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Sir Crispin Agnew of
Lochnaw, Baronet, QC, Rothesay Herald of Arms and Chief of Clan Agnew,
also makes mention of Clan ‘septs’ in his article ‘Clans, Families & Septs’;
“It should also be said
that the various Sept lists, which are published in the various Clans and
Tartan books, have no official authority. They merely represent some
person's, (usually in the Victorian eras) views of which name groups were in
a particular clan's territory. Thus we find members of a clan described, as
being persons owing allegiance to their chief "be pretence of blud or place
of thare duelling". In addition to blood members of the clan, certain
families have a tradition (even if the tradition can with the aid of modern
records be shown to be wrong) descent from a particular clan chief. They
are, of course, still recognised as being members of the clan.
Historically, the
concept of "clan territory" also gives rise to difficulty, particularly as
certain names or Septs claim allegiance to a particular chief, because they
come from his territory. The extent of the territory of any particular chief
varied from time to time depending on the waxing and waning of his power.
Thus a particular name living on the boundaries of a clan's territory would
find that while the chiefs power was on the up they would owe him allegiance
but - if his power declined retrospectively at some arbitrary' date which
the compiler of the list has selected. Often the names are Scotland-wide and
so it is difficult to say that particular name belongs to a particular clan.
Often surnames are shown as potentially being members of a number of clans,
and this is because a number of that name has been found in each different
clan's territory. Generally speaking, if a person has a particular sept name
which can he attributed to a number of clans, either they should determine
from what part of Scotland their family originally came and owe allegiance
to the clan of that area or, alternatively, if they do not know where they
came from, they should perhaps owe allegiance to the clan to which their
family had traditionally owed allegiance. Alternatively, they may offer
their allegiance to any of the particular named clans in the hope that the
chief will accept them as a member of his clan. Equally, as has already been
said, with the variations from time to time of particular chiefly
territories, it can be said that at one particular era some names were
members of or owed allegiance to a particular chief while a century later
their allegiance may well have been owed elsewhere.
In summary, therefore,
the right to belong to a clan or family, which are the same thing, is a
matter for the determination of the chief who is entitled to accept or
reject persons who offer him their allegiance.” |
