The Highlanders of Scotland - Clan Strachan Society

256 THE HIGHLANDERS [part ii
CHAPTER V.
The Gm.l.c,\^i.'~(continued).
Atho II.
The district of Atholl unquestionably formed, from the very
earliest period, one of the principal possessions of the powerful
and extensive tribe of the Gallgael ; but it possesses peculiar
claims to our attention from the fact, that it is the earliest
district in Scotland which is mentioned in history, and that it
has, from a remote period, preserved its name and its boundaries
unaltered. Its principal interest, however, arises from the strong
presumption which exists, that the family which gave a long line
of kings to the Scottish throne, from the eleventh to the four-
teenth century, took their origin from this district, to which they
can be traced before the marriage of their ancestor with the
of Malcolm II. raised them to the throne of Scotland.
daughter
When Thorfinn. the earl of Orkney, conquered the North of
Scotland, the only part of the territory of the Northern Picts
which remained unsubjected to his power was the district of
Atholl and part of Argyll. The king of the Gallgael was slain
in the unsuccessful attempt to preserve the Isles, and the king of
the Scots, with the whole of his nobility, had fallen in the short
but bloody campaign which laid the North of Scotland under
the Norwegian earl.
Had any of the Scottish nobility remained, of sufficient
power to offer the least resistance to the progress
of the Nor-
wegians, there can be little doubt that he would naturally have
been placed on the throne ; but in the disastrous condition to
which the Scots were reduced, they had recourse to Duncan, the
son of Crinan, abbot of Dunkeld, by the daughter of Malcolm,
the last Scottish king. Duncan, after a reign of six years, was
slain in an attempt to recover the northern districts from the