Somerled (d.1164): King of the Isles and Founder of the MacDonald Lordship

Each major claim carries one of three labels. established means supported by primary records, official bodies or several independent reliable sources. shared means the core fact is sound but sources disagree on details, dates or interpretation. traditional means widely repeated but not traceable to a primary or independent source.

Very little contemporary evidence survives. Somerled appears in short entries in the Chronicle of Holyrood and the Melrose Chronicle, in the Irish annals, in the Chronicle of the Kings of Man and the Isles (compiled in the thirteenth century), and in a Latin poem on his death written by a Glasgow cleric. No charter of his survives. Richard Oram warns that the sources for Argyll and the Isles in this period are "notoriously inaccurate in their chronology". Almost everything about his early life, his first marriage and the manner of his death comes from Clan Donald histories of the seventeenth century, written about five hundred years later.

Name and family

established Somerled's Gaelic name, Somairle, comes from the Norse Sumarliði, "summer traveller", a name often explained as a term for a seasonal raider. His father was Gillebrigte, son of Gille Adomnáin. The People of Medieval Scotland database, drawing on W. D. H. Sellar's entry in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, records that he was said to descend from Colla Uais, a legendary founder of the Airgíalla in the north of Ireland, through a Godfrey son of Fergus who was supposedly a contemporary of Kenneth mac Alpin.

shared Sellar, in a study of 1966, argued that the Clan Donald pedigree is credible for its later generations. The names Gillebrigte and Gille Adomnáin are confirmed by the annals, and he thought the line back to Godfrey son of Fergus, a ninth-century lord of the Isles in the Annals of the Four Masters, was plausible. He rejected the link to Colla Uais as a fiction. Later scholars, including Alex Woolf, have questioned whether the Four Masters' entries on Godfrey can be trusted. The ancestry before Gillebrigte remains uncertain.

shared Somerled's world was Norse-Gaelic. The Gall-Ghàidheil, the "foreign Gaels" of mixed Scandinavian and Gaelic culture, had dominated the western seaboard since the ninth century, and the kings of Man and the Isles, of Dublin and of Galloway all belonged to this mixed world. Oram stresses that Somerled should be seen in the tradition of Irish and Norse-Gaelic rulers who had fought for lordship in Ireland, the Isles and mainland Britain, rather than only in a Scottish setting.

shared A Y-chromosome study led by the Oxford geneticist Bryan Sykes, reported in 2005, found that a large share of men named MacDonald, MacDougall and MacAlister carried the same male-line marker, of Scandinavian origin, and concluded that Somerled's male ancestry was Norse. The finding depends on assuming that these men descend from Somerled and on small samples, but it fits the Norse-Gaelic picture rather than the tradition of a purely Gaelic hero.

Rise in Argyll

established Somerled's father Gillebrigte was building a power base in the peninsulas and sea lochs of the south-west Highlands in the 1120s. He married his daughter to Malcolm, Alexander I's illegitimate son, who claimed the throne against David I. Oram suggests the alliance was opportunism by an expanding Argyll ruler whose ambitions in the Clyde estuary collided with David's. David campaigned in the west by land and sea and secured recognition of his overlordship of Argyll by the mid-1130s. Malcolm was captured in 1134, and men of Lorn fought in David's army in 1138.

shared Oram does not say whether it was Gillebrigte or Somerled who made that submission. What is clear is that Somerled emerged as the dominant power in Argyll in the 1140s, under a Scottish overlordship that David I took seriously: in that decade David granted Holyrood Abbey a share of the renders due to him from Argyll and Kintyre.

traditional Clan Donald histories, notably the account of the Clanranald historians and Hugh MacDonald's seventeenth-century history of the MacDonalds of Sleat, say that Gillebrigte was driven out by the Norse and hid in a cave in Morvern, and that Somerled gathered the men of the district, defeated the Norse and recovered his ancestors' lands. Sellar thought the tradition credible in outline, in that Somerled did rise from relative obscurity, but not in its details. There is no contemporary evidence of a war of liberation against the Norse.

Marriage into the house of Man

established By about 1140 Somerled married Ragnhild, daughter of Óláfr I Guðrøðsson, king of Man and the Isles. Oram describes her as an illegitimate daughter and places the match among several marriage alliances Óláfr made with neighbouring rulers after David I extended his power into Argyll. Óláfr himself had been raised at the court of Henry I of England.

established The marriage was the foundation of Somerled's later claims. It made him the brother-in-law of Óláfr's son Guðrøðr and gave his sons a claim, through their mother, to the kingship of the Isles.

traditional Clan tradition gives Somerled an earlier wife, or partner, and a son called Gillecolm. The People of Medieval Scotland database records an illegitimate son, Gillebrigte, who died with his father at Renfrew; he may be the same person.

1153: the sons of Malcolm

established In 1153 Óláfr I was murdered by his nephews while his son Guðrøðr was in Norway. Guðrøðr returned within months and avenged him. In Scotland David I died in May 1153. According to the Chronicle of Holyrood, on 6 November 1153 "Somerled and his nephews, the sons of Malcolm", rose against Malcolm IV with many allies and disturbed much of Scotia.

shared Who the nephews were matters. They have often been identified as the sons of Malcolm MacHeth, later earl of Ross, and some reference works still say so. A. A. M. Duncan showed, and Oram agrees, that they were the sons of Malcolm son of Alexander I, who had married Somerled's sister and was then a prisoner at Roxburgh. Oram argues that the rising was a straightforward bid for the throne by a senior, though illegitimate, branch of the royal house, not a revolt of "Celtic conservatism".

established Little is known of the war. In 1156 the Holyrood chronicle records that Donald son of Malcolm was captured at Whithorn and imprisoned with his father. Oram suggests that by then Somerled had turned away from his nephews' cause towards a better prospect in Man.

The battle with Guðrøðr

established Guðrøðr's rule in Man and the Isles was unpopular. He had lost ships serving as a mercenary in Irish wars in 1154 and had failed in a bid to take Dublin. A group of Hebridean nobles, led by Thorfinn son of Ottar according to the Manx chronicle, turned to Somerled and proposed his son Dugald, Guðrøðr's nephew, as their king.

shared The two fleets met in a night battle at sea. The Chronicle of Man places it on the night of the Epiphany. Most accounts date it to 5–6 January 1156; Oram, reading the chronicle's dates differently, gives January 1157. The site is not known; the Sound of Islay and the waters west of Islay have been suggested. The fight was indecisive, and the kingdom was divided. Somerled and Dugald took most of the Inner Hebrides south of Ardnamurchan, including Mull, Islay and Jura, while Guðrøðr kept Man, Skye and the Outer Hebrides. The Manx chronicler lamented that so was the kingdom of the Isles ruined.

established In 1158 Somerled attacked Man again and drove Guðrøðr out. Dugald was now nominally king of a reunited kingdom of the Isles, but the Manx chronicler had no doubt that real power lay with his father. Guðrøðr went to England in September 1158 to seek Henry II's help, found the king gone to Normandy, appeared at Malcolm IV's court at Roxburgh early in 1159, where he witnessed Malcolm's great charter to Kelso, and finally went to Ingi, king of Norway. He did not return until after Somerled's death.

King of the Isles

shared What title Somerled held is uncertain. A Scottish chronicle called him regulus, kinglet, of Argyll in 1153. The Irish annals, recording his death, call him king of the Isles, and in some versions of Kintyre as well. Formally the kingship of the Isles belonged to his son Dugald, and the Isles remained under the nominal overlordship of the king of Norway. In practice Somerled ruled a sea kingdom stretching from Kintyre to the Minch and controlled Man from 1158.

established Somerled made peace with Malcolm IV in 1160. Malcolm had just defeated Fergus of Galloway, and a Scottish chronicle refers to his "federate enemies" in Galloway. Oram suggests this may mean an alliance between Fergus and Somerled. For Fergus the result was deposition; for Somerled, whose power lay beyond the reach of Scottish armies, it was only a return to the king's peace. G. W. S. Barrow showed that a royal charter of 1160 was dated by reference to that agreement.

Iona and the north of Ireland

established In 1164, according to the Annals of Ulster, Somerled and the community of Iona invited Flaithbertach Ua Brolcháin, abbot of Derry and head of the Columban monasteries in Ireland, to move to Iona and restore its leadership. The plan was blocked by Muirchertach Mac Lochlainn, king of Cenél nEógain and protector of Derry.

shared Oram reads the episode as evidence that Somerled aimed to make himself "leader of the Gael in the Isles and north of Ireland", and that his ambitions reached far beyond Argyll. His descendants continued the policy: his son Ranald is credited with founding the Benedictine abbey and the Augustinian nunnery on Iona around 1200, and Somerled's daughter Bethoc is recorded as the first prioress of the nunnery.

Renfrew, 1164

established In 1164 Somerled led a large army up the Firth of Clyde. The Irish annals say it came from Argyll, Kintyre, the Isles and Dublin. It landed near Renfrew. Oram notes that the Stewart lord Walter son of Alan, whose lordship lay there, was probably one target, and that by the early 1160s the eastern shore of the Clyde was lined with lordships held by the crown's greatest colonial lords, which pressed on Somerled's sphere. He suggests Somerled may have been encouraged by Malcolm IV's illness to think royal power was weak.

established Somerled was killed in a fight with local forces raised by the bishop of Glasgow and the sheriff of Lanark. One of his sons died with him. The People of Medieval Scotland database names this son as Gillebrigte.

shared The main account is the Carmen de morte Sumerledi, a Latin poem on Somerled's death written by a Glasgow cleric soon after the event. It credits the victory to St Kentigern and the prayers of Bishop Herbert of Glasgow, and claims that Somerled brought 160 ships. It is a celebration of the saint's protection of his church, not a neutral report, and its numbers cannot be relied on. It says Somerled fell early in the fight, wounded by a spear and cut down by a sword.

traditional Later Clan Donald histories, including the Sleat history of the seventeenth century, say Somerled was murdered in his tent by a treacherous kinsman bribed by his enemies, and that he had been reluctant to fight. No contemporary source mentions treachery. His burial place is unknown; tradition names Saddell in Kintyre or Iona.

established His sea kingdom fell apart at once. Guðrøðr returned from Norway with Norwegian help and recovered Man, and Somerled's sons divided his lands.

Saddell Abbey

shared The Cistercian abbey of Saddell in Kintyre is sometimes said to have been founded by Somerled. The People of Medieval Scotland database judges it more probably the work of his son Ranald. Somerled himself is better documented as a patron of the old Columban church at Iona than of the new reformed orders.

The sons of Somerled

established Somerled's lands were divided among his sons by Ragnhild. Dugald held the ancestral lands of Lorn and Mull and had been proclaimed king of the Isles in the 1150s; his descendants became the MacDougalls of Lorn and Argyll. Ranald held Islay, Jura and Kintyre and used the title king of the Isles. Angus held lands from Bute and Arran to Knoydart and the Uists.

established The brothers fought each other. Oram notes that there is no secure evidence for Dugald after 1175 and that Ranald may have encroached on his position. In 1192 Ranald and Angus fought a battle, which Angus won. In 1199 William the Lion granted Caithness to Ranald, who briefly took possession before Harald Maddadsson drove out his men. In 1210 Angus and his three sons were killed. Ranald's sons, Donald and Ruaridh, raided Skye in 1209 and northern Ireland in 1212 and 1214, the latter in alliance with Alan of Galloway's brother.

established Ranald's son Donald gave his name to the MacDonalds (Clann Domhnaill), based on Islay. Ruaridh's line became the MacRuairis of Garmoran. In the fourteenth century the MacDonalds absorbed most of the MacRuairi lands and took the title Lord of the Isles, which they held until the lordship was forfeited to the crown in 1493. The MacDougalls, led in the thirteenth century by Ewen, lord of Argyll, held their own lordship until they backed the losing side against Robert I.

Reputation

shared Somerled has been claimed as a Gaelic national hero who freed the west from the Vikings and as the founder of a Celtic resistance to the Scottish kings. Modern historians see him differently. Oram describes his later career as that of a man who saw himself as "a fully independent power" rather than a rebel, and places him alongside the Norse-Gaelic kings of Man and Dublin. R. Andrew McDonald's The Kingdom of the Isles (1997) treats him as the founder of a maritime lordship that lay between Scotland, Norway and Ireland. His achievement was real, but it was a sea kingdom won by marriage, war and opportunity, not a national cause.

• Somerled's name is Norse, from Sumarliði, "summer traveller".
• His sister was married to a son of Alexander I, and his nephews claimed the Scottish throne.
• He fought a night battle at sea on the feast of the Epiphany.
• He tried to move the headship of the Columban churches from Derry to Iona in 1164.
• The poem on his death credits the victory at Renfrew to St Kentigern, patron of Glasgow.
• Three great west Highland families, the MacDougalls, MacDonalds and MacRuairis, descend from his sons.
• His daughter Bethoc is recorded as the first prioress of the nunnery on Iona.

• Myth: Somerled was a Gaelic hero who drove the Vikings out of the west. He was a Norse-Gaelic ruler with a Norse name, married into the Norse royal house of Man, and his family ruled the Isles under nominal Norwegian overlordship.
• Myth: Somerled founded the Lordship of the Isles. The title was taken by his MacDonald descendants in the fourteenth century.
• Myth: the "sons of Malcolm" who rose with him in 1153 were the MacHeths. They were the sons of Malcolm, illegitimate son of Alexander I, and Somerled's own nephews.
• Disputed: the year of the sea battle with Guðrøðr. Most accounts give January 1156; Oram gives January 1157.
• Disputed: his ancestry. The Clan Donald pedigree back to Godfrey son of Fergus has been defended by Sellar and questioned by others; the descent from Colla Uais is legendary.
• Disputed: how he died. The contemporary Glasgow poem says he fell in battle; later clan histories say he was murdered by a kinsman.
• Disputed: who founded Saddell Abbey. It is attributed to Somerled, but more probably to his son Ranald.