The Ulster People:19 – the “Scottish” Connection

Posted on August 7, 2016 by
It is to the ‘Scottish connection’ that we shall now turn. We have already seen that the link between Ireland and “Scotland” goes back to when people first established themselves in Ireland, one substantial piece of evidence being the appearance in both north-east Ireland and south-west “Scotland” of an identical type of megalithic grave — which have been labelled the ‘Clyde-Carlingford cairns’ by archaeologists to highlight the definite link across the North Channel. While the ease of accessibility provided by the narrow waters of the North Channel would lead us to suppose that commerce and movement between the two areas was of a regular and extensive nature, it is only as we approach the ‘historical’ age that documentary evidence is provided for such intercourse.
Possibly because of the pressure of the “Uí Néill” territorial gains, and the contraction of Old Ulster, groups within the Northern population began to move across the North Channel, in particular the Dál Riata, who settled Argyll and the islands along the western seaboard. The Venerable Bede, writing in the 8th century (A History of the English Church and People), states that this land was obtained from the local Pictish people by a combination of force and treaty. There was probably not much change in population, rather in cultural dominance. The kings of the Dál Riata soon claimed sovereignty over territory on both sides of the North Channel, ancient British Epidia and Robogdia. When the legendary Fergus Mac Erc, also known as Mac Nisse Mór, forsook his Irish capital of Dunseverick around 500 and established his main residence in Argyll, we may assume that by this time the Scottish dynasties had ousted the mother-country in importance. Carrickfergus is named after Fergus and he is reputedly buried nearby. While his historicity has been challenged by Scottish nationalist academics, there is no doubt of his symbolic importance in later Medieval Times.
After their defeat alongside Congal Cláen at the great battle of Moira in 637, however, the Dalriadan kings were finally to lose their Ulster territories to the “Uí Néill”. Groups from Ireland had been raiding Roman Britain, according to Roman writers, as early as 343. To the Romans the Irish raiders were called ‘Scotti’, and Ireland became known as Scotia. However, while Ireland was eventually to lose that appellation, the new rulers crossing the North Channel were to bequeath the name to their new homeland. From the kings of Dalriada there is a direct link to the kings of what would become ‘Scotland’.

The settlement of these northern Irish in Argyll has tended to overshadow a later movement across the North Channel — that of a migration of Cruthin to Galloway. As Charles Thomas wrote: “An admirable guide to the early Irish settlement could be constructed from the distribution of certain place-name elements — particularly those relating to simple natural features. [Such names are found in] an intense localized concentration in the double peninsula of the Rhinns of Galloway, opposite Antrim. No special historical sources describe what now looks like another early Irish colony here — possibly of the sixth century. But isolated archaeological finds from Galloway, the spread of a type of early ecclesiastical site (the enclosed developed cemetery) which may be regarded as Irish-inspired, and several minor pointers in the same direction, are mounting to reliable evidence for a separate settlement in this south-western area.”

The church at Bangor would have had strong links with this area, as it had through Comgall and Molua (Moluag) with the Picts (Caledonian Pretani), A Bangor monk became Abbot of St Ninian’s old monastery of Candida Casa at the end of the sixth century. Churches in Galloway were often dedicated to saints popular in Ulster. Chalmers dated the main Cruthinic movements to the Galloway region to the eighth century “followed by fresh swarms from the Irish hive in the ninth and tenth centuries.” In Lowland Scots they would become known as Creenies or Kreenies.

Such a settlement by Ulster Cruthin may help to explain the references in old texts (Reginald of Durham, Jocelyn of Furness and Richard of Hexham) to the ‘Picts of Galloway’. Such references had troubled some historians, for the Scottish “Picts” were not believed to have dwelt so far south of the Antonine Wall, erected by the Romans to keep them at bay. However, the place-name and archaeological evidence indicating the link with Ulster provides an answer to the problem. Furthermore, the old Welsh records speak of the people of this area as Gwyddel Ffichti or ‘Irish Picts’.

These settlers had already absorbed the Gaelic language while in Ulster, and they were to carry it with them to “Scotland”, which eventually became named after them, “Scots” meaning Irish people. This new language, over the succeeding centuries, was eventually to spread throughout “Scotland”. The ancient traditions of Ulster which the settlers brought with them remained strong among the ordinary people long after they had disappeared from many parts of Ireland. Evidence of pre-Celtic and Celtic customs also abound throughout the Scottish-Irish ‘cultural province’ and much Ulster Folk material could still be collected in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland well into the 20th century.

To be continued

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