Bannerman shares something with other Scottish names such as Armstrong and Turnbull in that it relates to an event in their history. Sometime during the late 11th and early 12th century, within the reign of either Malcolm III or Alexander I the Kings forces had assembled on the banks of the Spey where a rebel […]
The Norse word gunnr means war. Living between Caithness and Sutherland, the Gunns were descended from the Norsemen, some think possibly from Olaf the Black himself, and their name foretold their destiny. The ferocious Gunns were continually at enmity with neighbouring clans, especially the Keiths. Gunn lands were constantly being encroached upon from the North, […]
The name MacAulay grew from two unconnected areas. One came from Dunbartonshire and were the MacAulays of Ardincaple. The other was the MacAulays of Lewis. The MacAulays of Ardincaple may have came to be through Amhlaidh, who was the son of Alwin, Earl of Lennox in the early thirteenth century. The name Aulay MacAulay, or […]
Robert the Bruce’s chamberlain was Sir Alexander Fraser and it is from his brother, Sir Simon Fraser, that the Frasers of Lovat descend. Sir Simon acquired the Bisset Lands around Beauly when he won the hand of its heiress, and these lands became the family home. Construction of Beaufort Castle in the late 1870s with […]
Derived from the name of the ‘forest keeper’. Archebaldus Forestar witnessed a grant by Gillemor filius Gilleconel to the church of Leshmagow in 1444, and in 1190 William Forestarius’s house was one of the boundaries of the lands of the church of Molle. In 1200 Marninus Forestarius had lands in the town of Dunipas, and […]
Clan MacNicol has a long and proud history of over 800 years in the Hebrides and Western Highlands. The Chief, MacNeacail (MacNicol or Nicholson) of Scorrybreac, took his designation from his land near Portree on the Isle of Skye. The islands of Lewis and Skye remained part of the Scandinavian kingdom of Mann (the Isle […]
The Clan Bain has no connection with MacBain or MacBean. In fact the clan is closely associated with Clan MacKay in the far North West of Scotland. Around 1427 an internal feud broke out within clan MacKay which split the the clan into two factions. On one side was the ageing chef of the clan […]
In old Latin documents the term Walensis is used to designate the Welsh, but in Scotland is more commonly used as a native name meaning a Strathclyde Briton and not, as is often thought, a Welshman coming in the train of the Norman French. It is from this Walensis that the name Wallace is derived. […]
The Ramsays are an ancient family of Anglo-Norman origin. The name was first recorded in Scotland by Simon de Ramsay, who travelled north with the Earl of Huntingdon in 1124. He was granted lands in Lothian and was the ancestor of the Ramsays of Dalhousie. The Ramsay family prospered and by the thirteenth century there […]
Hannay may have originally been spelt ‘Ahannay’, possibly deriving from the Gaelic ‘O’Hannaidh’, or ‘Ap Shenaeigh’. The family can be traced back to Galloway in South-West Scotland. The name of ‘Gilbert de Hannethe’ appears on the Ragman Roll in 1296. However unlike a large number of Scottish nobles who later sided with Robert the Bruce, […]
