A System of Heraldry - Clan Strachan Society

OF FOUR-FOOTED BEASTS.
of Fife, took his surname from these lands. And, by our records, there is Qimc
de Abernethy, son of Hugh, in the reign of King William ; and amongst the wit-
nesses in the charters of King Alexander II. Laurentius de Abernetby and Reginaldus
de Abernethy are frequently to be met with. Haddington's Collections. I
have seen a' charter of Hugh de Abernethy, of the lands of Owrebenchery to William
de Federeth, exonering him and his heirs from making any appearance in his
Court for these lands. This charter was granted in the reign of Alexander III.
and the seal thereto appended was entire, having a lion rampant bruised with a
ribbon. In the reign of Robert I. Alexander de Abernethy, Dominus de eodeni,
(Sir Robert Sibbald's History of Fife) left behind him three daughters, co-heirs ;
Margaret, married to John Stewart, Earl of Angus, who got with her the barony
of Abernethy, Helen to Norman de Lindsay of Crawford, who got with her the
barony of Balinbrei.ch, and the third daughter Mary, was wife to Andrew Leslie
of Rothes, who with her got the barony of Downy in Angus. These three daughters
were the mothers of three great families, Earls of Angus, Rothes, and Craw-
ford, who have been in use to marshal the arms of Abernethy, as before blazoned,
with their own.
Of the male line of the family of Abernethy was ABERNETHY of Rothiemay.
Laurence Abernethy was created Lord of Parliament by King James II in the
year 1455, to be stiled Lord Abernethy in Rothiemay, amongst the Lords in Parliament
1464. In the Act of Revocation of King James III. is WILLIAM Dominus
de Abernethy of Rothiemay. He is a witness in that King's charter of the lands of
Corstorphin to Alexander Forrester. His successors were commonly stiled Lords
Abernethy of Salton, and carried quarterly, first and fourth Abernethy, as above ;
second and third argent, three piles, points conjoined in base, .gules, for Wishart;
supported by two falcons proper ; armed, chessed and belled or ; crest, a parrot
feeding on a bush of cherries proper : motto, Salus per Christum.
ALEXANDER, the last Lord ABERNETHY, died about the year 1669. He sold the
lands of Salton to Sir Andrew Fletcher ; but the honours of the Lord Salton devolved
to his nephew Sir Alexander Fraser of Philorth, in right of his mother, a
sister of the last Lord Salton, whose successors have been in use to quarter these
arms with their own : As afterwards.
The heir-male of the family was ALEXANDER ABERNETHY of Auchnacloich, whom,
it seems, the last Alexander Lord Abernethy, designed to have declared his heir
and successor, as by his missive letters to him and his wife, which I have seen ;
wherein he invites and persuades his cousin, Auchnacloich, to come to Edinburgh,
upon the account, as the words of the letters, that it is his conjunct interest with
his, he being the nearest of kin and name to him. But death soon after prevented
the effectuating any thing by Lord Alexander.
ALEXANDER ABERNETHY of Auchnacloich stands recorded in the Lyon Register,
descended of ABERNETHY Lord SALTON, carrying the arms of the Lord Salton, as
above, with a bordure for his difference. His son John Abernethy, now of Mayen,
as male representer of Abernethy Lord Salton, disuses the bordure, and makes
use of the principal arms of the name : with the crest and motto, as above.
The surname of GRAY in Scotland, as descended from the Greys of Wark in
Northumberland, carry the same arms, viz. gules, a lion rampant within a bordure
ingrailed argent. Of whom before.
M'DOWALL or M'DOUGALL, which I take to be the same, (the figures and tinctures
of their arms being all alike, and they themselves using the name promiscuously,)
is a very old Scots name, which they derive with their original, from
Dovall of Galloway, who lived about 230 years before the birth of our Saviour,
killed Nothatus the tyrant, the sixth King of Scotland, and established Reutherus,
who had the better right to the throne, as our historians tell us. Afterwards,
another Dowall, Captain of Galloway, with the Captain of Lorn, went into England
against the Romans in support of the Britons, and put a
stop to the Roman armies
in defence of their own country. Upon this account, Sir George Mackenzie ob-
serves, in his Science of Heraldry, p. 3. The M'Dowall bears the lion collared
with an antique crown.
The old Lords of GALLOWAY were of this name, and one of the most powerful
families in Scotland at that time. They built five abbacies and five priories, and