STEWART-ROOTS-L Archives

From: "Rebecca York" <>
Subject: [STEWART-ROOTS] an interesting article on clans
Date: Fri, 6 Jun 2003 06:44:17 -0700

>From 'Reminiscences and Reflections of an Octogenarian
Highlander' by Duncan Campbell. Inverness 1910.


'In our Glen [Glen Lyon] a clannish community through inter-marriage was
formed by people of many surnames. It was much the same in the neighbouring
glens and districts. There never existed on the south side of the Grampians
a parish or barony or estate of many farms that was inhabited by people of
one surname. I question whether the ideal of one-clan, one-descent ever
existed anywhere on the Highland mainland, or in the larger islands,
whatever might be the case in the smaller islands. The one-stock clan idea
came out of a precedent Celtic system which was superseded by the feudal
system. When the clans in the fourteenth century began to raise their heads,
they had, in order to succeed, to graft their idea on feudalism, and to
accept the mixed population that had gathered themselves under it.
  The early Chronicle of Fortingall, written by the three Roman Catholics,
contained most of the surnames which the Fortingall people bore in my time,
such as Macnaughtons, Robertsons, Macdougals, Menzieses, Maegregors,
Stewarts, Maclellans, Campbells, Irvines. The introduction of most of these
surnames could be traced by the procession of proprietors. John of Lorne,
who received Glenlyon as tocher with his wife, the neice of King David
Bruce, was not indeed proprietor of Fortingall, but he was the "toiseach" or
King's representative, and uplifter of his rents and dues until the next
reign, when the Wolf of Badenoch, who placed an eagle's nest up at Garth,
"intromitted" with his charge, and got the heiress of Fortingall, Janet
Menzies, married to his son James. John of Lorne placed a Macgregor vicar in
Fortingall, and introduced Macdougal clansmen of his own there. The Stewarts
began to come in with the Wolf's usurpation, and afterwards had additions
from the Appin-Innermeath line. They were divided into the "Stiubhartaich
Dubh-Shuileach" and "Na Stiubhartaich Gorm-Shuileach" â?¹ that is to say, the
black-eyed and the blue-eyed Stewarts. Huntly, on the forfeiture of Neil
Ruadh of Garth, had temporary hold of the superiority of that place, and
introduced the Irvines. The Macnaughtons, many of whom were called Mackay â?¹
that is, the Children of Aodh â?¹ were transported from the North to the banks
of the Tay by William the Lion. The Chief of the old Atholl clan â?¹
afterwards called Robertsons â?¹ and Fergus, son of Aod or Aoidh, were lessees
of Fortingall and other thanages before John of Lorne appeared on the scene.
As for the Maclellans, named after St Fillan, they came at a later dato to
Fortingall from Glenlyon. I think the Macnaughtons and Robortsons are the
people of longest descent in Fortingall. The Macintyres were late comers
from Argyll, and the Andersons and Fishers were also late comors from
Breadalbane. So were the Campbells from Glenlyon and Breadalbane, and also
the much scattered Clan Charles Campbell, branch of the Black Dougal of
Craignish stock. With the variations of a small kind which a long period of
time must bring about anywhere, the Fortingall population had retained the
same~complexion and composition for four hundred years.'

'In 1860 the inhabitants of Balquhidder, under many surnames, were, with the
fewest possible exceptions, of undoubted Celtic descent. They spoke the
excellent Gaelic of the days of Robert Kirke and Dugald Buchanan, but there
were not many of them who could not well speak English also. It was a
singular thing that the people bearing the names of the oldest proprietors â?¹
Stewarts, Buchanans, and Campbells â?¹ made such a small numerical show in the
norminal muster. Fergusons came in with the Atholl minister of the first
half of the eighteenth century. The Macdonalds of Monochyle and Blarcriche
came from Glenlyon in the preceding generation. It is probable that when
Colin, Earl of Argyll, held a Justiciary Court in Balquhidder in 1526, he
brought in Macintyres to strengthen his clients, the Clan Laurin, against
the Clan Gregor, who were even then seeoming more dangerous to the peace of
the distriet than the Buchanans had been in the former century. By the end
of that century, Balquhidder, out-lying place as it was, without any
strong-handed local magnate invested with official authority, became a
convenient resort for the unruly Clan Gregor. It was in the kirk of
Balquhidder that they went, through their "ethnic" ceremony of swearing over
the head of murdered Drummond - Ernoch. Fearfully were they punished for
that murder and that heathenish eeremony. In 1860 the number of people
bearing the Stewart surname was surprisingly small, considering that they
had had a footing in the parish as early as 1400, and that being of the
King's clan they were favoured above others, especially when Sir Walter
Stewart ruled in Queen Margaret's name, and that they got legal titles to
the Braes, Glenbuckie, Gartnafuaran, and other places. The Earl of Moray has
still kept the Braes, but the other Stewart properties were all gone before
my time. The bigger one of them, Glenbuckie, was sold in 1846 to Mr David
Carnegie of Stronvar, who added to it by other purchases until he left his
son the far largest and best estate in the parish. In 1860 the people of the
Clan Glregor surname were numerous. I had great-great-grandchildren of Rob
Roy in my school, although the most of his male descendants went to the West
Indies soon after the execution of Robin Og. Rob Roy's youngest son, Ranald,
who was not mixed up with the evil doings of the others, remained behind,
and died as tenant of the Kirkton farm in good old age. In 1860 there were
at least two old men, Hugh Maegregor and the old bellman, who remembered him
perfectly. He was still living when the lame boy, Walter Scott was gathering
strength and stories at Cambusmore, ten miles away, and lived a good many
years more.
  The Balqubidder people who have the oldest surnames are the MacLarens or
Clan Laurin, who derive their designation, and presumably their lineage,
from a Culdee Abbot of Cuil who lived in the later times when the Culdees
married. A married Abbot of Glendochart was the founder of the Clan Macnab,
and Laurence Abbot of Cuil founded the Clan Laurin of the adjoining
district. Cuil is on the Edinchip estate. Not the smallest vestige of its
monastic structures remains; probably they were wooden buildings, as was
usual in Columban and Culdee days. But the memory of it and the names of its
Abbots have been preserved in ancient ecclesiastical documents. So faint
grew the local tradition about the Cuil Monastery, and so much was Abbot
Laurence forgotten, that in my time fanciful members of the Clan Laurin
began to claim tribal origin from a Seoto-Dalriadic prince of Argyll. It is
not unlikely that the protection of the clan by Earls of Argyll long
afterwards suggested this fancy. Had Abbot Laurence belonged to the early
era of Columban missionaries, he might well have been a Dalriadic-Scot or
Irishman. But as he belonged to a very much later time, he was much more
likely to be of the Pictish race.'


^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^
Becky
north Idaho
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"Just as eating against one's will is injurious to health, so study without a liking for it spoils the memory, and it retains nothing it takes in."
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http://www.rootsweb.com/~okjeffer/
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http://www.rootsweb.com/~txbrown/
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• [STEWART-ROOTS] an interesting article on clans by "Rebecca York" <>