Niven: Check out the article by
Karen Mathieson which is on the web page associated with this list or the
version reproduced in the most recent issue of Roslin O'
Roslin. It is the best thing I've seen yet on the
MacNokaird/Sinclair diad and extraordinarily strongly researched
piece. The Armada story I have heard in several different contexts
from the explanation of deValera to the complexion of the Black
Irish. I would tend to give that explanation a
pass.
Whilst looking for some information on an unrelated subject, I came across the following on Sinclair
septs and although I know there has been considerable discussion about the Sinclairs of Argyll, the
following may be of some interest: Rory,
I wonder if we should give it a pass?
Of the 18 Scots who escaped being massacred at Kringen, they settled in the area and their descendants
are still there!! The place-names of the farms in the Otta District (where Malcolm and I were the guests
of honour recently) are testimony to the proof of their residence. They are still intensely proud of their
Scottish descent although the Scots who accompanied Colonel George Sinclair were themselves of
Viking descent. The wheel had turned full circle.
Where would those Spanish sailors, who managed to save themselves, have gone to?
Another Spanish galley, the el Gran Grifon, was wrecked off Shetland and the crew saved by the intervention
of Malcolm Sinclair of Quendale. (Shades of Prince Henry with the Zeno galley?)
Thank you for the information on the MacNokairds. I'll look that up.
In haste,
Niven
CLAN SINCLAIR SEPTS
(1) Caird - the Cairds (Clann-na-ceairde) including both of that name and the romantic 'Romany'
Gypsies of Scotland are reckoned as a sept of the Sinclair Clan. The name signifies (Gaelic ceard or craftsman) a worker in metals*.
The name has appeared in various forms such as Macnecaird, MacNokerd, MacIncaird, etc.
- most frequently on the borders of Argyll and Perthshire.
MacBain remarks on the Cairds (Sinclairs) as follows:
"In the course of inflection the name, Sinclair, when borrowed into Gaelic, as it stands, becomes 'Tinkler' pronounced like Scotch 'tinkler', a caird, and, in looking about for a suitable equivalent or translation for M'Na Cearda, the popular fancy hit upon what was at once a translation and an equivalent M'Na-Cearda translated into Scotch Tinkler, and passed by a law of Gaelic phonetics into Sinclair (Ma-an-t-Sinclair)
(2) Clyne - as far back as 1561 the Sutherlands of Berriedale were dispossessed by the Earl of Caithness in consequence of their cruel treatment of the Clynes, dependents of the Caithness family, several members of the former having been killed by the Sutherlands.
(3) Gallie - Gunns from Caithness who settled in Ross in the seventeenth century were locally termed na Gallaich - the Caithness men. They would appear to be a Sinclair sept by all normal rules**.
* As mentioned in an earlier contribution to the Sinclair Discussion List, these 'workers in metal' were thought to have been the armorers from the Spanish galley which sank in Tobermory Bay
in 1588. In support of this suggestion the Sinclairs of Argyll are said to be of a darker complexion than their Northern namesakes.
** One wonders what the Gunns would make of this suggestion?