In the sale catalogue of
the Abertarff books and papers, which were disposed of at Inverness
towards the close of last autumn, I was attracted by the entry, “
Contract of friendship, Alexander Lord Lovat and John Chisholm, John
Mackenzie, and Kenneth Mackenzie, 2nd May 1549 and having given a
commission for the purchase of this document, I became the possessor of
a rather torn and ragged half sheet of foolscap, which was folded and
endorsed “Contract of mutuall frendship betwix my Lord Louat and Jone
M'Kenze of Kintaill.” Internally the writing was in good preservation,
except where the paper was torn ; but it contained some words in which
the characters and abbreviations were almost illegible. As illustrative
of the state of society in the Highlands in the middle of the 16th
century, it may have an interest for the Gaelic Society of Inverness,
one of whose objects is to rescue from oblivion manuscripts bearing on
the history of the Gaelic people. The document, which, so far as I am
aware, has not hitherto been published, is as follows :—
“At Bewling ye second day
of may in ye yeir of God ane thousand vc and xlix yiers it is appointit
aggreit ife fynale endit betwex ane nobill & potent lord Alexander Lord
frayser of Louet Johne Chessolm of Comer on ye tane part and Joline
M'Kenze of Kyntaill and Kennocht M'Kenze his sone and apperand ayr on ye
toyr part in maner form and effect as eftr followis, that is to say ye
sayd Johne M‘Kenze of Kyntaill and Kennocht M'Kenze his sone hes bundin
and oblist yam sellHs be ye faytht and treutht in yair bodeis ye haly
ewangelist tucheit corporly that yai sail defend matayne & tak afald pt
wt ye sayd Lord frayser of Louet and Johne Ohessolm of Comer in yair
querellis quhat sumeuyr in contrar all mortall man ye authorite my Lord
of huntlie ye Erie of Suthyrland & James Grant of Fruquhy allanerly
exceppit And in lykwyss ye sayd Lord frayser & Johne Chessolm of Comer
hes bundin & oblist yam selffis be ye faytht and treutht in yr bodeis ye
haly ewangelist tucheit corporly yat yai sail defend matayne and tak
afald pt wt ye sayde Johne Mckenze and Kennocht his sone in contrar all
man mortall ye authorite my lord of hunt-lye & ye lard of Balnagowyn
allanerle exceppit and yis band of kyndnes mayd becauss of ye tendyrnes
& kyndnes qlk hes beyne abefoyr betwex or forbears ; and [for observing
?] and keeping and fulfilling of yis or band of kyndnes ye sayd Johne
McKenze and Kennocht my sone hes subscribit and selit our part hereof to
remane interchengeble wt ye sayd Lord frayser and Johne Chessolm. At
Bewling the yeir day effoyr wretin before yir wytness Hewehon Symson off
Brigend Alexander Bayne and Sir Wylleam Dow chaplane wt wderis diueress.
And in lykwss ye sayds pteis abune wretin hes bundin &, oblist yair kyn
freynds [and serwands ?] in maner form as is abune wretin.
“Johne McKenze of Kyntail
wt my hand led at ye pen
“Kennocht McKenze wt my hand led at ye pen.”
Bonds of this nature seem
to have been not uncommon at the period when the above contract was
entered into. Law received but doubtful recognition, or at least its
rule was too frequently superseded by that of might; and men who could
not rely on their own strength as sufficient for their protection were
glad to purchase the support of their more powerful neighbours, or
exemption from their ill-will, or to strengthen the bonds of alliance
with their kinsmen and friends. There seem to have been at least three
distinct classes of bonds employed for these purposes.
(1) There were bonds of
assurance in which one man undertook not to molest another. Thus, on
22nd October 1527, Hector Mackintosh, Captain of the Clan Chat tan,
assures Ewen Alan son, Captain of the Clan Cameron, “ hymeself, his kyne,
party, purcheis and enyrdance, his & thare landis, gudis purcheis and
enyrdance” up to “ye fest of St Anclrow nixt to come.” We may feel
pretty sure that Ewen Alanson would need to keep good watch after the
feast of St Andrew, the 30th of November following, hut this bond
secures him forty night’s of peaceful sleep, so far at least as the Clan
Chattan were concerned. Bonds of assurance were not always so limited in
point of time. In 1593 Hugh Rose of Ivilravock received2
a bond of assurance from Huntly securing him and his dependents against
molestation “ be ws, our army, kyn, freyndis or Allane McConill dw off
Locheall, Alexr. Mc-Rennald of Gargawche, our dependaris, their
serwandis, depen-daris or awaitteris wpoune thame, in ony maner of way
and this assurance was to hold good till recalled.
(2) Another class of
protective bond was that of manrent given by inferiors to superiors,
under which protection was stipulated for, in return for a life-long
obligation of military service. This seems to have been very commonly
resorted to. It must not be supposed that all bonds of manrent were of
this nature. Tn some the obligation was for menial service, and the
stipulated return was a mere matter of wages. There has been preserved a
bond of this kind in which Thomas Davidson binds himself with a servant,
to serve Hugh Rose of Kilravock as a gardener for a year, and thereafter
if it pleases Kilravock for the rest of his life, receiving therefor
during the first year meat for himself and his servant, and four pennies
each working day, with a fee of one mark for the servant for the year,
and also a chamber to lodge in ; thereafter Kilravock, if he retains
him, is to build him a house and give him such wages as are usually
given to men of his craft. Four pennies a day, or two shillings Scots
for six days work, is twopence of our money as weekly wage, while the
servant’s annual fee was but Is. ljd. The special feature of bonds of
manrent, whether the obligations undertaken were of military or menial
service, appears to be that they bound for life to a state of vassalage.
They seem to be, indeed, a relic of slavery or serfdom, the manrent
service being even assignable.
When Sir Jno. Campbell,
brother to Colin, 3rd Earl of Argyll, made good his claim in right of
his wife, Lady Muriel Calder, to the Cawdor estates, he found himself
far from home and friends. Sheriff Nicolson, quoting Gregory, gives the
proverb, “Is fada an eubh o Loch Obha, ’us cobhair o Chlann O’Duibhne,”
as having originated at a battle in Glenlivat between Huntly and Argyll
in 1594. But in the book of the Thanes of Cawdor, where the proverb is
given thus, “ S’ fhada glaodh o Lochow ; s’ fhada cobhair o chlann
dhoaine ” [the last word evidently misspelt], it is said to have
originated in a contest for the possession of the person of Lady Muriel
Calder in 1500. Campbell of Inverliver had been sent by Archibald, 2nd
Earl of Argyll, to take the child from her maternal grandfather at
Kilravock, and bring her to Inveraray, Argyll and Kilravock having
obtained a gift of tutors dative to her, and Argyll having the ward of
her marriage. Inverliver was opposed by two of her uncles, Alexander and
Hugh Calder, who overtook him with a superior party at Daltul'lich, and,
pressing him to fight, caused him to utter the ejaculation which has
passed into a proverb. Whichever story is true, whether the proverb
originated before or after Sir John Campbell’s time, there can be little
doubt that the idea it expresses, a sense of imminent danger, and of
distant relief, might very well have been uppermost in the knight’s mind
as he took possession of his wife’s heritage. It was in these
circumstances that his brother, the Earl of Argyll, assigned to him in
the year 1522,t “ the manrent and seruice of our traist frendis, and
seruandis Alexander McAllane McRoyri and Donald Gromach McDonald Gallach
and all thar kyne frendis and seruandis that dependis one them, etc.”
Such an assignation, though rare, is said by Mr Cosmo Innes to be “not
without parallel.” When bonds of manrent were given by considerable
personages, they may sometimes have been compelled to do so by the
pressure of circumstances ; but quite as frequently such bonds had a
commercial character, and were given as a quid pro qud, a return for
gifts of land or other favours. The bond of the Grants in 1546, which is
cited in the footnote, J was given by them in consideration of their
having been infeft in liferent by Huntly in “ his sex dawachs of his
landis of Strathoune .... with the forest and glen of Glenawne, and
keping of the hous and for-talice of Drummyne, togidder with the
bailliorye of the lorschipe of Strathoune,” and similarly in 1550 the
Laird of Fowlis gives his bond of manrent to Huntly “ for the quhilk (he
says) the said nobill and mychty Lord hes giffen me his bond of
mantenans, togidder with the sume of foarte pundis wsuall ruone of
Scotland to be payit yeirlie induring the said space of ray liftyme.”
There are many bonds extant approaching in character those of manrent,
but in which the obligation is not expressly stated to be for life. They
are generally between persons more nearly of equal station, and they may
be met with, shading imperceptibly into deeds of the next class.
(3) This third class of
protective bond is that between friends and equals, of which the
transcript from the Abertarff papers is a fair specimen. The chief of
Kintail and his son, who were parties to it, are also parties to a much
more formal agreement of a similar kind* between them, and Campbell of
Cawdor, Grant of Fruquhy, and Ross of Balnagown. This agreement, which
is entered into at the Chanonry of Ross January 15-45, contains a
provision that if any of the parties fail in fulfilling their part
thereof, the remainder shall take part against “ the brekar fray their
consall.” It is difficult to understand by what other sanctions such a
contract could have been enforced. A bread) of its covenants could
hardly have formed the ground of a civil action, not to mention that the
very fact of such agreements been made, presupposed a state of society
in which submission to law was uncertain. In the case of the contract
between Lovat, Chisholm, and Kintail, which has been the foundation for
these remarks, the covenant is affirmed with an oath on “ the haly
ewangel,” a disregard of which might perhaps have been dealt with
ecclesiastically. In 1570 Lord Lovat and Huntly entered into a contract
of friendship! for the enforcement of which there is neither oath nor
any other visible provision beyond the sanction which mutual interest
supplied. Lovat wanted a feu farm of “ the landis k names of Beowlyne
with the salmond fischeing thereof,” etc., and Huntley’s influence is
promised to obtain this for him from the Abbot of Kinloss. On the other
hand, Huntly, who belonged to Queen Mary’s party, had to maintain his
position in the North against Lennox, who had been appointed Regent by
Elizabeth, and wanting all the support he could get, he secures Lovat’s
aid by this agreement.
On the face of the
contract between Lovat and Chisholm “on the tane part,” and the two
Mackenzies “on the toyr,” there is nothing to show why it was entered
into, nor does tradition or history so far as I am aware mention any
special circumstance which called for a strengthening of alliances on
the borders of Ross and Inverness at that particular juncture; and I am
inclined to suppose that it may have been with some view of avenging his
clan on the Macdonalds, with whom the Mackenzies had a hereditary feud,
that Alexander Lord Lovat entered into this agreement. He was the son of
Hugh, the fifth Lord, who with his eldest son by his first wife Ann
Grant of Freuchy, and with most of his clan, fell in tight with the
Macdonalds at the Battle of Blar na Leinne, on Loch-Lochy in 1544. Sir
Robert Gordon says that 300 of the blood and surname of Fraser were
killed at this battle, and there wes a rumor spred that there wes not
one of the familie left alyve that was of manes state. Bot it happened
by the singular benefite of God, that they left their wyffs with chyld
when they went to the feight : by which meanes that familie wes
afterwards raised and restored.” But as yet five years only had elapsed
: the Frasers who, in the interval, had come to man’s estate could not
have been very numerous, and their Chief might be willing enough to
strengthen himself by alliances whether for defence or for vengeance.
Another explanation of
this contract may be that it was a token of reconciliation between Lovat
and Kintail. Hugh, Master of Lovat, who had been killed at Loch-Lochy,
was a son of Ann Grant of Freuchy, and tradition says was left at home
intentionally by his father, who did not wish his life endangered. But
stung by the taunts of his step-mother, Janet Ross of Balnagown, who
wished the succession opened to her own son (the Lovat of this
contract), the Master followed his father, and with him lost his life.
It might very well be, therefore, that the Grants of Freuchy felt some
coldness towards the young Lovat and his mother. John Mackenzie of
Kintail was married to one of these Grants (a daughter of John, the
tenth laird, says the historian of the Mackenzies), and if so a sister
of the deceased Anne Lady Lovat, and aunt of Hugh, who was the victim of
his stepmother’s taunts. There was thus a reason for coldness between
the two families of Lovat and Kintail, which were, nevertheless, closely
allied by blood—John of Kintail’s mother having been a daughter of Hugh,
3rd Lord Lovat; and it is not unnatural to suppose that as this contract
was “ made because of the tenderness and kindness which has been before
betwixt our forbears,” so it bore witness to the close of a temporary
estrangement.
This would seem to be the
most reasonable explanation, were it not for the introduction of
Chisholm as a party to the deed. I have been unable to trace any near
connection by blood between him and either Lovat or Kintail, and though
there had been early alliances between their families, 1 think lie must
have been here conjoined with Lovat, rather because his lands, lying
interspersed among those of the Frasers, the interests of the two
families as regards defence from aggression were inseparable. The
contract thus receives the colour of a defensive alliance rather than
that of a deed of reconciliation. It may have been both ; and the
reservation by the Mackenzies of their freedom in the case of quarrel
between Lovat and Grant, shows that if there had been a reconciliation
between these families, doubts were felt as to its permanence.
The reservations made by
each of the parties to the contract are not without interest. Both admit
a prior allegiance to “ye authorite,” i.e. the Crown, and to “my Lord of
Huntlie.” Huntly was at this time Chancellor of the Kingdom and Earl of
Moray, and at a previous time had been her Majesty’s Lieutenant-General
for the North of Scotland; but “ye authorite” having been alieady “exceppit,”
it is evident that Huntly here stands for himself, and not for the
Crown. AVhen during the Queen’s minority, he held the Lieutenancy of the
Northern parts of Scotland, he had obtained a general bond from the
nobility and barons of the North,* pledging them to obedience, and to
maintenance of the law, and among the names attached to it are those of
Lovat, Chisholm, and John Mackenzie of Kintail. Possibly this bond was
regarded as one personal to Huntly, but unless his distinctive qualities
and hereditary position had secured for him the attachment of the
Highland Chiefs, one can hardly suppose that it would have been long
regarded as of perpetual obligation.
The Mackenzies further
exempt from their part of the agree ment the Earl of Sutherland and
Grant of Freuchy. The cause for this last has been already mentioned,
and Kintail was bound by a bond of manrent of 1545 to the Earl of
Sutherland.
On his part, besides the
Crown and Huntly, Lovat only excepts from the contract his mother’s
relative, the Laird of Balnagown.
The document, signed by
the Mackenzies, is described as “ our part hereof,” showing that there
was a counterpart signed by Lovat and Chisholm to remain -with the
Mackenzies. Neither John nor Kenneth Mackenzie could write their own
names, a rather unusual circumstance in persons of their degree at that
period.
In a deed, cited by Mr
Fraser-Mackintosh, of the 9th August 1550, we find the names of the
witnesses Hugh Simsonne and William Dow, and we learn that Brigend was
Easter Kinmylies, near Inverness.
Perhaps some members of
the Society may know where the Brig stood. In a document of this sort
there is some interest in filling up local details, and a local
association is peculiarly fitted for doing it; but it is as illustrating
the nature of social relations in Inverness-shire three centuries ago,
that I have brought this interesting contract of friendship under the
notice of the Gaelic Society of Inverness; and I hope it may be
considered a not unsuitable contribution to the Society’s Transactions. |