What was Kenneth mac Alpin’s paternal descent?
The second question we have to solve is, To what family of the Scots of Dalriada did Kenneth, by paternal descent, belong? The ordinary pedigree, which traces his descent through the kings of Dalriada of the Cinel Gabhran, and identifies his father Alpin with Alpin son of Eachach, the last of the Dalriadic kings, is not older than the twelfth century, and is unquestionably artificial; but we have indications that two other lines of descent were attributed to him. St. Berchan, in his so-called prophecy, after a few stanzas which refer to Conall, the son of Comgall, the king of Dalriada who received Saint Columba as narrated by Adamnan, passes at once to the reign of Kenneth mac Alpin, with these words:—
A son of the clan of his son will possess
The kingdom of Albany by virtue of his strength.
Conall, according to the Tract on the Men of Alban, had seven sons,[[453]] from any one of whom Kenneth may have descended, and this would attach him to that tribe of the Dalriads termed the Cinel Comgall, from whom the district of Cowall takes its name; but the same tract contains another statement, which seems to present to us a more authentic notice of his descent. According to this tradition, from Eachach Buidhe, son of Aedain, the king of Dalriada inaugurated by Saint Columba, there branched off two clans, ‘the clan Fergusa Gall, son of Eachach Buidhe, or the Gabhranaigh, and the clan Conall Cerr, son of Eochaid Buidhe, who are the men of Fife in the sovereignty; that is, the clan of Kenneth, son of Alpin, son of Aidan.’[[454]] This has all the appearance of a genuine fragment which has been preserved from some older source. The reference to Fife, which appears to have been the province which mainly supported the claim of this family, and in which Rathelpin, or the Fort of Alpin, was situated, and the appearance of a Conall, son of Aidan, in Kintyre, in 807, by whom Conall, son of Tadg, the then Pictish governor of Dalriada was slain,[[455]] and who was probably a son of the same Aidan here made father of Alpin, gives great probability to it. We may therefore conclude that Kenneth mac Alpin belonged to the Cinel Gabhran, but was descended from a different branch than that which had furnished the kings of that race to Dalriada.
A.D. 860-864.
Donald, son of Alpin, king of the Picts.
Kenneth mac Alpin was succeeded by his brother Donald, who, according to the Pictish Chronicle, held the same kingdom for four years. His death is recorded by the Annals of Ulster four years after that of Kenneth, with the same title of king of the Picts. He died, according to the Pictish Chronicle, at his palace of Cinn Belachoir, on the ides, or 13th, of April. St. Berchan says of him—
Three years to the king,
And three months, who shall number them?
On Loch Adhbha shall be his grave: