directed from Spence Family History

MacDUFF (MacDhuibh)

Although the main power of the Clan MacDuff (MacDhuibh) was in Fife, and ‘ Macduff ’ was not usually used as a surname, except by the MacDuffs in Perthshire, its chiefs (The Earls of Fife) were of such power and influence throughout the eastern highlands, that some understanding of its history is necessary to any consideration of the origins of several later clans. Certainly, the chiefs of the Clan Macduff held rich lands in the lowlands of Fife, Stirlingshire, East Lothian and Midlothian. but they also held far more extensive lands in the Highlands of Perthshire, Banffshire, Inverness-shire and Moray. Among the branches of the Clan Macduff were the families of Wemyss, Spence or Spens, Fife and Abernethy, also perhaps Cameron, Scrymgeour, Fernie, Kilgour, Syras and Scott of Balwary (who anyway married the Syras heiress). In fairness to the Duffs of Muldavit, afterwards Dukes of Fife, who were small landowners in Banff in the fifteenth century, their unproved claim to be a branch of the Clan Macduff of Fife is not so improbable as it might seem at first sight, when it is remembered that the original Macduff clan had great estates in Banffshire in the Middle Ages. In the highlands of Perthshire, as early as the twelfth or thirteenth century, the Earls of Fife held the hill district of Strathbran, where David MacDuff, Baron of Fandowie, still appears in 1594 and 1602. ‘ Alexander McDuff, brother to Balanloan ’, is named in a list of Gentlemen on the Atholl Estates who took part in the Rising of 1745 ( the Jacobite Duke of Atholl was created Lord Strathbran by the Old Chevalier in exile); and the MacDuffs of Bonhard in Perthshire recorded in the nineteenth century Arms which clearly allude to a Fife and Atholl connection. Indeed, in the late thirteenth century the Earls of Atholl, just north of Strathbran, were themselves a branch of the Clan Macduff, holding also the Aberdeenshire district of Strathbogie. Above all, the mediaeval Earls of Fife held vast Highland districts (including Strathavon), in the Cairngorms and on the Spey, in the counties of Inverness-shire, Moray and Banffshire. These lands bordered on Badenoch, haunt of the Clan Chattan, and lay on both sides of Rothiemurchus, cradle of the Clan Mackintosh. It is not therefore unreasonably to accept the Mackintosh claim to be themselves a branch of the Clan Macduff: and the lyon rampant appears in the first and fourth quarters of their shield on the earliest surviving Mackintosh seal, that of Alexander Mackintosh, Thane of Rothiemurchus in 1481. The lyon is still borne, red on gold, by The Mackintosh and his cadets, such as Shaw of Tordarroch and Farquharson of Invercauld. The early members of the Clan Macduff are literally seen through the mists of time. Although indistinct, the vital thread links us with Aethelred (Gaelicised as Aedh), a son of Malcolm III and Queen Margaret and the last hereditary Abbot of Dunkeld and first Earl of Fife — of the Kindred of St.Columba who had inaugurated the King of Scots in the early days of the Celtic Church in Scotland. The Kindred of St.Columba had themselves attained the throne in 1034. He was the elder brother of King Edgar, King Alexander I and King David I. Born probably about 1070, and debarred from the throne either through infirmity or as an abbot, he married the sister and heiress of Maelsnechtai, King of Moray, who was Chief of Clan Duff as grandson of Queen Gruoch (the Lady MacBeth of Shakespeare), herself the heiress of the line of King Dubh (or Duff), killed in 967. Among Aedh’s children were a son Dubh (or Duff), who died in his father’s lifetime, leaving two sons, Constantine, 2nd Earl, who died about 1129, and Gillemichael MacDuff, 3rd Earl, who did not long survive him. Gillemichael had two sons, Duncan, 4th Earl, and Hugh, whose son Michael was ancestor of the Wemyss family (still representors). Hugh may also have been ancestor of the Duffs of Banffshire. The abbot-earl Aedh probably died in about 1128, after which the Moraymen rose in several attempts to put his surviving sons successfully upon the throne. This was in keeping with the old laws of the Gaels, which would have preferred the MacAedh brothers before their MacDuff nephews. The Macduff earls therefore supported the line of King David I and King Malcolm IV, and were accorded by them in return the premier position in the realm. Since ‘ Macheth ’ (MacAedh) was sometimes confused with ‘ MacBeth ’, it seems possible that the historic Macduff support of the boy King Malcolm IV against Macheth is the origin of the tale of a legendary Macduff’s support of King Malcolm III against MacBeth, that gave rise to Shakespeare’s famous play. Anyway, the Clan Macduff was the premier clan among the Gaels of mediaeval Scotland. Its chief, the Earl of Fife ‘ by the Grace of God ’, bore a red lyon on gold, a coat-of-arms only appropriate to a branch of the royal house of Scotland senior even to that of the reigning kings themselves. He was treated as almost a sacred personage, being placed first after the King in all gatherings, speaking first in Council at Parliament, and leading the van in battle (which among the ancient Gaels was the duty of an abbot bearing a holy reliquary, like the Ark of the Covenant in biblical times). Indeed, the chieftains of the most important cadet branch of the Clan Macduff were hereditary Abbots of Abernethy. Duncan, who died in 1154, was made hereditary early by David I, in return for military service. The position of the earls as magnates of the important province of Fife reflected compensation for exclusion from kingship. The Earl of Fife and the Abbot or Lord of Abernethy were both ‘ Capitals of Law of the Clan Macduff ’: the Gaelic is toisech-dior, literally ‘ thane of law ’ or ‘ law-chief ’. This celebrated law was that all manslayers within the ninth degree of kin to the earls of Fife could claim sanctuary at the Cross of MacDuff near Abernethy, and secure remission by paying a fixed compensation to the victim’s family. Above all, the chiefs of the Clam Macduff had the right of enthroning the king on the Stone of Destiny, at Scone. Duncan was succeeded by his son Duncan, 5th Earl, father of Malcolm, 6th Earl, who was succeeded by his nephew Malcolm, 7th Earl, who married Helen daughter of Llewellyn, Prince of Wales, with issue two sons, Colban, 8th Earl, and MacDuff or Reres. Colban had a son Duncan, 9th Earl, and also a daughter Isabella. After Edward I had carried off the Stone to Westminster, King Robert Bruce himself underwent a second Coronation in order to be crowned in 1306 by Isabella, a member of the Clan Macduff (Fife’s sister, whom the English kept in a cage in public as a reprisal). Duncan had a son Duncan, 1285-1353, 10th Earl, who was followed by his daughter Isabella, Countess of Fife. When she died childless about 1389, the earldom passed by an entail made by her father, to Robert Stewart, Earl of Menteith. His third son Robert, the last Earl of Fife (who was also the Regent Albany) succeeded but was beheaded and forfeited in 1425. The earldom then became annexed to the crown and the Clan Macduff right of crown-bearing passed to the Lord Abernethy, who (through two heiresses) was then the Red Douglas and is now the Duke of Hamilton. The genealogy of the Duffs becomes credible after a grant to David Duff, of the lands of Muldavit and Badavy, in Banffshire, in the reign of Robert III, 1390-1406. After the direct line of Craighead-Muldavit expired, Alexander Duff of Keithmore’s son, Alexander, assumed the chiefship. He had three sons, Alexander of Braco, who died in 1718 without male issue; William of Dipple, and Patrick, from whom descended the Duffs of Hatton and Fetteresso. William of Dipple, a wealthy landowner, was succeeded by his son, William, who was cr. Baron Braco of Kilbryde, in 1735, and Viscount MacDuff and Earl Fife, both in the peerage of Ireland, 1759. He erected Duff House, 1740-45. During the ’45 Jacobite uprising he was on the government side. His son James, 2nd Earl of Fife, was cr. a peer of Great Britain, 1790, as Baron Fife. He made additions to his estate and changed the name of the town of Doune to MacDuff, and procured for it a burgh charter. He died in 1809, when the title Baron of Fife expired, and the other honours devolved on his brother. Alexander, 6th Earl, was cr. Duke of Fife in 1889, on his marriage to Princess Louise, daughter of King Edward VII. All the peerages, save the Dukedom, and the representation of Duff on Brace, became dormant in 1912, but the present and 3rd Duke, James Carnegie, who succeeded in 1959, was already 11th Earl of Southesk, and has other honours. The plain shield of a red lyon on gold is still borne by Wemyss of Wemyss, whose line have lived at Wemyss itself in Fife since the twelfth century, and who spring in the direct male line from Gillemichael MacDuff, Earl of Fife more than eight hundred years ago.