INTRODUCTORY
In the rush and hurry of this twentieth century, the present generation find themselves so fully occupied with their own contemporaries, that for the most part they can take little or no interest, even in their own immediate predecessors, still less in their progenitors of old generations.
But we, who were born before life’s unsatisfying rush became so great, still like to gather up the traditions of bygone years, and in fancy see our own “forbears” as we know them to have been long ago.
As a daughter of the Chief of Clan Cumming, my home was, of course, at Altyre, in Morayshire, i.e. at headquarters—a goodly heritage in truth, and yet a mere fragment of the vast possessions of the Clan in the days of its power. With regard to antiquity, it is said that the Cummings of Altyre are directly descended from the Counts de Comyn who were directly descended from Charlemagne. Robert, who was fifth in descent, was created Earl of Northumberland by his cousin, William the Conqueror. He was killed in Durham in January 1069. Besides broad lands in Northumberland, his family held estates in Yorkshire and Wiltshire. From him the old knights of Altyre (who were also Lords of Badenoch) prove direct descent in the male line.
In the reign of Alexander III. the Comyns were also Earls of Buchan, Earls of Menteith, Lords of Galloway, and Lords of Lochaber, owning vast tracts of country. And besides these great barons, there were then thirty landed knights in the Clan.
Of the Red Comyn who (while alone at prayer in Greyfriars Church in Dumfries) was stabbed in sudden passion by Robert Bruce and murdered by Kirkpatrick, it is recorded that sixty belted knights, with all their vassals, were bound to follow his banner. But in that sacred and unguarded hour, only his uncle, Robert Comyn of Altyre, was near, and shared his fate.
The spelling of surnames in ancient documents is always liable to variation, but probably no other has lent itself so largely to the fancy of scribes. In one old charter of the Altyre family it is spelt in five different ways. Cumeine, Chuimein, Commines, Cumyn, Comyn, Comin, Coming, Cumin, Cummine, Cuming, and the modern form of Cumming, are among these varieties.
The Clan is spoken of by various old writers as the most potent that ever existed in Scotland; and a quaint old atlas, published in Amsterdam in 1654 by Jean Blaeu, quotes a somewhat older Latin work by Sir Robert Gordon of Stralloch, concerning
“Altyr, qui appartenoit à ceux de la maison de Cumines qui estoit, il y a plus de trois cens ans, la plus riche, et la plus puissante de l’Ecosse.”
How it came to pass that this powerful family should, so quickly after the accession of Robert Bruce, have been reduced to the comparatively small proportions of later years, is one of the unsolved mysteries of Scottish history.