Memoir of Marshal Keith

vi. PREFACE.
acquired so early as 1006 must be set aside, when we
find Cosmo Innes, in his Sketches of Early Scotch History,
writing thus : — " The introduction of heraldry was, in
all countries, quickly followed by the adoption of the
shields of arms as the appropriate distinction of seals.
This cannot be said to have commenced in Scotland earlier
than the reign of William the Lion (116$ — 1 2 14). Even
during that reign, the practice was by no means general.
William himself, and some persons of great distinction,
both Saxon and Norman, though evidently following the
knightly customs of the age, had not yet adopted fixed
family arms." In almost every old family, we find its
representatives ready to trace the origin of their arms to
some great achievement on the part of some ancestor.
Wherever it has been possible to investigate these, the
legends in connection with them have been found to be, in
a great measure, fabrications. It was only at a much later
period, and in very rare instances, that such commemorative
marks were allowed to be added. However, as it is
interesting, being the earliest account we have of the family,
it has been given, leaving the reader to form his own
conclusions.
To honour the memory of the dead, to sketch truth-
fully the career of the two men whose crumbling castles
stand in our midst, — and around which cling our sunniest
memories, — and to raise to them "a monument more
durable than brass," has been the small but honest endeav-
our of
THE AUTHOR.