Page:The Complete Peerage Ed 2 Vol 1.djvu/192

 142 COMPLETE PEERAGE angus with FoTHREVE now together forming co. Fife ; (5) Mar with Buchan, now together forming cos. Aberdeen and Banff; (6) Moray (Muref or Moreb) with Ross, now cos. Inverness and Ross ; and (7) Caithness with Suther- land. The district on the west being the Kingdom of Dalriada (now part of Argyll), is here omitted ; but in the loth century the province of Arregaithel (Argyll) was added^ which included not only the Dalriada, but the entire western seaboard of Scotland as far north as the old province of Caithness, which latter province was then omitted, having previously passed into the hands of the Norwegians. The ruler of each of these districts originally bore the title of " Ri " {i.e. King), being inferior only to the " Ardri " {i.e. Supreme King) ; but in the loth century (with the exception of Argyll, and occasionally of Moray) each such ruler was styled " Mormaer, " i.e. Great Maer or Steward. During the reign of Alexander I, in the foundation charter of the monastery of Scone bearing date either 11 14 or 11 15, the Mormaers of most of these provinces occur for the first time under the name of Earls. This charter was granted " with the consent of nine persons, two of whom have the simple designation of Episcopus [being] followed by seven others, six of whom have the word Comes, or Earl, after their names, and the only one who is not so designated is Gospatrick, whom we know to have been at the time (or shortly afterwards) Earl of Dunbar, and who probably represented that part of Lothian attached to Alexander's Kingdom. The other six must of course have represented the districts of transmarine Scotland which properly formed Alexander's dominions The six persons who bear the title of Comes, are Beth, Mall us, Madach, Rothri, Gartnach, and Dufugan, and of these we can identify four, " (') viz. (Mallus) Stratherne; (Madach) Athole; (Rothri) Mar; and (Gartnach) Buchan. Doubtless another was (Dufugan) Angus. " Beth, Comes " is difficult of strict identification, not improbably he was Earl of Fife, but possibly Earl of Moray. (*•) In this early part of the 12th century, out of the seven original provinces founded by the seven brothers, Caithness, was certainly, and Moray probably (though Fife possibly) wanting ; the two vacant places being supplied by Dunbar (from the Lowlands), and by Buchan, which had previously become separated from Mar. " Thus the great Celtic Chiefs of the Country, to whom the Nor- wegians applied the Norwegian title of Jarl, which was a personal dignity though given in connection with a territory, now appear bearing the Saxon title of Comes or Earl, and the Celtic title of Mormaer, probably official in its origin, was now merged in a personal dignity. " (") " From the time when the Celtic King Malcolm (1057-98) had m. the Saxon Princess Margaret, there had been an increasing Saxon influence in the government of the Celtic provinces," and of his three sons (by that Prin- cess) who, from 1098 to 11 53, were successively Kings [S.], "the reigns of Edgar and Alexander I must be viewed as essentially those of Saxon (') Skene's Celtic Scotland. (") See (as to this point) Skene, ut supra, vol. iii, p. 62, note 36. (O Ibid.