcundman might take with him under any circumstances. The system was admirably adapted for implanting the members of a dominant amongst a subordinate race, who, in the course of a few generations, must have thus become united in the ties of interest and affection with the ruling “caste.” No such ties bound thevilleinto his feudal lord; and the evils and advantages arising out of each system were totally different. It was this custom which above all others tended to render the Anglo-Norman lords “beyond the pale,”Hibernis Hiberniores. As much devotion was shewn to aGeraldineas to aMacArthy.

[35]Adam.Vit. St. Col., l. 3, c. 5. It was theVergobreith, not theToshach, who was “consecrated” by the Druids,v.p. 28, n.†. Giraldus Cambrenses has left an extraordinary description of the barbarous rites with which the inauguration of the princes of Cinel Conal was celebrated. He wrote from hearsay, and very probably heightened the colouring of a picture that was exaggerated in the first instance; for he fully participated in that rooted antipathy which seems to have long existed between the Welsh and the Irish. Still the words of Ailred shew that certain barbarous ceremonies on such occasions lingered amongst the Scottish Gael in the twelfth century, shocking the more fastidious ideas of David after he had “rubbed off his Scottish rust.” “Unde et obsequia illa quæ a gente Scottorum in novella regum promotione more patrio, exhibentur ita exhorruit ut ea vix ab episcopis suscipere cogeretur” (Twysden, p. 348). The conspicuous part still assigned at coronations to the Scottish “Stone of Destiny” is as well known as are the numerous tales and fables connected with it. In his “Essay on Tara” Mr. Petrie impugns the identity of the stone in St. Edward’s chair with the genuineLia Fail, upon which the Ardrighs of Ireland were inaugurated at Tara; where, in his opinion, the mystic stone of the “Tuath de Danan” still remains in spite of the claims of the Dalriads and the fables of the Connaughtmen. It indeed seems extraordinary that a small and migratory tribe from the north of Antrim should have been permitted to carry off with them the “sacred stone” of the Irish kings, and I am inclined to look upon the ScottishLia Failas the stone upon which thePictishkings and their successors were consecrated, its only migration, unless it was removed fromDunfothirtoScone, having been undertaken at the order of Edward the First; though after the Gaelic people of Scotland had identified their own ancestry with that of the MacAlpin line of princes theLia Failnecessarily became mixed up with the supposed wanderings of the latter.

[36]The early Frank kings used to migrate in this way frommanortomanor, and the custom long prevailed amongst the Scandinavians. It was the origin of the “sorning,” a word derived from the same source as the Frenchsejourner, and “Waldgastnung,” so often prohibited in the old laws of Scotland and the north. The Anglo-Saxons were perfectly well acquainted with the same custom, and lands were held for a certain number of “night’sfeorm”—so many nights’ free quartersoriginally,—the name of the tenure being at length permanently transferred to thetenantandtenement. Hence our wordsFarmerandFarm.

[37]Most of the materials for this sketch have been taken from “Martin’s Western Isles,” the “Irish Annals,” and the “Works of the Irish Archæological Society,” particularly the “Hy Fiachrach,” where the subject is ably illustrated by Mr. O’Donovan inAppendix L. The “Circuit of Murketagh” contains an interesting account of the manner in which hostages and tribute were exacted, and the different methods of proceeding with kinsmen, allies, and rivals. The theory ofTanistryextended to ecclesiastical offices, and we meet withTanistbishops andAdbharabbots; the former signifying, apparently, the successoractuallychosen, the latter oneeligibleto be chosen. Thus, and in many other ways, the old Celtic principle of division appears to have gradually pervaded their branch of the church. Even the careful separation of sacerdotalauthorityfrom practicalpowerseems to have clung to the Gaelic people for some time after their conversion; for while the Hy Nial for centuries monopolized the supreme power, thePrimacywas the exclusive appanage of the Clan Colla,a race excluded from the throne.

[38]A king of Atholl was amongst the rivals who succumbed to Angus (Tigh.739), and from the foundation of Dunkeld and St. Andrews by Constantine and the second Angus, it may be gathered that the provinces connected with those monasteries were “in the crown.” In the Irish annalsFortreimis latterly almost synonymous with the kingdom of the Picts. Its capital,Dun-Fothir, was evidently the ScottishTara, andDundurnin the north perhaps the ScottishCashel. Moray and Mærne seem to have long been the leading subdivisions of the north, but it would be difficult to name the corresponding divisions of the south. Abernethy appears to have been connected with Strathearn, Dunkeld with Atholl, and St. Andrews with Fife.

[39]Lodbroka Quida. Str., 12. The epithet of “the Hardy” is applied to Kenneth in theDuan. The old chronicle continues to apply the name ofPictaviato Scotland proper, orAlban, andSaxoniato the Lothians; whilst the Ulster annals call the MacAlpin dynasty “Kings of the Picts” to the close of the century.

[40]Innes App., No. 3.

[41]This expression, the “laws of Aodh,” may have found its way into the chronicle without the transcriber being aware of its meaning. In the Irish annals thelex Patriciiorlex Columbæalludes to the right of visitation and other dues belonging to the representatives orCowarbsof those saints; and the confirmation of the “lex Aodh Fin” by the Gael may mean the recognition of the claims of his descendants, the MacAlpin family, toCanandCuairtover the provinces of the Picts. Royallawwas identical with royalsupremacy.

[42]Their first arrival, or rather permanent settlement, is placed by theAn. Ult.in 839. The district ofFingallmay derive its name fromFinegall, “the stranger clans,” as well as fromFin-gall, “the white strangers.”

[43]The Fingall are sometimes supposed to have been Norwegians and the Dugall Danes, a fanciful distinction apparently, as Thorstein Olaveson was king of the Dugall (An. Ult.874), and his father Olave was undoubtedly a Norwegian. The Hy Ivar, chiefs of the Dugall, were undoubtedly a Danish race, for the Northmen who slew Elli at York in 867 were Dugall, and known asScaldingsorSkioldungrof the royal race of Denmark.An. Ult.866.Twysden, p. 70.

[44]A. F. M., 847, 849, 850, 851. Olave “took hostages from every clan, and tribute from the Gael.”

[45]Innes App., No. 3.An. Ult.865, 869, 870, 872.Sim. Dun. de Gestis, 866.Ware. Antiq. Hib., c. 24. Ivar was unquestionably the Inguar of early English history, and perhaps Olave was the Ubba; for in the Langfedgatel quoted by Lappenberg (Eng. under Ang. Sax., vol. i., p. 114, n. 4), Olave is substituted for Uffo, evidently the same name as Ubba. TheChron.3 ascribes the death of Olave to Constantine, whilst the Landnamaboc says he was killed in Ireland.

[46]An. Ult.856. Laxdæla Saga and Landnamaboc inCol. de Reb. Alb., p. 65 to 69. TheGallgaelmust be distinguished from their rivals theOirir-Gael, or Gael of the coasts (i.e., ofArgyle). Mr. Skene (Highlanders, pt. 2, c. 2) considers them to have been identical, on the strength of a passage which, I think, scarcely bears him out. When the fleet of Turlough O’Connor ravaged Tir Conal and Inch Eogan in 1154 (A. F. M.), the clan Eogan sent to hire “Longus Gallgaidhel, Arann, Cinntire, Manann et Cantair Alban” ships of the Gallgael, Arran, Kintyre, Man, and “the coasts of Alban,”i.e.Oirir-Gael. Gallgael must here mean the Islesmen. The Orkneyinga Saga (Antiq. Celt.-Scan., p. 180) calls the Caithness men Gaddgedlar or Gallgael; in short, it was the name of the two races when blended, and in later days there was a continual struggle for superiority between the Oirir-Gael and the Gallgael—represented by the families of Somarled and of the later kings of Man,—in which the former were ultimately successful, uniting at length under one head the dominion of Argyle and the Isles. There is a slight discrepancy in the accounts of Ketil contained in the Sagas. He was leader of the Gallgael when Harfager was an infant, and appears to have succeeded Godfrey MacFergus, whose name betokens a mixed descent, and who died in 853 (A. F. M., 851). The Gallgael possessed the islands before the time of Harfager.

[47]Ekkialsbakka, according to Mr. Skene “the Mounth;” according to Johnstone, the Ochil Hills, appears to be rightly translated by Mr. Laing (Heimskringla, vol. 1., p. 291); “the banks of the Ekkial, or Oikell, a river which still marks the limits of Sutherland, the ancientSudrlandof the Orkney Jarls.

[48]Antiq. Celt.-Scand.(Landnamaboc), p. 20, 21.

[49]Chron. Sax.875. Halfdan was a brother of Ivar. According toSim. Dun. Hist. Dun., l. 2, c. 13, he was driven from Northumbria very soon after he settled there, and perished miserably, slain by “his own people.” He was probably the Albdan Toshach of the Dugall, who was killed in battle by the Fingall in 877 at Loch Cuan, or Strangford Lough.An. Ult.876.

[50]CompareAn. Ult.874 withChron.3,Innes’ Ap.“Thorstein ruled as king over these districts, Caithness and Sutherland, Ross, Moray, and more than the half of Scotland”—Landnamaboc. “Thorstein at length became reconciled with the King of Scots, and obtained possession of the half of Scotland, over which he became king.”—Laxdæla Saga(Col. de Reb. Alb., p. 66 to 69). Such were the results of Thorstein’s victory, which were evidently admitted by the old chronicle in its brief notice, “Normanni annum integrum degerunt in Pictavia.” The half of Scotland plainly refers to the ancient territories of the Northern Picts.

[51]This account of the wars of Sigurd and Thorstein is taken from the Sagas already quoted, the Ulster annals and Chron. 3 in Innes’s Appendix. They must have occurred between the deaths of Olave, about 871, and of his son in 875; and the decisive conflict between the Picts and Dugall in 875, when the former were defeated with great slaughter (An. Ult.), the battles of Dollar and Coach-Cochlum, two years before the death of Constantine,i.e., in the same year; and finally the death of Oistin or Thorstein MacOlave, placed by the Ulster annals under the same date, all mark the year 875 to have been the era of his brief triumph. All accounts agree that Thorstein perished by unfair means. “He was betrayed by the Scots and slain in battle.”—Landnamaboc.“The Scots did not keep the treaty long, but betrayed him in confidence”—Laxdæla Saga.These authorities are confirmed by the Ulster annals, which record the death of Thorstein Olavesonper dolum.

[52]Innes’, App.5.Wynton, bk. 6, c. 8.Fordun, l. 4, c. 16. Macpherson, in his “Geographical Illustrations of Scottish History,” explains theWerdofathaof the Register of St. Andrews and Wynton to meanWem-du-fada, “the long black cave,” in which Constantine is supposed to have suffered the cruel death of “the spread eagle.” The period of this reign is easily ascertained. Under the first year the Chronicle No. 3 places the death of Malsechnal, king of Ireland; and as that king died on Tuesday 20th November (A.F.M.), his death must have occurred in 863. The same chronicle records the death of Aodh MacNial, king of Ireland, which happened in 879, under the second year of Eocha and Cyric (Grig), thus placing their accession, and consequently the death of Constantine’s brother Aodh, in 878. As the reign of Aodh lasted for only a year, that of his brother must have begun in 863 and ended in 877.

[53]Cyric (or Ciric, the same as the French St. Cyr) was the original name, which has been corrupted into Grig, Girg, and Gregory the Great. It seems to be a different name fromGregor, which is apparently the ScandinavianGriotgar. Eccles Girg or Grig is the modernCyruskirk. Dundurn or Dunadeer, in the Garioch, appears long to have held the same place amongst the Northern Picts as Dunfothir or Forteviot in the South,i.e., it was the capital of the leading province.Caledonia, bk. 3, c. 7, p. 383, note I.

[54]Innes, Ap. 3, 5.Fordun, l. 4, c. 16.An. Ult.877. Eocha is described as thealumnusof Cyric, who was evidently the real king of Scotland for the time.

[55]Innes, Ap. 5.Wynton, bk. 6, c. 9. It was probably to the gratitude of the monks, the only chroniclers of the age, that Cyric was partly indebted for some of his posthumous fame as Gregory the Great, an universal conqueror. The line of Aodh appears to have been connected withAtholl, which may account for the deposition of Dunkeld from its prominent position.

[56]Innes, Ap. 3. The title ofCivitas Regalisis given to Scone early in the next reign. Thepalatium, or royal residence of Kenneth, was at Forteviot, the ancient Pictish capital.

[57]Innes, Ap. 3 and 5.Wynton, bk. 6, c. 9.Fordun, l. 4, c. 17, 18; l. 11 c. 40, 59. Wynton, Fordun, and theChron. Ryth.at the end of theChron. Mel.—the same evidently as that quoted by Wynton—agree in giving eighteen years to Cyric, and placing his death at Dundurn, Dornedeore, or Dunadeer, in the Garioch. The reigns of the three kings extended over twenty-two years, from 878 to 900, the dates in the Ulster annals of the deaths of Aodh and Donald; and as Eocha reigned for eleven years (Chron.5), Donald must have succeeded in 889. The Chron. No. 3 places an eclipse on St. Ciric’s Day (16th June) under the ninth year of Eocha and Cyric. This actually occurred on 16th June 885, in theeighthyear of their reign; and allowing for the trifling inaccuracy of a year, it is evidently the eclipse referred to. From confounding St. Ciric with St. Siriac, on whose day (8th August 891) an eclipse also happened, both Pinkerton and Chalmers have misdated all these reigns.

[58]Innes, Ap. 3, 5.An. Ult.899.Fordun, l. 4, c. 20. Either this king, or one of his predecessors, must have been the sufferer at Mundingdene, a mile south of Norham, when the obedience of Guthred, son of Hardicanute (rather a mythical personage), to the dictates of Abbot Edred’s vision, in restoring the lands of St. Cuthbert between Tyne and Wear to the Church, was rewarded by the intervention of the Saint in behalf of the sacred territory, when it was invaded by a band of Scots, who were miraculously engulphed in the yawning earth!Sim. Dun. Hist. Dun., l. 2, c. 14.Leland, vol. i. p. 329. It is a pity the miracle was not repeated a few years later, when Reginald Hy Ivar divided these very lands amongst his pagan followers. What with thesac,socandinfangthief, granted by Guthred in the ninth century, the fine of 96 Anglo-Norman pounds, and the near vicinity of the Scots to St. Cuthbert’s territory, the story affords a very fair specimen of the inventions by which the monks occasionally tried to give a title to lands which they often really possessed rightfully, though without legal proof of such right. A miracle or a victory, especially if either were at the expense of the Scots, lent an air of sanctity or authority to the fabrication, which it would have been impious or unpatriotic to doubt.

[59]Innes, Ap. 3.An. Ult.903. As the annals call the victors “the men of Fortren,” I have rendered theSraith Eremiof Pinkerton’s version ofChron.3, Strathearn.

[60]Innes, Ap. 3. It probably resembled those meetings of the Anglo-SaxonWitan, at which the ecclesiasticalDooms, so often preceding the secularDoomsin the Anglo-Saxon laws, were promulgated, and may have had some reference to the recent elevation of the See of St. Andrews to the primacy.

[61]An. Ult.871. According to this authority, Constantine “procured” the death of Artga.

[62]An. Ult.876, 877.An. Camb.andBrut y Tywys, 880.Caradoc, Hist. Wales, p. 38.Caledonia, vol. i., bk. 3, c. 5, p. 355. Chalmers gives the name of Constantine to their first leader, whilst, according to Caradoc, Hobart was their chief when they reached Wales. To some old tradition of this migration, and to the encroachments of the Galwegians, theInquisitio Davidisprobably alludes:—“Diversæ seditiones circumquaque insurgentes non solum ecclesiam et ejus possessiones destruxerunt verum etiam totam regionem vastantes ejus habitatores exilio tradiderunt”Reg. Glasg.In fact it would appear as if a Scottish party had dated its rise from the days of Kenneth MacAlpin, and secured a triumph by the expulsion of its antagonists, on the accession of Eocha to the Scottish throne, and by the election of Donald in the reign of the second Constantine.

[63]Innes, Ap. 3. Donald and Eocha, or Eogan, were the invariable family names (with only one exception) of the princes of Strath Clyde, until the extinction of the race in the time of Malcolm II.

[64]An. Ult.901–903. The Egill’s Saga (Antiq. Celt.-Scand.p. 32), in describing Olave the Red, calls him “the son of a native Scot, by a descendant of Ragnar Lodbroc,” meaning by the expression “a native Scot,” that his father was of Scottish descent by both parents. This description cannot apply to Olave’s father Sitric and his brothers, the well-known grandsons of Ivar, whose children could not possibly have been of pure Scottish descent. It is remarkable, however, that the name of thefatherof Sitric and his brothers is never mentioned by the Irish annalists, who invariably call them Hy Ivar, orgrandsonsof Ivar (for theHyhad not yet become a family prefix), whilst they also frequently allude to Godfrey and Sitric, the sons of Ivar, and their descendants, who never attained to the same celebrity as the others. These latter more famous Hy Ivar appear to have been in some way connected with the Western Isles, where their descendants were long regarded in the light of a royal race. The first appearance of Reginald Hy Ivar is in a naval battle off the Isle of Man; and as his family had no footing at that time either in England, Scotland, or Ireland, he must have recruited his fleet from amongst the Gall-Gael. Nearly thirty years later the son of Reginald was driven from the same Western Islands, which he probably had inherited in his childhood (for Reginald and his brothers were young), when the English and Irish possessions of his father fell to the share of his uncles Sitric and Godfrey. (An. Ult.942.An. F. M.940.) After the death of Godfrey Mac Fergus in 853, who figures in the genealogy of Somarled, lord of theOirir-Gael, and must have been (from his name) of Scottish descent by the father’s side, the Isles next appear under the rule of Caittil or Ketil, a Norwegian, but as his sons settled in Iceland after the expedition of Harfager (Landnamabok), he could not have transmitted his power to his descendants; and the Sagas say that the Isles then fell into the hands of Scottish and Irish Vikings. If one of these Vikings, a Scottish lord of the Gall-Gael or Oirir-Gael, had married Ivar’s daughter, the description in the Egill’s Saga would exactly apply to himself, his wife, and his sons, and it would be only necessary to suppose that the writer of the Saga, aware of Olave’s descent from a Scottish Viking and a grand-daughter of Ragnar Lodbroc, made him by mistake thesoninstead of thegrandsonof the Scot. This supposition would equally account for the connection of the Hy Ivar with the Isles, and the ignorance of the Irish annalists respecting their father’s name.

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