| Was
the turning point for the fortunes of Latin Christianity (again, a good story reycled: St.
Columba gave the O’Donnell a similar command in the sixth century).
The church founded by St. Maelrubha in 673
became the center of a Celtic tribal abbey dedicated to St. Andrew and administered after
the Viking period by a patrilineal kindred with the Irish-style surname "0
Beolain." As we have seen, the abbey was located among the Northern Picts, at
Applecross on the west coast of Ross. Since the ninth and tenth centuries were
transitional between the Pictish and Gaelic systems of descent, we can expect that before
that time the abbey had passed to the successors of St. Maelrubha in the Pictish mode of
matrilineal descent. Yet such direct Gaelic-Pictish interaction was not forthcoming over
much of the North and East, and thus the Pictish matrilineal system was apparently in a
position to linger on in the more purely Pictish areas of Ross, Sutherland and
Aberdeenshire, away from the direct effects of the centralizing monarchy. We should not be
surprised then to find that as late as 1014 the then Earl of Mar (Aberdeenshire) succeeded
through an heiress. The fact that this succession did not cause a break in political
continuity with the original Picto-Gaelic line indicates a Pictish style succession on the
old model.
However, during the period vast areas of
Ross, Sutherland, Caithness, Orkney and the Hebrides ("the Isles") were all
under Norse rather than Pictish control. In these areas, interaction was Norse-Pictish,
and thus matrilineality was faced with an aggressive Indo-European patrilineality of the
first order, especially where political control was at issue. We would not expect
patrilineal Vikings to pass matrilineally what was acquired in a patrilineal spirit,
either by dynastic marriage or masculine sword right. Interaction did occur. Norse sources
such as the Icelandic Landnamabok, supported by archeology, reveal a very interesting
situation: The Norse royalty of the area was already both Christian and half—Celtic
by the mid-ninth century (their genealogies show frequent marriages to Celtic princesses).
We should not be surprised, then, to find
that Helgi, the son of Ketill Flatnefr, nine-century Norse ruler of the Hebrides, was
himself known by the Gaelic nickname of "Bjolan" (Beolain), nicknames being the
usual second element in Norse personal names. Nor should we be surprised to find that
Helgi Bjolan’s relatives brought Christianity to Iceland in the ninth century. The
very survival of Applecross as an abbey on the coast of Viking Ross points to fortuitous
Norse patronage. Helgi Bjolan is undoubtedly the namesake of the O’Beolains, since
his father was ruler of the Hebrides (Applecross faces these) and his nephew was King of
Ross. Beolain is certainly not a typical Gaelic name.
The earlier Pictish abbots of Applecross were probably
"co-arbs" (bloodrelated successors) of St. Maelrubha in the Pictish mode of
matrilineal descent. Since Applecross, as a Celtic tribal abbey, was continuously active
throughout |
