Search just our sites by using our customised search engine

Unique Cottages | Electric Scotland's Classified Directory

Click here to get a Printer Friendly PageSmiley

Clans and Families of Ireland and Scotland
X. The Vikings and Normans


history as Bonnie Dundee (or as "Bloody Claver’s" by the Covenanters he campaigned against).

In the early fifteenth century the then Graham chief’s half-brother Patrick Graham married Robert II’s granddaughter, who was the heiress of the new Stewart Earldom of Strathearn, and their son, Malise Graham, was thus heir of Strathearn. Patrick Graham was killed by the Drummonds in 1413, leaving the infant Malise in the guardianship of Patrick’s younger brother Sir Robert Graham of Kinpoint. In 1427 James I seized the rich Earldom of Strathearn, giving Malise instead the almost empty title of Earl of Mentieth, and packing him off to England as a hostage-prisoner for almost 26 years. Sir Robert Graham, the boy’s uncle and guardian protested in vain, and finally raided the King at Perth and killed the King himself, for which act he was later tortured to death. This line continued, however, and in 1631 the then Earl of Mentieth renewed his claim on Strathearn, but was in 1633 forced to accept the Earldom of Airth instead.

The MacGilvernocks (Mac Giolla Mhearnaigh—"Son of the servant of St. Ernan"), a sept of the Graham’s Highland Border regions, Anglicized their name as Graham. This was the family of the Reverend Archibald Graham, last Bishop of the Isles, 1680—1688.

The Grants (Grannd, from the Norman-French "le Grand," meaning "the big") are a Norman family introduced into the north of Scotland by the Bissets on the return of some of them from their exile of 1242. In England the Bissets and the Grants possessed adjoining lands in Nottinghamshire and were intermarried. In 1246 King Henry Ill of England granted Lowdham to Walter Byset till he should recover his lands in Scotland. The adjacent manor of East Bridgeford was then held by William le Grant, who had married Alfreda Byset, a Bisset heiress, They are first recorded in Scotland when Laurence and Robert Ie Grant appear as witnesses to a grant by the Bissets to Beauly Priory near Inverness in 1258. Later, as Sir Laurence le Grant, the former appears as Sheriff of Inverness, while Robert is recorded as holding land in nearby Nairnshire. As sheriffs of Inverness, the chiefs of the Grants became established in the Glenmoriston area around their center at Castle Urquhart on the northeastern shore of Loch Ness, and acquired blood-ties to the native-men of the district, who held themselves connected to the MacGregors, which may simply indicate their traditional connection to Argyle. In this connection it should be mentioned that the arms of the MacArthurs, formerly princes in Argyle till 1427, could be taken as a differenced version of the arms of the Grants as both color and the "Cross Moline" are standard marks of difference to show bloodrelationship. There did exist a famous Norman family of Grants in the early thirteenth century with the same armorial motto as the Scottish Grants:

"Stand Fast,"—Latin, Tenons Ferme. Nevertheless, the arms of the Grants, three golden antique crowns on red, may have been inherited at the time that the Grants settled in Scotland around 1258, hence the possible MacArthur


Page 137

Index

Page 139

[Page 138]

 


 


This comment system requires you to be logged in through either a Disqus account or an account you already have with Google, Twitter, Facebook or Yahoo. In the event you don't have an account with any of these companies then you can create an account with Disqus. All comments are moderated so they won't display until the moderator has approved your comment.

comments powered by Disqus

Quantcast