The Highlanders of Scotland - Clan Strachan Society

CHAP. VII] OF SCOTLAND 305
look to other quarters for the early occupiers of this division of
the territories of that tribe.
The first families that can be traced as in possession of this
part of Moray are those of Bisset, a family unquestionably of
Norman origin, and of Thirlstain, certainly a Lowland, if not a
Norman family, and there can be little doubt that they
acquired this district from Malcolm IV. in 1160, when we know
that he planted a great part of Moray with strangers. The
oldest authorities for this fact, however, are equally distinct, that
he removed the old inhabitants and placed them in other parts
of the country, for which purpose the crown lands must have
been principally employed. It is, therefore, extremely probable,
that those clans of Mora}- descent which we find at an early
period in districts the most remote from their original seat,
formed a part of the inhabitants of this district whom Malcolm
IV. removed.
To them the Macnachtans certainly belonged, for their
genealogy indicates a Moray descent, while their traditions
place them at a very early period
in the crown lands of
Strathtay.
There is one remarkable circumstance regarding this clan,
which is, that while the other clans can generally be traced to
have previously formed a part of some greater sept, the
Macnachtans at a very early period appear in the same independent
state in which they existed at a late period, and also, that
they continued without preceptible
increase or diminution of
strength. Their earliest possessions, which they have always
maintained, although thev afterwards held them of the earl of
Argyll, extended betwixt the south side of Lochfine and Lochawe,
and included the glens of Ara and Shira, Glenfine, and
others, while their ancient seat, the castle of Dunduraw, shews
that they must at one time have possessed considerable power.
They probably obtained these properties from Alexander II., on
his conquest of Argyll in 1221, and must as crown vassals have
formed a part of his army, to whom the forfeited lands were
principally given. The MS. of 1450 deduces them through a
long line of ancestors from Nachtan Mor, who, according to that
authority, must have flourished in the tenth century ; but the
first chief of the family occurring in this genealogy, whose age we
U