The Highlanders of Scotland - Clan Strachan Society

CHAP. VII] O F S C O T L A N D 109
originated ; and it is in fact one which seems naturally to have
arisen from the form of their society, which rendered it a matter
of such vital importance to secure the lineal succession of their
chiefs. It is perhaps not improbable that it was this peculiar
custom which gave rise to the report handed down by the
Roman and other historians, that the ancient inhabitants of
Great Britain had their wives in common, or that it was the
foundation of that law in Scotland b}' which natural children
and as this custom
became legitimized by subsequent marriage ;
remained in the Highlands until a very late period, the sanction
of ancient custom was sufficient to induce them to persist in
regarding the offspring of such marriages as legitimate.^ It
naturally followed that when the feudal law was introduced, it
came, in this point, to be directly opposed to the Highland law,
and must have frequently occasioned the lineal and legitimate
heir, according to Highland principles, to be looked upon as a
bastard by the government, and according to their rules as
incapable of succeeding ; and thus arose many of those disputes
about succession and chiefship which embroiled so many families
with each other and with the government. But it must always
be kept in mind that the Highlanders themselves drew a very
strong distinction between bastard sons and the issue of these
handfast unions, whom they considered legitimate, and that they
rigorously excluded from succession of an)^ sort the illegitimate
offspring.
Having thus given a short view of the principal peculiarities
which distinguished the constitution and laws of the Highlanders
from those of other nations, it becomes proper that we should in
some degree complete the sketch b\- a cursory examination of
the gradation of ranks which appears to have existed
o/ranks°° among them, and these we must, in the same manner
as the law of succession, regard in two points of view ;
first, in reference to their relation to property or the land of which
^ As late as the sixteenth century becaus, as he alleged, his mother wns
the issue of a handfast marriage handfasted and financed to his
claimed the earldom of Sutherland. father ;'" and his claim was i^om^/^^ off
Alexander Sutherland claimed the by Sir Adam Gordon, who had married
earldom "as one lawfullie descended Earl John's heiress.— Sir Kobert
from his father Earle John the third ; Gordon.