Volume 3 - Electric Scotland

44 HTSTORY OF THE WESTERN ISLANDS*
thirteen years of ag-e, whose mother was Fingala the
daughter of Lauchlin an Irish King, and the sister of
Dervorgilla of Galloway afterwards married to Baliol
together with Reginald and Ivor, who were natural chil-
dren. This name, Dervorgilla, by the bye, seems to
have both amused and puzzled Hailes, who gives various
spellings of it. It is simply Gaelic, Diormhorguill, and
is the representative of Dorothy. Eng'lish readers who
may chance to be interested in the Queen of Galloway,
may be told that the Gaelic mh is sounded v. Godred
had nominated Olave to succeed him; but, on account of
his youth, the people chose Reginald in 1188. In 1204,
Olave being then thirty years old, Reginald, suspicious
of his own security, did homage to John of England in
hopes, of eventual protection ;
and though there were no
other fact to show it, this is sufficient to prove that the
Isles had renounced their allegiance to Norway : by this
act at least, they did so. About the same time also, he
surrendered Lewis to Olave; who, expressing his dis-
content at the barrenness of his territory, was imprisoned
under the custody of William of Scotland, but afterwards
liberated by Alexander the second in 1214.
Olave, being at liberty, proceeded to Mann, and then
to the court of John ; whence afterwards returning, he was
compelled by Reginald to marry Lavon, supposed by
some to be a daughter of Somerlid, by others a Lamont,
and was reinstated in the possession of Lewis. Regi-
nald had married into the same family ; having a son by
that connexion, named Godred, and a daughter whose
name is unknown. Olave's marriage was however an-
nulled by the Church, and he then married a daughter
of the Earl of Ross, who is called Ferquard by some, by
others, Mac an Tagart. This is the first connexion which
appears between the Kings of the Isles and the Earldom
;