Series 1 > Loyall dissuasive

Ixxvi THE LOYALL DISSUASIVE
among the septs of Clan Chattan, may have got its name-
father from this king of Dalriada who fled to Lochaber in 736.
A later Murich, grandson of the chief of Clan Chattan, is
credited with giving name to Clann Mhurich. I am inclined to
think that Clan Chattan took origin as a clan during the eighty-
three years in which the exiled Scots fought for the recovery
of Dalriada, aided by their friends, the northern Piets, now
united with them in kinship and religion. It was recovered in
819. The valleys of the Spean, Laggan, and the Spey, were
the highways of Columban missionaries, and the dedications to
Columba, Adamnan, and other Celtic saints show the hold of
the Scots upon these valleys. At this time the great territory,
extending from near the western seas to the east coast,
assumes the name it ever afterwards bore, Moray. Bishop
Forbes, in his Kalendars of Scottish Saints, tells us that
Murdoch is the basis of the name Moray; and it is singular
that the old Pictish name for the district should disappear,
and that Muref should replace it, at a time when King Mur-
dach was consolidating the two peoples, Scots and northern
Piets, in this central region. The Scottish element, with its
superior education, would naturally influence the nomencla¬
ture of the combined races. The Pictish Chronicle, a work of
the tenth century, gives the division of the country under the
names of the sons of Cruithne, son of Cinge. The edition in
the Irish Nenius adds to this, £ and they divided the land into
seven divisions, as Columcille says,
Seven Children of Cruithne
Divided Alban into seven divisions :
Cait, Ce, Cirig, a warlike clan ;
Fib, Fidach, Fotla, Fortrenn,
and the name of each man is given to their territories.’1
Five of these districts are identified. Fib is Fife; Fotla is
Atholl; Fortrenn is the region between the rivers Forth and
Tay, with Forteviot as its capital; Cirig is Angus and Meams;
1 Skene’s Critic Scotland, vol. i. p. 186.