Clan Fraser of Lovat
History Chapter I
The clan as a social institution is infinitely old, and occurs in many parts of the world. Many Highland clans were founded in the 14th and 15th centuries. Among these was the Clan Fraser of Lovat. The rapidity of its growth is notable, and is largely due to the good fortune and intelligence of its chiefs, who did not come to the Highlands as conquerors, or refugees, but as the legal heirs to former rulers in an established society. They were careful to maintain good relations with the Crown, and to extend their territory by legal methods. The boundaries of this, soon to become the clan "country", underwent a number of alterations in the course of time, nor was the whole of the land in it exclusively and invariably possessed by Frasers. The chiefs, too, sometimes owned lands beyond the clan country proper. By and large, however, the extent of this in East and Central
Inverness-shire remained fairly constant from 1422 until 1746. It will be described in
some detail later, but since its ancient inhabitants were for the most part absorbed
into the Clan Fraser of Lovat, it's necessary to give a brief account of its earlier history.
The whole of this region was once a Pictish province. The Picts were a Celtic race,
and spoke a Gaelic tongue. When they were eventually conquered by the Scots,
also Gaelic speakers, this province became known as Moravia or Moray, though its
boundaries to the north and west went far beyond the present Morayshire. It was
for long virtually independent of the Scottish Kingdom of Alba, being ruled by a
Celtic line of "Mormaers" or Earls. Often it was disputed between the Mormaers,
Norwegian invaders, and the kings of Alba, but by the 12th it had come under the direct control of the last, now styled Kings of Scotland. During these times of civil strife a number of prominent Moray men were transplanted" elsewhere, and their places filled by incomers, some of Scoto-Norman origin. About now, too, that part of the ancient Moray which we today call Ross-shire appears as a distinct Earldom, ruled by a Celtic Earl.
In 1296 thee Scottish War of Independence began, and English troops over-ran
Moray and garrisoned certain castles, among them Inverness and Urquhart. The
people of Moray and Ross made an outstanding contribution to the Scottish cause,
and their leader, one Andrew de Moray, until his death from wounds in 1297, fought
staunchly beside William Wallace. Among the Normans, or Scoto-Normans, whom
all these events had introduced into Moray, appear the Bissets, the de Grahams,
the de Fentons, and possibly the Grants. With all of these, as we shall see, the
progenitors of the Lovat chiefs had much to do.
The 1st of the name of Fraser and the early spellings vary greatly and undoubtedly
came from France, though precisely when and whence is not known. No credence
unfortunately can be given to one of the most picturesque versions of their origin, which must not on that account be omitted here. According to this, the progenitor of the Frasers was a Frenchman
named Julius de Berry, who lived at "Auverc near Burbon" and who, in the spring of
916, regaled "Charles Simplex, king of France and Emperor," and the Papal Nuncio,
with dishes of ripe strawberries. In consequence, he received a royal command to
change his name to Fraise, from the French word for strawberry,, and to adopt three
"stalked strawberries" for his family arms. A herald's comment must be that hereditary
arms did not appear in Western Europe before the 12th century, though it is true that
objects resembling strawberry flowers, without stalks, have been borne on the armorial
shields of Frasers since 1281. The probability is that, however the name Fraser arose,
these :cinquefoils," "rosettes," or "strawberry flowers" were adopted in allusion to it.
Scottish heralds, when blazoning Fraser arms, have long termed these objects "fraises."
Whatever their origin, or the precise spelling of their name, Frasers appear as landlords
in England during the 12th and 13th centuries. In Scotland, the 1st recorded is one Simon Fraser, who in 1160 gave a large tract of land to the monks of Kelso. This family seems to have spread quickly through Tweeddale and the Lothians, and thence through Stirling, Angus, and Kincardine to Aberdeenshire, and later, to Inverness-shire. One of them, Sir Simon Fraser of Oliver Castle in Peeblesshire, was a promincent adherent of William Wallace and Robert The Bruce. He was captured by the English in June 1306 at Methven, taken to London, and there executed with singular barbarity. A 2nd Sir Simon Fraser fought in the Scottish army at Bannockburn in 1314, to be slain with two of his brothers, and by the same foe, at Halidon Hill in 1333. His elder brother, Sir Alexander Fraser, was an intimate friend of Robert The Bruce, likewise fought at Bannockburn, and two years later married The Bruce's sister, Lady Mary, widow of Sir Neil Campbell of Lochow. By her he had two sons, from one of whom descend Lord Saltoun and a number of Aberdeenshire Frasers. Sir Alexander, too, fell in battle with the English, at Dupplin Moor in 1332.
It has been claimed that yet a 3rd Sir Simon Fraser, reputed to have died in 1287,
was the progenitor of Lord Lovat's family, and that, having married a Bisset heiress
he received a charter of their lands in the present Inverness-shire in 1254. That
may be, but the1st authentic document connecting a Fraser with the lands of Lovat
and the Aird is dated 12th September 1367, where one Hugh Fraser is styled:
"Dominus de Loveth at portionarius de le Ard." It is possible that this Hugh may be
a son or grandson of the Sir Simon Fraser who was slain at Halidon Hill. There is
certainly some connection between them, and as late as 1377 Hugh still owned
lands in Peeblesshire. None of his sons was called Simon; but from his time the
pedigree of the House of Lovat is proved, and there is good reason to think that the
Gaelic patronymic of "MacShimi," or "Simon's son," was locally applied to the Fraser
possessor of Lovat at least before 1416. There is evidence, took, that the Frasers of
Lovat early adopted the Gaelic custom of sending their children to be "fostered" by
their tenantry, and it is reasonable to suppose that shortly after their settlement in
Inverness-shire the members of the future chiefly House spoke Gaelic as their 2nd tongue.
The Bissets certainly owned Lovat, the Aird, and other extensive property in Moray and Ross early in the 13th century. It is known that in 1268 these lands were divided among three Bisset daughters, co-heiresses, and that their husbands were, respectively, Sir David de Graham,
Sir William de Fenton, and Sir Andrew de Bosco. We
have seen that in 1367 Hugh Fraser was in possession
of Lovat, which was the de Graham portion of the Bisset
inheritance. By 1416, the marriage of this same Hugh
Fraser's second son, Hugh to Janet de Fenton, secured
most of the de Fentonportion likewise for the Frasers,
though they did not obtain Beaufort itself until 1511.
The de Bosco portion was located mostly in Ross-shire
and Nairn-shire, and the greater part of it passed to
other heirs than Frasers, who, however continued to
acquire fragments of the original Bisset inheritance for
another two centuries.
The 2nd Hugh Fraser, about 1422, received lands in
Stratherrick, east of Loch Ness, almost certainly from
the Dunbar Earls of Moray, though their occupants at
this time appear to have comprised a number of Grants. Hugh also received, and probably also from the Earls of Moray, one-third of Glenelg, on the western sea-board opposite the Island of Skye. The Lovat family held Glenelg for nearly two hundred years. This Hugh's grandson, a third Hugh, was created a Scottish peer sometime between 1456 and 1464, by the title of Lord Fraser of Lovat. The exact date of the creation is not now known. Among further acquisitions legally made by his descendants were the former Church lands of Beauly Priory, the Barony of Dalcross, more lands in Stratherrick, certain properties in Aberdeenshire (by purchase from their Fraser kinsfolk there), and Dalcattaig and Portclair on the west shore of Lock Ness (by purchase from the Grants of Glenmoriston). Not all of this territory became the home of the Clan Fraser of Lovat; in Glenelg, Dalcattaig and Portclair the people followed other chiefs. The Aberdeenshire properties were in character essentially Lowland, even though their Lovat possessors spent much of their time in their own Highland country, and made a point of taking a prominent part in clan affairs. But the rest was fit and ample nursery for a youthful clan.
