We can now turn with some sense of relief from the intricate maze of the genealogy of the Caithness earls to the more open ground of Scottish history, which we left at the date of the death of William the Lion in December 1214, when he was succeeded on the throne of Scotland by his son, Alexander II, a youth who had then just entered his seventeenth year. We can then work the results of our genealogical conjectures into the general history of the northern counties.

Alexander II, like his predecessors, was in the year after his accession immediately confronted with a revolt headed by Donald Ban MacWilliam the younger, another of the descendants of Ingibjorg of Orkney, widow of Earl Thorfinn and first wife of Malcolm Canmore. The scene of the rising was, as usual, Moray; and Donald was aided not only by the inhabitants of that province, but also by a large force of Irish mercenaries. This rebellion, however, was speedily crushed by Ferchar Mac-in-tagart of the family of the Lay Abbots of Applecross in the west of Ross, a county to which Henry, the eldest son of Harold Maddadson had in vain laid claim.

Differences which threatened to break out between Scotland and England were speedily settled, and the young king, as we have seen, married Joanna, sister of King Henry III of England, in 1221. Alexander next conquered the district of Argyll in 1222, and in the same year reduced Caithness to subjection on the occasion of Bishop Adam’s murder, and he shortly afterwards put down two rebellions, the one in Moray, as above stated, and the other in Galloway, a district which, however, he did not finally conquer till 1235, although Mac-in-tagart was knighted for a victory there in 1215, and soon after, by 1226, became Earl of Ross. In 1236, as a punishment for burning to death the Earl of Atholl, in revenge for the defeat of a member of their family at a tournament, the Bissets were deprived of their estates near Beauly, and fled to England, where they endeavoured to embroil that country again with Scotland. In this they failed, and a treaty was signed between the two nations that neither should make war on the other unless it were first attacked itself.

Argyll, Galloway, and Moray being subdued and settled, and the old Earldom of Caithness broken up, and divided among trustworthy feudal tenants holding their lands by military service from the Scottish king, the whole of the mainland of Scotland may now be said to have been effectively incorporated into one kingdom under the Scottish Crown. Ecclesiastically, also, the whole realm was divided into diocèses, whose bishops were appointed by consent of the king.

The dream of Malcolm II at last was realised.

The western islands of the Hebrides, however, still owed allegiance to the king of Norway, who was till 1240 engaged in civil war with Duke Skuli in his own kingdom. Alexander II therefore equipped a naval expedition to reduce the islands, but, soon after he had embarked, he sickened and died on the island of Kerrera, near Oban, in 1249, leaving as his successor, his son Alexander III, then only in his eighth year, who was married in 1251, before his eleventh year, to Margaret, daughter of Henry III of England, then a child of about the same age as himself. The marriage was followed by a nine years’ struggle between the rival factions of Alan Durward, Justiciar of Scotland, and of Walter Comyn, Earl of Menteith, in which England constantly interfered, till the Comyn, or Scottish, faction finally gained the upper hand. In 1261, Alexander III’s only child Margaret, who afterwards became Queen of Norway, was born.

Between 1242 and 1245 two Scottish bishops had been sent to Norway by Alexander II to induce King Hakon to give up the Hebrides to Scotland, and now his son Alexander III sent another embassy of an Archdeacon and a Scot, called in the Saga Misel, but more probably Frisel or Fraser, who, being found to be spies, tried to escape, but were caught and made to witness the young King Magnus’ coronation in his father’s lifetime. These embassies, though backed by offers of money compensation, were wholly unsuccessful.

Meantime affairs in Sutherland and Caithness had been pursuing an orderly course for nearly forty years. William, eldest son of Hugo Freskyn, had succeeded his father in Sutherland before 1214, the year of Earl David’s death, and had in or after 1237 become its first Earl, and three years afterwards, according to tradition, though probably this event happened later, with the aid of Richard of Moray, Bishop Gilbert’s brother, a Norse landing at Unes or Little Ferry is said to have been repulsed in a battle at Embo, near Dornoch in Sutherland. In this battle Richard fell, and the Norse Prince was also killed, the Ri-Crois at Embo, which has disappeared long ago, being erected in memory of the latter. Earl William had died in 1248, and had been buried in the Cathedral at Dornoch, which Bishop Gilbert had founded close to and west of the site of the older Church of St. Bar, and which he had dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary in or after 1222.

The Bishop had given to his diocese of Caithness the Constitution which is still extant at Dunrobin. This Constitution, like that of Elgin, was in the main based on that of Lincoln. But the Bishop was to be Primus and above all other dignitaries of the Cathedral. For it was ordained that instead of the one priest who had previously officiated, there should be ten Canons with the Bishop as their head, five of them holding the dignities of Dean, Precentor, Chancellor, Treasurer, and Archdeacon, each of them during residence to minister there daily, as well as the Abbot of Scone, who was a Canon, but had a Vicar to perform his duties in his absence. The teinds (or tithes) of certain parishes were allocated to each member of the Chapter; and lands, residences, and prebends were assigned to them, provision also being made from the teinds of other parishes for the lighting and services of the Church. Bishop Gilbert built and completed the Cathedral, making, it is said, the glass for its windows at Sidera, from sand taken from near the howe of the first Jarl Sigurd, a worshipper of Odin.

Bishop Gilbert had also translated the Psalms into Gaelic; and, having set his diocese of Caithness, comprising the modern counties of Sutherland and Caithness, in good working order, and having re-buried his predecessor Adam, with a stately funeral, at Dornoch in 1239, had made his will in 1242, and died in the episcopal palace at Scrabster, near Thurso, in 1245. It was probably during his episcopate that King Alexander II gave his open letter, directed to the sheriffs, bailies, and other good men of Moray and Caithness, and enjoining them to protect the ship of the Abbot and Convent of Scone and their men and goods from injury, molestation or damage in their journeys to the north. Bishop Gilbert was buried at Dornoch, and was succeeded by Bishop William, and he in his turn, in 1261, by Bishop Walter de Baltroddi, who doubtless suffered from King Hakon’s fines levied in Caithness in 1263, and whose daughter the Chief of the Mackays is said to have married after that date.

In 1261 the Hebrides had been harried by William, MacFerchar, Earl of Ross and uncle of Freskin de Moravia the younger, with great cruelty and barbarity, and King Hakon in 1263 began to collect and equip a fleet with a view to revenging the injury done to his subjects in the west. In the preparation for this in the spring of 1263, we find Jon Langlifson, whose mother Langlif was Harold Maddadson’s youngest daughter, and who was thus himself a nephew of Earl John, sent over with Henry Skot to Shetland to obtain pilots for King Hakon, while Dougal of the Isles met them in Orkney, and was let into the secret of Hakon’s intended expedition.

Meantime Earl Magnus II, being, according to our conjectures, a member of the Angus line, whose mother was an elder sister of Harald Ungi, and being also the husband of Earl John’s daughter, had become entitled to the earldom of Orkney soon after Earl John’s death in 1231, and probably since 1236 had held part of Caithness as Earl, by heirship, and by charter from the Scottish King. Magnus II, soon after the earldom of Sutherland had been taken away from him, had died in 1239. Gillebride had then succeeded to both the reduced Scottish earldom of Caithness and the whole of the Orkney jarldom as successor in the Angus line of Magnus II; and Gillebride had died in 1256 leaving a son Magnus III. Like his predecessors, Magnus III seems to have found himself in the awkward position of being bound to serve two masters who were rapidly approaching a state of war with each other. Freskin de Moravia, dominus de Duffus by 1248, who about that date had married the Lady Johanna, had with her obtained not only her lands in Strathnaver and Caithness, but also the bulk of the Erlend share of the earldom lands of Caithness, while Magnus held the rest of Caithness, and William, second Earl of Sutherland, then a mere boy, had succeeded to that earldom on his father’s death in 1248.

As already stated, Alexander II’s attempt on the Sudreys had proved abortive through his death in 1249, and the further attacks on them in Alexander III’s reign by William, son of Ferchar Mac-in-tagart, and Earl of Ross, had been made in 1261; and by 1262 or 1263, Freskin had died, leaving two daughters Mary and Christian, both minors and unmarried, to inherit his share of Caithness, as co-parceners, each entitled to one quarter of that county.

Early in 1263 Magnus III of Orkney and Caithness, was in Bergen with King Hakon. For the Saga says, “with him from Bergen came Magnus, Jarl of Orkney, and the king gave him a good long-ship.”

Sailing from Norway in the end of July 1263, King Hakon found a fair wind, and crossed in two days to Shetland, where he lay for a fortnight assembling his fleet in Bressay Sound off Lerwick. While he was here Jon Langlifson, son of Langlif, the youngest daughter of Earl Harold Maddadson, brought the disappointing news that King John of the Sudreys had gone over to the side of the Scottish king, but the news was disbelieved, and Hakon, at the time, had every reason to think that, while he was sure of the support of the Orkneymen and their earl, the western islanders would support him to a man. Quitting Shetland, therefore, he sailed to Orkney, and his fleet lay first at Ellidarvik or Ellwick in The String off the south of Shapinsay, a few miles from Kirkwall. While it was here, King Hakon conceived the idea of sending a squadron of his ships to raid the shores of the Moray Firth, and there is little doubt that this project was aimed at the lands of the families of De Moravia in Sutherland and Moray. The question, however, was submitted to a council of the freemen of the fleet, who proved to be unwilling that any of them should leave their king and decided that the fleet should not be divided, but that the original object of the expedition, the reconquest of the Western Isles and West of Scotland, should be adhered to instead. What Earl Magnus’ feelings on the subject were is not recorded, but it can hardly have been pleasing to him to find that his people in Caithness were to be subjected to a fine by his suzerain in Orkney, though, probably by his advice, the Caithness folk paid the fine exacted from them, and had hostages taken from them, in consequence, by the Scottish king.

Hakon’s fleet then sailed round the Mull of Deerness into the roadstead of Ragnvaldsvoe, in the north of South Ronaldsay, which is now known either as St. Margaret’s Hope or possibly as Widewall Bay in Scapa Flow, and it was while it was there that the annular eclipse of the sun, ascertained by astronomical calculation to have taken place on the 5th August 1263, was reported by the writer of the Saga to have been seen by him. While the fleet was here, it appeared that the Orkney contingent of ships which Hakon had commanded to join him, were not “boun” or ready for sea, and Jarl Magnus accordingly “stayed behind” with his people in Orkney under orders to follow the main fleet.

On St. Lawrence’s day, the 10th of August 1263, Hakon weighed anchor without the jarl, or his men, and the fleet, the largest then ever seen in these waters, sailed from Ragnvaldsvoe into the Pentland Firth, and, rounding Cape Wrath on the same day, anchored in Asleifarvik, now corruptly called Aulsher-beg or Old-shore, on the west coast of the parish of Durness in Sutherland. Thence the fleet ran across to the Lewis, whence it proceeded on a southerly course by Rona, into the Sound of Skye, and brought up at the Carline, now the Cailleach, Stone, in Kyleakin or the Kyle of Hakon. The Norse King was soon joined by King Magnus of Man, and Erling Ivar’s son, and Andres Nicholas’ son, and Halvard and Nicholas Tart, the last having made no land since he left Norway till he sighted the Lewis. Dougal, king of the Sudreys also joined King Hakon, and the fleet shortly afterwards reached Kerrera, near Oban in the Sound of Mull. The events which followed are recounted, in considerable detail and with much exaggeration on both sides, by Scottish and Norse chroniclers, but it is impossible to reconcile their different versions of the story of the battle of Largs. Nor does such detail, save in the result, affect Sutherland or Caithness. Suffice it to say, then, that after much fruitless negotiation between the two kings, purposely prolonged by the Scottish monarch, a severe and protracted October storm drove many of the Norse ships ashore near Largs, where the Scots attacked their crews; and five days later King Hakon withdrew, and sailed with the remnants of his starving and shattered fleet northwards by the Sound of Mull and Rum and Loch Snizort in Skye, and thence round Cape Wrath, to the Goa-fiord or Hoanfiord, which we know as Loch Erriboll, reaching it on Sunday, October 28th, 1263, in a profound calm.

On their way south, Erling Ivar’s son, Andrew Nicolas’ son, and Harvard the Red had “sailed into Scotland under Dyrnes, from which they went up country, and destroyed a castle and more than twenty hamlets.” But on the return voyage the children of Heth were waiting for the invaders, and on the day “of St. Simon and St. Jude, when Mass had been sung, some Scottish men, whom the Northmen had taken, came. King Hakon gave them peace and sent them up into the country; and they promised to come down with cattle to him; but one of them stayed behind as a hostage. It happened that day that eleven men of the ship of Andrew Kuzi landed in a boat to fetch water. A little after, it was heard that they called out. Then men rowed to them from the ships, and there two of them were taken up, swimming much wounded, but nine were found on land all slain. The Scots had come down on them, but they all ran to the boat, and it was high and dry, and they were all weaponless, and there was no defence. But as soon as the Scots saw the boats were rowing up, they ran to the woods, but the Northmen took the bodies with them.

“On Monday King Hakon sailed out of the Goa-fiord and let the Scottish man be put on shore, and gave him peace."

Such is the story, so far as Sutherland and Caithness are concerned, of Hakon’s expedition as told in his Saga, which adds that after losing one ship in the Pentland Firth, while another was all but sunk in the Swelchie near Stroma, he sheltered for the night in the Sound north of Osmundwall, and finally landed again near Ragnvaldsvoe and went to Kirkwall. Retaining twenty of his ships, he let such of the rest of them as had not already gone home sail for Norway.

Deserted by his Jarl, the aged king found a home in the Palace of the faithful bishop, Henry of Orkney, who, alone of all Orkney men, had followed the fortunes of the fleet. Then King Hakon’s health gradually failed, and after laying up his ships in Scapa Flow, and seeing to the welfare of his men, he lay down to die of a broken heart, listening as he sank to Masses indeed, but afterwards with greater joy to the Sagas of the Norse kings. “Near midnight” on the 15th of December “Sverri’s Saga was read through. But just as midnight was past Almighty God called King Hakon from this world’s life.”

His body lay in state, first in the Palace and then in the Cathedral of St. Magnus, where after a Solemn Mass it was temporarily buried in the Choir, and it was removed in his flag-ship to Christ Church in Bergen three months afterwards.

The consequence of King Hakon’s failure was the immediate conquest of the Isle of Man and of the Hebrides by Alexander III.

Sutherland and Caithness were saved for Scotland, it would seem, only by the vote of King Hakon’s freemen before sailing for Largs, while the defeat of his fleet there led directly to the cession by King Magnus, his successor, under the treaty of Perth in 1266, of all the Western Highlands and Islands, for a payment of 4000 marks down and of 100 marks a year, and the treaty also secured their permanent political union with Scotland.

Orkney and Shetland, however, remained part of Norway for two hundred years more, and have since 1468 been held by Scotland and afterwards by the United Kingdom only under a wadset or mortgage securing 58,000 crowns, the unpaid balance of the dower of Margaret, wife of James III of Scotland and daughter of King Christian of Norway. The right to redeem them was frequently though fruitlessly claimed by Norway and Denmark in succession until the reign of Charles II and even later; and possibly this right remains, to the legal mind, open until the present day.

On the 20th February 1471 the Earldom of Orkney and Lordship of Shetland were, by an Act of the Scottish Parliament, finally annexed to the Scottish Crown. But Norse law and usages and the Norse language long lived on in Orkney and longer still in Shetland.