[ [245] The old name for Skye, and throws some doubt on the derivation of the name “Sgiathanach,” usually accepted.
[ [246] We have no tradition respecting this poet. But he must have been a bard of the M’Gregors’. The allusion to the Feinn will be understood by referring to the war-song of Gaul.
[ [247] Elsewhere translated Loch Tummell. “Tolve” is the word in the original. Loch Tullich lies at the head of Glenurchay.
[ [248] This is usually the name of Gaul, but here it is Finn, whose mother’s name was Muirn.
[ [249] Probably the chief bard of the MacGregors.
[ [250] It has been suggested to the Editor that this poet might have been the chief of the Macnabs, the chief of this period being Finlay Macnab of Boquhan; and we know that the Macnabs counted themselves of the same lineage with the Macgregors. There is much in the composition given here, however, to indicate his being an ecclesiastic.
[ [251] We learn from Greg. High. pp. 65, 66, that Allan MacRuari, great-grandson of Ranald, and chief of clan Ranald, was one of the principal supporters of Angus, the young Lord of the Isles, at the battle of the Bloody Bay; and that he also followed Alexander of Lochalsh in his invasion of Ross and Cromarty in 1491, receiving a large share of the booty taken on the occasion. The poet describes him as a sacrilegious marauder.
[ [252] The ecclesiastical establishment at Iona. The Reformers had probably less to do with the destruction of the buildings in Iona than is generally thought.
[ [253] The church of St. Oran in Iona.
[ [254] The Hebrides were known as “Innsegall,” or the islands of the strangers, probably since the rise of the kingdom of the Norsemen there.