SCOTTISH CLANSHIP
Historically the clans were autonomous political, legal, and military groups of people ruled by a chief and joined by kinship, territorial, and traditional ties.
Today, Scotland’s clans are, in the opinion of legal history professor Mark Weiner, little more than clubs.
Scotland Before the Clans
Scotland has been a frontier throughout much of its history and prehistory and its population has been molded by successive waves of migration and invasion. Although evidence of settlement dates back to the 4th millennium BC, the first documentation of Scotland’s inhabitants are Roman accounts of the Caledonii tribesmen. These “painted men” as the Romans described them are the likely ancestors of the Picts who dominated throughout the Dark Ages. After the Roman withdrawal, Welsh speaking Britons settled in the Forth and Clyde Valleys followed by the Dal Riata from Ireland in the West who would become known as the Scots. Next Norse invaders settled the Northern and Western Isles as the Picts were absorbed by the Norse and the Scots in the Highlands. Normans then moved in from the south shaping the Lowlands.
Rise of the Clans
Much of Scotland lacked a support from a strong central authority , especially after 1266 when the Treaty of Perth ceded Norse control of Argyll and the Hebrides to Scotland and throughout the Wars of Independence. This allowed individual warlords who had already amassed land and influence to consolidate their personal power and establish local control and dominance supported by their kin – thus the clans were born.
Robert the Bruce supported the consolidation of clan power with feudal grants of land and titles to the chiefs in exchange for support against the English. In succeeding generations the power of the Scottish crown waned, but the chiefs maintained their local authority.
Age of the Clans
Beginning with the ransom of David II, a number of factors combined to strangle the Scottish economy and weaken its monarchy. Within their home territories, the chiefs maintained their powers throughout the 15th and 16th centuries.
However, many of the Clans supported the Jacobite cause supporting the rebellions of 1689, 1715 and 1745. The final defeat of the Jacobite cause at Battle of Culloden signalled the effective end of clanship as it had been known for centuries.
Scottish Diaspora
After the Battle of Culloden, the English actively supressed Highland culture through the Proscription Act and other legislation. Banned from bearing arms and wearing the kilt, clansmen settled into the role of tenant farmers and chiefs into the role of landlords. But changes in agricultural practices and successive years of famine saw landlords evicting their tenants in favor of the higher profits of sheep herding.
Some moved to the cities, but many of the dispossessed Scots sought a better life in the colonies. Thus within only a generation or two of the last Jacobite rebellion, Scots were dispersed across the English speaking world, where their descendants can be found today.
Rebirth of the Clans / The Clans Abroad
Beginning with the works of Sir Walter Scott, the romantic image of Scotland and the Clans was born. Many writers engaged in cultural tourism visiting Scotland and romanticizing the land and its peoples. Their tales helped forge a romantic image of Scotland and the Scots which is perpetuated to this day in movies such as Braveheart and Rob Roy and books and television series such as Outlander.
The large populations of Americans, Australians and other who claim Scottish descent feed this romantic image by reconnecting with their roots. Many choose to do this through modern clan societies – organizations (often established as non-profits) which are formed to connect distantly related (or even unrelated) individuals bearing the surnames of the ancient Scottish Clans and to further research and charing of aspects of Scottish culture.