[160] Such appears to be the meaning of the expression of the Chronicler, “he found nothing there for which he was the better,” Chron. Sax. 1072. Compare Wendover ad. an. 1072.
[161] Edgar, according to the Chron. Sax., returned to Scotland from Flanders in 1074, and he probably sought refuge in the latter country at the approach of William.
[162] Lord Hailes, vol. 1, p. 17, thinks it improbable that Abernethy on the Tay can be the place intended, from its lying out of William’s probable route. He appears, however, to have forgotten that all the early invaders of Scotland who combined a fleet with their land force—and none else were successful—must have held their course along the coast, or their fleet would have been useless. Abernethy, according to Ailred, was in Scotia (Twysden, p. 340), or beyond the Forth, and it was exactly because William had succeeded in penetrating into the heart of the real kingdom of Scotland that Malcolm came to terms.
[163] Chron. Sax. 1072. Sim. Dun. de Gestis 1072–1087. An. Ult. 1072. It may be gathered from Sim. Dun. de Gestis 1091, that Malcolm held twelve manors of William and received a yearly payment of twelve marks of gold, and as the kings only met once, these grants must have been made on this occasion. The homage of Malcolm would appear to have been simple not liege, for he never seems to have been called upon to perform any feudal service; whilst his subsequent repudiation of the demands of Rufus shows that the homage was not rendered for the kingdom of Scotland, but was simply the feudal recognition of his subsidy. In short, the meeting appears to have resulted in a compromise, William endeavouring to secure the peace of his northern borders by what in the present age would take the form of a pension or subsidy, then conferred as a feudal grant, for which Malcolm performed homage, giving up his son as a hostage for his faithful observance of the treaty. Vide Appendix L, part 2.
[164] Sim. Dun. de Gestis 1072. Malm. Gesta. Regum, l. 3, sec. 253.
[165] Sim. Dun. de Gestis 1073. Chron. Sax. 1074. Malm. Gest. Reg., l. 3, sec. 251.
[166] Chron. Sax. 1077. An. Ult. 1085. Mr. Skene (Highlanders, vol. i., p. 123) supposes, on the strength of a very ambiguous entry in the Ulster Annals, that a certain Donald MacMalcolm, a son or descendant of Malcolm MacMalbride, the Mormaor of Moray who died in 1029, reigned over the north of Scotland from the death of Thorfin in 1064 to his own death in 1085. It is impossible, however, that this Donald could have been the representative of Malcolm of Moray, or he must have been Mormaor of that province in place of Macbeth, Lulach, and Malsnechtan, of whom the latter died in the same year as Donald, in the peaceful possession of Moray. Neither would Donald have had any claim upon the crown, as he was not the heir of Gruoch, and it is impossible that he could have reigned over the north of Scotland for upwards of twenty years, whilst his kinsman Malsnechtan, the real heir, was content with the province of Moray. If the entry is correct it is just as possible that the words “Donald, son of Malcolm king of Scotland” may apply to a son of Malcolm the Third; but the word Righ in the Irish Annals is very ambiguous, and ought to be translated prince rather than king, a title which answers more to the Ardrigh.
[167] Sim. Dun. de Gestis 1079–80. Chron. Sax. 1079. Fordun, l. 5, c. 21. Vide Appendix Q.
[168] Sim. Dun. de Gestis 1087.
[169] Sim. Dun. de Gestis 1091. Chron. Sax. 1091.