Celtic Scotland

The result of our inquiry into the ethnology of Britain and the race and language of the occupants of its northern districts, hasty and general as, from the limits of this work, it has necessarily been, may be thus summed up:—

The Celtic race in Britain and Ireland was preceded by a people of an Iberian type, small, dark-skinned, and curly-haired. They are the people of the long-headed skulls, and their representatives in Britain were the tin-workers of Cornwall and the Scilly Islands, who traded with Spain, and the tribe of the Silures in South Wales, and, in the legendary history of Ireland, the people called the Firbolg. The Celtic race followed them both in Britain and in Ireland. These are the people of the round-headed skulls, and consisted of two great branches, whose language—the British and the Gadhelic—though possessing evident marks that they had a common origin, and that both branches belonged originally to one race, is yet distinguished by marked dialectic differences. Each of these great branches again was divided into varieties. Of the Gadhelic branch, one was a fair-skinned, large-limbed, and red-haired race, and were represented in Britain by the people of the interior whom the Romans thought to be indigenous, and who, after the Roman province was formed, were called by them the Picts or painted people. They are represented in the legendary history of Ireland by the Tuatha De Danann and by the Cruithnigh, a name which was the Irish equivalent of the Latin ‘Picti,’ and was applied to the Picts of Scotland, and to the people who preceded the Scots in Ulster, and were eventually confined to a district in the eastern part of it. The other variety was a fair-skinned brown-haired race, represented in the legendary history as the race of Milidh or Milesius, and, after the fourth century, known by the name of Scots.

The other great branch of the Celtic race, which extended itself over the whole of that part of Britain which became subject to the Roman power, and was incorporated into a province of the Roman Empire, were those we have termed British, and resembled the Gauls in their physical appearance. The two varieties of their language in Britain are represented by the Cornish and the Welsh.

The Celtic race was followed by a Teutonic people, who were of the low German race, and issued from the low-lying country along the north coast of Germany, extending from the Rhine to the Cimbric Chersonese. After assailing the Roman province during the last half-century of its existence, when they were known by the name of Saxons, they made settlements during the first half of the fifth century in what was called the Saxon Shore, and along the east coast from the Humber to the Firth of Forth. These earliest settlers consisted partly of Frisians, but mainly of the people called ‘Angli,’ who were part of a confederation of tribes who bore the general name of Saxons, and were followed at a later period by those who seemed to have belonged to the people originally called Saxons.

Out of these Celtic and Teutonic races there emerged in that northern part of Britain which eventually became the territory of the subsequent monarchy of Scotland, four kingdoms within definite limits and under settled forms of government; and as such we find them in the beginning of the seventh century, when the conflict among these races, which succeeded the departure of the Romans from the island, and the termination of their power in Britain, may be held to have ceased, and the limits of these kingdoms to have become settled.

North of the Firths of Forth and Clyde were the two kingdoms of the Scots of Dalriada on the west and of the Picts on the east. They were separated from each other by a range of mountains termed by Adamnan the Dorsal ridge of Britain, and generally known by the name of Drumalban. It was the great watershed which separated the rivers flowing eastward from those flowing westward, and now separates the counties of Argyll and Perth. The northern boundary appears to be represented by a line drawn from the mouth of Loch Leven through the district of Morvern, separating the old parish of Killecolmkill from that of Killfintach, then through the island of Mull by the great ridge of Benmore, and by the islands of Iona and Colonsay to Isla, where it separated the eastern from the western districts of the island.^[283]

The Scottish colony was originally founded by Fergus Mor, son of Erc, who came with his two brothers Loarn and Angus from Irish Dalriada in the end of the fifth century, but the true founder of the Dalriadic kingdom was his great-grandson Aedan, son of Gabran. It consisted of three tribes, the Cinel Gabran, the Cinel Angus, and the Cinel Loarn, which were called the ‘three powerfuls of Dalriada.’ The Cinel Gabran consisted of the descendants of Fergus, whose son Domangart had two sons, Gabran and Comgall, and their possessions consisted of the district of Cowall, which takes its name from Comgall, that of Cindtire or Kintyre, which then extended from the river Add, which flows into the bay of Crinan, to the Mull of Kintyre, and included Knapdale and the small islands of this coast. The Cinel Angusa settled in Isla and Jura, while the names of their townships which have been preserved embrace the eastern half of the island only. The Cinel Loarn possessed the district of Lorn, which takes its name from them and extends from Loch Leven to the point of Ashnish. Between the possessions of the Cinel Loarn and those of the Cinel Gabhran extended what is now the great moss of Crinan, called in Gaelic ‘Monadhmor;’ and on the bank of the river Add, which meanders through it, there rises an isolated rocky hill, the summit of which bears the mark of having been strongly fortified, while the great stones and cairns on the moss around it preserve the record of many an attempt to take it. This fortified hill was called Dunadd, a name which it still retains, and was the capital of Dalriada. It was also called, from the moss which surrounds it, Dunmonaidh. The possessions of these Dalriadic tribes surrounded a small district extending from the districts of Lorn, Kintyre, and Cowal, to Drumalban, in the centre of which was the lake of Loch Awe. As this territory was not included in the possessions of any of these tribes, it probably still retained its original population, and contained the remains of the earlier inhabitants before the arrival of the Scots. The kings of this small kingdom of Dalriada all belonged to the race of Erc, and succeeded each other according to the Irish law of Tanistry, which often assumed the form of an alternate succession from the members of two families descended from the common ancestor. In Dalriada it alternated first between the descendants of Gabran and Comgall, the two grandsons of Fergus, and afterwards between the Cinel Gabran and Cinel Loarn.^[284]

The remaining districts north of the Firths of Forth and Clyde formed the kingdom of the Picts. Throughout the whole course of their history as an independent nation there seems to have been a twofold division of this people, and they were eventually distinguished from each other as the northern and the southern Picts. Bede tells us that they were separated from each other by steep and rugged mountain chains, and he terms in one place the northern Picts, the Transmontane Picts.^[285] This mountain range can only refer to the great chain termed the Mounth, which extends across the island from Ben Nevis in Lochaber, till it terminates near the east coast between Aberdeen and Stonehaven. The whole country north of this range from sea to sea belonged to the northern Picts, who appear to have been purely Gaelic in race and language. The southern Picts are said by Bede to have had seats within these mountains, which refers no doubt to the districts intersected by the lesser chains which extend from the main range towards the south-east, and from the barrier of the so-called Grampians. These districts consist of the Perthshire and Forfarshire Highlands, the former of which is known by the name of Atholl. The western boundary of the territory of the southern Picts was Drumalban, which separated them from the Scots of Dalriada, and their southern boundary the Forth. The main body of the southern Picts also belonged no doubt to the Gaelic race, though they may have possessed some differences in the idiom of their language; but the original population of the country extending from the Forth to the Tay consisted of part of the tribe of Damnonii, who belonged to the Cornish variety of the British race, and they appear to have been incorporated with the southern Picts, and to have introduced a British element into their language. The Frisian settlements, too, on the shores of the Firth of Forth may also have left their stamp on this part of the nation. The former are probably the Britons of Fortrenn of the Pictish legends, and the latter have apparently left a record of their presence in the term of the Frisian Shore, known as the name of a district on the south of the Firth of Forth; and the name of Fothrik, applied to a district now represented by Kinross-shire and the western part of Fifeshire, may preserve a recollection of their Rik or kingdom.

The Picts seem to have preserved a tradition that the whole nation was once divided into seven provinces, whose names were derived from seven sons of Cruithne, the ‘eponymus’ of the race, and the reference to Saint Columba, as perpetuating this in a stanza, relegates it to this period. Of these names five can be recognised. In Fib we have Fife, Fodla enters into the name of Atholl, Circinn into that of the Mearns, Fortrenn was certainly the district from the Tay to the Forth, and Caith was the district of Cathenesia, originally of great extent, and embracing the most northern part of the island from sea to sea.

The seat of government appears to have been sometimes within the territory of the southern Picts, and at others on the north of the great chain of the Mounth. When we can first venture to regard the list of the Pictish kings preserved in the Pictish Chronicle as having some claim to a historical character, we find the king having his seat apparently in Forfarshire; but when the works of Adamnan and Bede place us upon firm ground, the monarch belonged to the race of the northern Picts, and had his fortified residence near the mouth of the river Ness.

When we examine the historical part of the list of the Pictish monarchs, we find that it exhibits a very marked peculiarity in the order of succession. We see brothers, sons of the same father, succeeding each other, but it does not present a single instance, throughout the whole period of the Pictish kingdom, of a son directly succeeding his father. Bede gives us the law of succession thus: ‘That when it came into doubt they elected the king rather from the female than from the male royal lineage, a custom,’ he says, ‘preserved among the Picts to his day.’^[286] It is thus stated in the poem attached to the Irish Nennius, ‘that from the nobility of the mother should always be the right to the sovereignty;’ and in the prose legends, ‘that the regal succession among them for ever should be on the mother’s side.’ ‘That not less should territorial succession be derived from men than from women for ever;’^[287] ‘so that it is in right of mothers they succeed to sovereignty and all other successions.’ ‘That they alone should take of the sovereignty and of the land from women rather than from men in Cruithintuath for ever.’ ‘That of women should be the royal succession among them for ever.’^[288] These statements, when compared with the actual succession, lead to this, that brothers succeeded each other in preference to the sons of each, not an unusual feature in male succession; but, on their failure, the contingency alluded to by Bede arose, and the succession then passed to the sons of sisters, or to the nearest male relation on the female side, and through a female. This, however, does not exhaust the anomalies exhibited in this list of kings, for we find that the names given as those of the fathers of the kings differ entirely from those of their sons, and in no case does a son who reigns bear the same name as that of any one of the fathers in the list. The names of the reigning kings are in the main confined to four or five names, as Brude, Drust, Talorgan, Nechtan, Gartnaidh, and these never appear among the names of the fathers of kings, nor does the name of a father occur twice in the list. Further, in two cases we know that while the kings who reigned were termed respectively Brude and Talorcan, the father of the one was a Briton, and of the other an Angle.^[289] The conclusion which Mr. M‘Lennan, in his very original work on primitive marriage, draws from this is, that it ‘raises a strong presumption that all the fathers were men of other tribes. At any rate there remains the fact, after every deduction has been made, that the fathers and mothers were in no case of the same family name;’^[290] and he quotes this as a reason for believing that exogamy prevailed among the Picts. But this explanation, though it goes some way, will not fully interpret the anomalies in the list of Pictish kings. The only hypothesis that seems to afford a full explanation is one that would suppose that the kings among the Picts were elected from one family clan or tribe, or possibly from one in each of the two divisions of the northern and southern Picts; that there lingered among the Picts the old custom among the Celts, who, to use the language of Mr. M‘Lennan, ‘were anciently lax in their morals, and recognised relationship through mothers only;’^[291] that intermarriage was not permitted in this royal family or tribe, and the women had to obtain their husbands from the men of other tribes, not excluding those of a different race;^[292] that the children were adopted into the tribe of the mother, and certain names were exclusively bestowed on such children. Such an hypothesis seems capable of explaining all the facts of the case; and if the male child thus adopted into the tribe of the mother became king, and was paternally of a foreign race, it will readily be seen how much this would facilitate the permanent occupation of the Pictish throne by a foreign line of kings. It would only be necessary that one king, who was paternally of a foreign tribe, and whose succession to the throne could not be opposed in conformity with the Pictish law of succession, should become powerful enough to alter the succession to one through males, and perpetuate it in his own family. Although the Pictish people might resist to the utmost their subjection to a foreign nation, and would make every effort to throw off the yoke, there would be nothing in the mere occupation of the throne by a family of foreign descent, who derived their succession originally through a female of the Pictish royal tribe, to arouse their national feeling to any extent against it.

The death of Brude mac Mailchon, the king of the northern Picts, whom Saint Columba converted, is recorded by Tighernac in the year 584,^[293] after a reign of thirty years; and as no battle is mentioned between him and the Dalriads after the arrival of Saint Columba, it seems probable that the boundaries of the respective kingdoms by the Picts and Scots of Dalriada were amicably settled by the same influence which procured the recognition of the independence of Dalriada at the convention of Drumceitt. Brude was succeeded by Gartnaidh, who is called son of Domelch, who reigned eleven years, and his death took place in 599,^[294] two years after that of Saint Columba himself. He is succeeded by Nectan, who bears the unusual designation of grandson of Uerd, and who occupied the throne at the beginning of the sixth century.^[295]

The districts south of the Firths of Forth and Clyde, and extending to the Solway Firth on the west and to the Tyne on the east, were possessed by the two kingdoms of the Britons on the west and of the Angles of Bernicia on the east. The former extended from the river Derwent in Cumberland in the south to the Firth of Clyde in the north, which separated the Britons from the Scots of Dalriada. The British kingdom thus comprehended Cumberland and Westmoreland, with the exception of the baronies of Allerdale or Copeland in the former and Kendal in the latter, and the counties of Dumfries, Ayr, Renfrew, Lanark, and Peebles, in Scotland. On the east the great forest of Ettrick separated them from the Angles, and here the ancient rampart of the Catrail which runs from the south-east corner of Peeblesshire, near Galashiels, through the county of Selkirk to the Peel Hill on the south side of Liddesdale, probably marked the boundary between them. The population of this kingdom seems to have belonged to two varieties of the British race,—the southern half, including Dumfriesshire, being Cymric or Welsh, and the northern half having been occupied by the Damnonii who belonged to the Cornish variety. The capital of the kingdom was the strongly-fortified position on the rock on the right bank of the Clyde, termed by the Britons Alcluith, and by the Gadhelic people Dunbreatan, or the fort of the Britons, now Dumbarton; but the ancient town called Caer Luel or Carlisle in the southern part must always have been an important position. The kingdom of the Britons had at this time no territorial designation, but its monarchs were termed kings of Alcluith, and belonged to that party among the Britons who bore the peculiar name of Romans, and claimed descent from the ancient Roman rulers in Britain. The law of succession seems to have been one of purely male descent.

Of Aedilfrid, who at this time ruled over Bernicia, and soon after extended his sway over Deira also, it is told us by Bede that he ‘conquered more territories from the Britons, either making them tributary, or expelling the inhabitants and planting Angles in their places, than any other king;’ and to his reign we attribute the greatest extension of the Anglic power over the Britons. He appears to have added to his kingdom the districts on the west between the Derwent and the Mersey, thus extending Deira from sea to sea, and placing the Northumbrian kingdom between the Britons of the north and those of Wales. The river Tees appears to have separated Deira from Bernicia, and the Angles of Bernicia, with whom we have more immediately to do, were now in firm possession of the districts extending along the east coast as far as the Firth of Forth, originally occupied by the British tribe of the Ottadeni and afterwards by the Picts, and including the counties of Berwick and Roxburgh and that of East Lothian or Haddington, the rivers Esk and Gala forming here their western boundary. The capital of Deira was York, and that of Bernicia the strongly-fortified position on the coast nearly opposite the Farne Islands, crowning a basaltic rock rising 150 feet above the sea, and accessible only on the south-east, which was called by the Britons Dinguayrdi, by the Gael Dunguaire, and by the Angles Bebbanburch after Bebba the wife of Aedilfrid, now Bamborough. About half-way along the coast, between Bamborough and Berwick-on-Tweed, lay, parallel to the shore, the long flat island called by the Britons Ynys Medcaud, and by the Angles Lindisfarne.^[296]

In the centre of Scotland, where it is intersected by the two arms of the sea, the Forth and the Clyde, and where the boundaries of these four kingdoms approach one another, is a territory extending from the Esk to the Tay, which possessed a very mixed population, and was the scene of most of the conflicts between these four states. Originally occupied by the tribe of the Damnonii, the northern boundary of the Roman province intersected it for two centuries and a half, including part of this tribe and the province, and merging the rest among the barbarians. On the fall of the Roman power in Britain, it was overrun by the Picts, and one of the earliest settlements of the Saxons, which probably was composed of Frisians, took place in the districts about the Roman wall. It was here that during the sixth century the main struggle took place. It falls naturally into three divisions. The first extends from the Esk and the Pentland Hills to the Roman wall and the river Carron. This district we find mainly peopled by Picts, the remains probably of those who once occupied the eastern districts to the southern wall, and preserved a kind of independence, while the rest were subjected by the Angles.

From the Picts the Angles give the hills which formed its southern boundary the name of the Pehtland, now Pentland hills. Near its south-eastern boundary was the strong natural position called by the Britons Mynyd Agned and also Dineiddyn, and by the Gael Dunedin. Nine miles farther west, the Firth of Forth is narrowed till the coast approaches within two miles of that of Fife, and affords a ready means of access; and on the south shore of the upper basin of the Forth, and near the termination of the Roman wall, was the ancient British town of Caeredin, while in the Forth itself opposite this district was the insular town of Giudi. The western part of this territory was known to the Welsh by the name of Manau Guotodin, and to the Gael as the plain or district of Manann, a name still preserved in Sliabhmanann, now Slamanan, and this seems to have been the headquarters of these Picts.

Between them and the kingdom of the Picts proper lay a central district, extending from the wall to the river Forth, and on the bank of the latter was the strong position afterwards occupied by Stirling Castle; and while the Angles of Bernicia exercised an influence and a kind of authority over the first district, this central part seems to have been more closely connected with the British kingdom of Alclyde. The northern part, extending from the Forth to the Tay, belonged to the Pictish kingdom, with whom its population, originally British, appears to have been incorporated, and was the district afterwards known as Fortrenn and Magh Fortrenn.

Finally, on the north shore of the Solway Firth, and separated from the Britons by the lower part of the river Nith, and by the mountain range which separates the counties of Kirkcudbright and Wigtown from those of Dumfries and Ayr, were a body of Picts, termed by Bede, Niduari; and this district, consisting of the two former counties, was known to the Welsh as Galwydel, and to the Irish as Gallgaidel, from which was formed the name Gallweithia, now Galloway.

Three years after the great battle in which Aidan was defeated at Dawstone in Liddesdale, he died, leaving his throne to his son Eocha Buidhe, or the yellow-haired, whom Saint Columba had named as his successor;^[297] and in the same year Aedilfrid, king of Bernicia, attacked Aeduin, who had succeeded his father Aella in Deira when a child, and had barely attained majority, and drove him from his throne, thus uniting Deira to Bernicia, over which he reigned twelve years. A change likewise soon took place among the Pictish kings, and in the year 612 Nectan appears to have been displaced by Cinioch or Cinadon, son of Luchtren, who from the Gaelic form of his name probably belonged to the northern Picts.^[298] Five years afterwards Aeduin, who, after wandering as a fugitive in different parts of Britain, had finally taken refuge with Redwald, king of the East Angles, succeeded in persuading him to assist him to recover his throne.

A large army was accordingly raised, and meeting Aedilfrid, who was advancing against him with inferior force, he attacked him and slew him on the borders of the kingdom of Mercia, on the east side of the river called Idlae or Idle, a small river which falls into the Trent. Aeduin thus not only regained his kingdom in the year 617, but obtained possession of both provinces of Deira and Bernicia, which had been under the rule of Aedilfrid, and in his turn drove out his sons, who, with many of the young nobles of their party, took refuge with the Scots of Dalriada or with the Picts. The eldest of the sons, Eanfrid, appears to have fled for protection to the king of the Picts; and the second, Osuald, who was then of the same age that Aeduin had been when he was expelled, went to the island of Iona, where Bede tells us he was instructed in the Christian faith and baptized by the seniors of the Scots. Aeduin, too, with his whole nation was converted to Christianity by Paulinus in the eleventh year of his reign. Bede classes Aeduin among the kings of the Anglic natives who possessed imperial authority, and he is the first of the Northumbrian kings to whom such power is attributed: he says that he ruled over all the people both of the Angles and the Britons who inhabit the island, and in another place, that none of the Angles before him had brought under subjection all the borders of Britain that were provinces either of themselves or the Britons.^[299] These expressions must not be taken literally, and are not altogether consistent with the similar statement with regard to his predecessor Aedilfrid, but they undoubtedly imply that he was one of the most powerful of the Northumbrian monarchs, and at least retained all the acquisitions of his predecessors, while he has left his name in one district, which shows that he had extended the limits of the Northumbrian kingdom in one direction at least. The oldest form of the name of Edinburgh is Edwinesburg,^[300] which leads us to infer that he had added the district from the Esk to the Avon at least, of which it was the chief stronghold, to his kingdom. The country extending from the river Avon to the range of the Lammermoor hills was called by the Saxons ‘Lothene,’ and by the Gael ‘Lethead,’ and appears also under the name of the province of Loidis, a name which was afterwards extended as far south as the Tweed.^[301]

The Irish annalists record in the year 627 the battle of Ardcorann, in which the Dalriads were victorious, and Fiachna, son of Deman, was slain by Conadh Cerr, king of Dalriada.^[302] Fiachna mac Deman was the king of the Cruithnigh of Dalaradia in Ireland, and the battle was probably fought in Ireland, Conadh Cerr, king of Dalriada, coming to the assistance of the Irish Dalriads; but Conadh Cerr was the son of Eochadh Buidhe, who was still alive, and he would appear to have transferred the throne of Dalriada to his son. The explanation will probably be found in the record of another battle fought two years afterwards, also in Ireland, called the battle of Fedhaeoin or Fedhaeuin. This battle was also fought between the Cruithnigh and the Dalriads, and the latter were defeated. On the side of the victors were Maelcaith mac Scandail, king of the Cruithnigh of Ulster, Dicuill mac Eachach, king of a tribe of Cruithnigh, and Eochadh Buidhe; and, on the other, Conad Cerr, king of Dalriada, and two grandsons of Aidan, who were slain.^[303] Eochadh Buidhe is here on the side of the Cruithnigh and opposed to two of his own sons, one of them leading the Dalriads; but the Annals of Ulster, quoting an old book called the Book of Cuanac, record the death of Eochadh Buidhe, king of the Picts, in the same year, and this corresponds with the length of his reign as given in the Albanic Duan, where a king of the Picts is mentioned who does not appear in the list of Pictish monarchs. The inference is that he was king of the Picts of Galloway, and it would appear that in the course of his reign Eochadh had either obtained authority over them or acquired a right to that province, and placed his son Conadh Cerr on the throne of Dalriada proper; and thus, when a war broke out between the Cruithnigh and the Dalriads of Ireland, the anomaly occurred of the father fighting on the one side with his Picts, and the sons with the Dalriads on the other.

On the death of Conadh Cerr in 629, his brother Domnall Breac succeeded him as king of Dalriada, while the rule over the Picts, which gave to Eochaidh Buidhe his title of king of the Picts, probably passed by the Pictish law of female succession to another family.

The death of Cinaeth mac Luchtren, king of the Picts, is recorded by Tighernac in 631,^[304] and he was succeeded by a family of three brothers, Garnaid, Bredei, and Talore, sons of Wid or Foith, who followed each other on the Pictish throne during the next twenty-two years. In the meantime a storm was gathering on the borders of Northumbria, which was soon to burst upon Aeduin and bring his powerful kingdom with his own life to an end. Among those British kings who had been subjected to the authority of the Northumbrian king was a king of the Britons termed by Bede ‘Caedwalla.’ He is described by Bede as a man who, though he bore the name and professed himself a Christian, was yet so barbarous in his disposition and behaviour that he spared neither women nor children in his wars.^[305] This British king resolved not only to throw off all subjection to Northumbria, but to cut off the whole nation of the Angles within the borders of Britain. He was enabled to attempt this enterprise by having secured the support of Penda, whom Bede calls a most warlike man, of the royal race of the Mercians,^[306] who had just ascended the throne of that nation. Penda and his whole nation were still pagans and idolaters, and probably viewed the establishment of Christianity as the religion of Northumbria with much hostility; and Caedwalla, though nominally a Christian, had all the hatred of the Welsh Church towards the Anglic Christians and their church, with whom they held no communication.

A great battle was fought between these leaders and Aeduin in a plain called by Bede Haethfeld, now Hatfield, in the West Riding of Yorkshire, on the 12th of October in the year 633, in which Aeduin was himself killed, and all his army either slain or dispersed. His son Osfrid also fell in the same war, and another son Eadfrid was obliged to go over to Penda.^[307] In the genealogies and chronicle attached to Nennius this battle is called the battle of Meicen, and both Osfrid and Eadfrid are said to have been slain in it; and it is added that none of Aeduin’s race escaped, and the victor is termed Catguollaun, king of Guenedotia or North Wales. Bede tells us that a great slaughter was made at this time of the church and nation of the Northumbrians, and the more so because one of the commanders by whom it was done was a pagan, and the other a barbarian more cruel than a pagan, and that the province of Deira fell on Aeduin’s death to Osric, son of his uncle Aelric, who was a Christian, being one of those whom Paulinus had converted; while Eanfrid, the eldest son of Aedilfrid, who had taken refuge on the accession of Aeduin with the Picts, and had there been instructed in the Christian religion by the Scottish monks, returned on Aeduin’s death to Bernicia and took possession of his father’s kingdom. We are told, however, by Bede that both kings, as soon as they obtained possession of their kingdoms, renounced their Christianity and returned to their former paganism, but were soon after slain by Caedwalla, who first surprised and killed Osric, who had besieged him in the city of York, and after having reigned for a year over the provinces of the Northumbrians, also killed Eanfrid, who came to him with only twelve soldiers to sue for peace, when he was probably advancing upon Bamborough. That year, adds Bede, is to this day looked upon as unhappy and hateful to all good men, as well on account of the apostasy of the Anglic kings who had renounced the sacraments of their faith, as of the outrageous tyranny of the British king.^[308]

After the death of Eanfrid, his brother Osuald advanced from the north with an army small indeed in number, as Bede tells us, but strengthened with the faith of Christ, and north of the Tweed, and encountered the army of the Britons, which was greatly more numerous, at a place near the Roman wall called in the Anglic tongue Devisesburn, where a complete victory was gained, and the impious commander of the Britons was slain. The field of battle, Bede tells us, was also called Hefenfelth, or the heavenly field, and was not far from Hexham, in the vale of the Tyne. It has been identified with a place called St. Osualds, close to the wall, and about seven or eight miles north of Hexham; and the British commander must have been driven across the wild moor on the south side of the wall through the Tyne, until he was overtaken at a distance of eight or nine miles from the battlefield, and slain at a little stream called Devisesburn, a tributary of the Rowley water. This battle is termed in the additions to Nennius the battle of Catscaul, and it has been well suggested that this name may be intended for Cad-ys-gual, the battle at the wall. It is somewhat remarkable that while Bede names Caedwalla whenever he has occasion to mention him, he does not name him as the commander who was slain at this battle. Adamnan, who was born in 624, and was therefore ten years old when the battle was fought, tells us that the day before the Saxon ruler Osuald went forth to fight Catlon, a very valiant king of the Britons, he saw Saint Columba in a vision, who told him to march out from his camp to battle the following night, when his foes would be put to flight and his enemy Catlon delivered into his hands; and that the next night King Osuald went forth from his camp to battle, and had a much smaller army than the numerous hosts opposed to him, yet he obtained an easy and decisive victory, for King Catlon was slain, and the conqueror on his return after the battle was ever after ordained by God emperor of all Britain. Adamnan adds that he had this narrative from the lips of his predecessor, the abbot Failbe, who solemnly declared that he had himself heard King Osuald relate it to the Abbot Segine.^[309] We can hardly have better evidence than this as to the events of the battle, whatever may be said as to the vision, and Tighernac likewise names Catlon, king of the Britons, as King Osuald’s opponent,^[310] but the name given to Caedwalla in recording the battle in which he slew King Aeduin was not Cathlon but Chon. In the Genealogies annexed to Nennius, Caedwalla is termed Catguollaun, king of Guenedotia, while King Osuald’s opponent is named Catgublaun, king of Guenedotia. It is therefore not impossible that the impious commander of Bede may not have been Caedwalla himself, and that there may be some truth in the account given in the Welsh Bruts that the Caedwalla, who slew Aeduin, survived for many years after; but this is not a matter which much affects our narrative so far as it concerns the history before us.

About the same time the family of that Nectan, king of the Picts, who had been dispossessed in 612 seem to have made an effort to recover the throne, for the Annals of Inisfallen have in 634 the death of Aengus, son of Nechtan, and Tighernac records in 635 the battle of Seguise, in which Lochene, son of Nechtan Cennfota, and Cumuscach, son of Aengus, fell. These names are purely Gaelic forms, and ‘Cennfota’ is a Gaelic epithet, meaning long-headed. The Annals of Ulster have the death of Gartnait, son of Foith, in the same year, and say he fell in this battle, which seems to leave little doubt that it was a contest for the throne.^[311] The battle was probably fought on the west bank of the Tay, a few miles above Dunkeld, at a place now called Dalguise; and on the east side of the river, immediately opposite that place, a cairn once stood about thirty feet in diameter, which contained a single stone coffin, and near it two high upright stones, while at a small distance from the cairn were found a few rude stone coffins. These may have been memorials of the battle. Gartnaidh was succeeded by his brother Bredei, son of Uid or Foith.

In the same year in which the battle was fought which placed Osuald on the throne of Bernicia, Domnall Breac, king of the Scots of Dalriada, appears to have made an attempt to wrest the district between the Avon and the Pentland Hills from the Angles,—whether as having some claim to it through his grandfather Aidan, or, what is more probable, as a leader of the Britons, but was defeated at Calathros,^[312] or Calatria, now Callander—a name applied to a small district between the Roman wall and the Avon; and Bede, who ranks Osuald after Aeduin among those who held imperial authority in Britain, tells us that he held the kingdom within the same boundaries.^[313]

Cummen the Fair, who was abbot of Iona from 657 to 669, tells us in his Life of Saint Columba, which is still preserved, that, when the saint inaugurated Aidan as king of Dalriada, and placed his hands upon his head, and blessed him, he prophesied of his sons, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, thus addressing him:—‘Believe unhesitatingly, O Aidan, that none of thy enemies shall be able to resist thee, unless thou first act unjustly towards me and my kin. Wherefore exhort thy sons with these words, lest they lose the kingdom,’ which, he adds, took place, for they transgressed the injunction of the man of God, and lost the kingdom. Adamnan, who is also a contemporary authority for the events of this period, quotes this passage, somewhat amplifying it, and adds—‘Now this prophecy hath been fulfilled in our own times in the battle of Roth, in which Domnall Breac, the grandson of Aidan, ravaged without the slightest provocation the territory of Domnall, the grandson of Ainmuireg; and from that day to this (between 690 and 700) they have been trodden down by strangers.’^[314] The battle termed by Adamnan, Roth, was the battle of Magh Rath, fought in 637 between Domnall, son of Aed, king of Ireland, and Congal Claen, king of Uladh, that is of the Cruithnigh of Dalaradia, and appears to have been a great struggle between the Cruithnigh and kindred tribes with the dominant Scots of the race of Hy Neill. Congal Claen applied for assistance both to the Britons and to the king of Scottish Dalriada, and was supported by a large auxiliary force. His claim upon Domnall Breac arose probably from the connection of his father, Eochadh Buidhe, with the Picts, and the gravamen of the charge against the Dalriadic king was that, by the settlement at the convention of Drumceatt, the hostings and expeditions of Scotch Dalriada were to belong to the king of Ireland, and by ranging himself on the side of the Cruithnigh against him, he not only violated that condition, but assailed the head of the family to which Saint Columba belonged.^[315]

In the following year Domnall Breac seems to have made another attempt to wrest the territory between the Avon and the Pentlands from the Angles; and Tighernac records in 638 the battle of Glenmairison, or Glenmureson, which is probably the small stream now called the Mureston Water which flows from the Pentlands into the Linhouse Water near Midcalder, in which his people were put to flight, and the siege of Edinburgh.^[316] During these wars there appears to have been hitherto a combination of the Britons of Alclyde and the Scots of Dalriada against the Angles and the Pictish population subject to them. It was, in fact, a conflict of the western tribes against the eastern, and of the Christian party against the pagan and semi-pagan, their common Christianity forming a strong bond of union between the two former nations, and after the death of Rhydderch Hael in 603 the Dalriadic kings seem to have taken the lead in the command of the combined forces. Rhydderch, we are told, but on no better authority than that of Jocelyn of Furness in the twelfth century, was succeeded by his son Constantine; but the throne of Alclyde had by this time passed to another branch of the same family, and from whatever cause it arose, a breach now took place between the Britons and the Scots, and we find the British king and the king of Dalriada in a hostile position to one another, and brought into violent conflict, which ended in the fate which Saint Columba predicted for any descendant of King Aidan who should attack |A.D. 642. Domnall Brecc slain in Strathcarron.| the head of the house of Hy Neill overtaking Domnall Breac, who, in December in the year 642, was slain in the upper valley of the river Carron, which was known afterwards as the forest of Strathcawin, by Oan, king of the Britons, in the fifteenth year of his reign.^[317] Dalriada seems to have fallen into a state of anarchy on the death of Domnall Breac. During the remainder of this century we find no descendant of Aidan recorded bearing the title of king of Dalriada; and it is probable, from Adamnan’s remark that from that day to this they have been trodden down by strangers, that the Britons now exercised a rule over them.^[318]

The same year which saw Domnall Breac slain in Strathcarron likewise brought Osuald’s reign over Northumbria to a disastrous end. His first effort, on finding himself firmly seated on the throne, had been to re-establish the Christian Church in his dominions, and to drive back the flow of paganism and apostasy which had overspread the country. He naturally turned to the form of Christianity in which he had been educated, and sent to the elders of the Scots, desiring them to send him a prelate who might instruct the nation of the Angles once more in the Christian faith, and ere long received Bishop Aidan from them for this purpose. The account of this mission belongs more to the History of the Early Christian Church in Scotland, and will be there more fully noticed. It is sufficient for our present purpose to say that his episcopal seat was fixed in the island of Lindisfarne, which the king gave him for the purpose. ‘From that time,’ says Bede, ‘many came from the region of the Scots into Britain, and preached the Word to those provinces of the Angles over which King Osuald ruled, and they among them who had received priests’ orders administered the sacrament of baptism. Churches were built. The people joyfully flocked to hear the Word. Possessions and lands were given of the king’s bounty to build monasteries. The Anglic youth were instructed by their Scottish masters, and there were greater care and attention bestowed upon the rules and observance of regular discipline. Most of those that came to preach,’ adds Bede, ‘were monks, and Bishop Aidan himself was a monk of the island called Hii,’ and now, corruptly, Iona.^[319]

Bede sums up his account of his reign by saying, ‘In short, he brought under his dominion all the nations and provinces of Britain, which are divided into four languages—namely, the Britons, the Picts, the Scots, and the Angles;’^[320] but this general expression must be taken as qualified by the statement Bede had previously made in contrasting him with the other Northumbrian kings in his enumeration of those who held imperial authority, that he had the same extent under his rule as his predecessor Aeduin, and it implies no more than that he had brought all the people within the then limits of the Northumbrian kingdom under his subjection, to whatever race they belonged. Bede, however, is stating a more definite result of his reign when he adds that, through his management, the provinces of the Deiri and the Bernicians, which till then had been at variance, were peacefully united and moulded into one people.