CLAN MACNICOL

'Clan MacNicol' or 'Clan MacNeacail' is an Island Scottish clan long associated with the Isle of Skye, and were also a sept of the Clan MacLeod.^[1] In the 1980s Sir David Nicolson, 4th Baron Carnock was recognized by Lord Lyon King of Arms as Chief of Clan Nicolson.^[2] Not content with this Ian Nicolson, an Australian, petitioned Lord Lyon to be chief of the Nicolsons of Scorrybreac, and in 1988 was regonized as ''Ian Norman Carmichael Macneacail of Macneacail and Scorrybreac, Chief of the Highland Clan MacNeacail''.^[3]

Contents

History

Origins

Isle of Lewis

Isle of Skye

Clan profile

Tartan

See also

Notes

References

External links

History

Origins

MacNeacail (Scottish Gaelic), is anglicized as MacNicol, Nicholson/Nicolson and literally means "Son of Nicol." Nicol, a diminutive of Nicholas (Greek: Νικόλαος "''Victory People''"), was first brought to the British Isles by the Normans,^[4] and was a very common medieval name.^[5]
The supposed progenitor of the Clan MacNicol is first recorded as Mackrycul.
The MacNicols are thought to have originally inhabited the lands on the west coast of Ross, Scotland. By the early fourteenth century they had lost their lands, between Loch Maree and Loch Torridon, through the marriage of a MacNicol heiress to a member of the MacLeods of Lewis. It is thought that it was about this time that the MacNicols removed to the Isle of Lewis, following the MacLeods. Later on, as the MacLeods moved south to the Isle of Skye, the MacNicols were among them and settled mainly in the northern central side of the island, surrounding the area of Scorrybreac near Portree.^[6]

Isle of Lewis

There was a tradition that the MacNicols were situated in Lewis in ancient times. The ''Indweller of Lewis'' wrote around 1678 and 1688 of such tradition.^[7] He stated that the first and most ancient inhabitants of Lewis were three men of three different races; ''Mores'', ''Iskair MacAulay'', and ''Macnaicle''. Also, it was through marriage to Macnaicle's daughter that the Macleods became dominant in Lewis.^[8]
On Lewis the ravine separating Dùn Othail from the mainland is called "''Leum Mhac Nicol''" (Scottish Gaelic), ''Nicholson's Leap''. Legend was that a MacNicol for a certain crime was sentenced by the chief of Lewis to be castrated. In revenge he ran off with the chief's only child to the ravine and leaped across the chasm. MacNicol threatened to throw the child into the sea unless the chief himself agreed to be mutilated as well. Attempts at rescuing the child failed and the chief finally agreed to the mans terms. Just as the chief consented MacNicol leaped over the cliff and into the sea with the child crying out in gaelic. "''I shall have no heir, and he shall have no heir''."^[9]

Isle of Skye

A tradition from Skye is that a chief of the MacNicol clan, MacNicol Mor, was engaged in a heated discussion with Macleod of Raasay. As the two argued in english a servant, who could speak only gaelic, imagined that the two leaders were quarrelling. The servant, thinking his master in danger, then drew his sword and slew MacNicol Mor. To prevent a feud between the two septs, the clan elders and chiefs, of the two septs, then held council to determine the manner in which to appease the MacNicols. The decision agreed upon was that the "''meanest''" of Clan Nicol would behead Macleod of Raasay. Lomach, a lowly maker of pannier baskets, was chosen and accordingly cut off the head of the Laird of Raasay.^[10]
During the sixteenth century MacNicoll of Portree was part of the sixteen member of "The Council Of The Isles" of the Lordship of the Isles, in Island Finlaggan in Islay.^[11]
The first MacNicol chief on record in Scotland was John, son of Neacal in the early fourteenth century. He appears in the company of leading Hebridean chiefs, Macdonald, Macdougald and Macruairi, descendants of Somerled who had wrested control of the southern Hebrides. In Skye, home of the MacNeacail chieftains, an accommodation was eventually reached in which the Mac Neacail became administrators, or "tacksmen," for the MacLeods. When a Skye sheriff named Nicolson retired in the 1980s, it was noted locally as the end of a chain of Mac Neacail leadership going back almost a thousand years on that island.

Clan profile

★ Gaelic Names: ''MacNeacail'' (Surname) & ''Clann 'icNeacail'' (Collective).

★ Clan Crest: A hawk's head erased, gules.^[12]

★ Clan Slogan: Sgorra Bhreac (Scottish Gaelic).

★ Clan Badge: Trailing azalea.

★ Clan Chief: John MacNeacail of MacNeacail and Scorrybreac.^[13] The chief resides in Ballina, NSW, Australia.

★ Clan Seat: Scorrybreac, Isle of Skye, Scotland.

Tartan

The MacNicol/Nicolson tartan that appears in the MacIan/Logan work represents a woman wearing a tartan shawl. Logan even admits they had never encountered a tartan for the MacNicols/Nicolsons, and that "it is probable they adopted that of their superiors" - the MacLeods.^[14]

See also

★ Clan Nicolson

★ Scottish clan

Notes

1. MacLeod Septs. clanmacleod.org. Retrieved on April 13 2007
2. Sir David Henry Arthur Nicolson of that Ilk, 4th Baron Carnock. thepeerage.com. Retrieved on August 07 2007
3. "Macneacail of Macneacail and Scorrybreac". burkes-peerage.net. Retrieved on August 07 2007
4. Black, p.628-629.
5. Reaney, p.322.
6. Cairney, p.57.
7. Thomas, "Traditions of the MacAulays of Lewis", p.364-365.
8. Maidment, p.341.
9. Thomas, "On the Duns of the Outer Hebrides", p.371.
10. Maclauchlan & Wilson & Keltie, p.272.
11. Black, p.551.
12. Bain, p.138-139.
13. clanmacnicol.org. Retrieved on August 18 2007
14. Stewart, p.86.

References

★ Bain, Robert. ''The Clans And Tartans Of Scotland''. Glasgow & London: Collins Publishers, 1983. ISBN 0 00 411117 6.

★ Black, George Fraser. ''The Surnames of Scotland : Their Origin, Meaning and History''. New York City: New York Public Library, 1946.

★ Cairney, C. Thomas. ''Clans And Families Of Ireland And Scotland, An Ethnography Of The Gael, A.D. 500-1750''. -: Willow Bend Books, 2000. ISBN 1-58549-070-9.

★ Maclauchlan, Thomas. & Wilson, John. & Keltie, Sir John Scott. ''A History of the Scottish Highlands, Highland Clans and Highland Regiments''. (Volume 2), Edinburgh and London: A. Fullarton & Co., 1875.

★ Maidment, James. (1844). ''The Spottiswoode Miscellany: A Collection of Original Papers and Tracts, Illustrative Chiefly of the Civil And Ecclesiastical History Of Scotland''., (Vol.2), The Spottiswoode society

★ Reaney, Percy H. ''A Dictionary of English Surnames''. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005. ISBN 0192806637.

★ Stewart, Donald C. ''The Setts of the Scottish Tartans, with descriptive and historical notes''. London: Shepheard-Walwyn, 1974. ISBN 0 85603 011 9.

★ Thomas, Capt. F W L. "Traditions of the MacAulays of Lewis". ''Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, 14 (1879-80)''.

★ Thomas, Capt. F W L. "On the Duns of the Outer Hebrides". ''Archaeologia Scotica: Transactions of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, 5 (1890)''.

External links

★ Clan MacNicol North America

★ Clan MacNicol Australia

★ Canadian Clan MacNicol Society

★ Clan MacNicol Utah