Half Celtic, Half Viking: The Norse-Gaels, the Kingdom of the Isles and the Gallowglass

Half Celtic, Half Viking: The Norse-Gaels, the Kingdom of the Isles and the Gallowglass

Chapters:
0:00 Norse-Gaels
1:20 The Kingdom of the Isles
3:48 Gallowglass
5:11 Support

Creative Commons Imagery:

Who were the Norse-Gaels and what impact did they have on history? One of the interesting parts of the history of these islands in the North Atlantic Ocean is the interaction between different peoples over the centuries, fuelled by invasions and migrations.

The Norse Vikings are probably the most famous invading force, and their interactions with the local Gaels produced a people known as the Norse-Gaels or foreigner-Gaels, a people who had mixed Gaelic and Norse ancestry and culture. They emerged in the Viking Age, when Vikings who settled in Ireland and Scotland intermarried with the Gaels. This intermarriage meant that many Norse adopted the Gaelic language as well as many Gaelic customs. Many also left their Norse gods behind and converted to Christianity.

From around the 9th to the 13th century, the Norse-Gaels controlled large parts of the area around the Hebrides and the Irish Sea. The most powerful Norse–Gael dynasty was the House of Ivar. The Norse-Gaels founded numerous kingdoms, including the Kingdom of Dublin, the Lordship of Galloway and briefly in the 10th century they ruled the Kingdom of York. One notable kingdom of the Norse-Gaels was known as the Kingdom of the Isles, which included the territory of the Hebrides, the Isle of Man and the islands of the Clyde (notably Arran and Bute). These collection of islands were known to the Norsemen as the "Southern Isles," distinct from Northern Isles of Orkney and Shetland.

Some sources argue that the Kingdom of the Isles was a successor kingdom in a sense to Dal Raida, a Gaelic Kingdom that merged with the Picts in 843 to form the Kingdom of Alba. The exact extent of the kingdom in the early period is not fully clear, although it probably was centred on some of the Hebridean Islands and expanded out from there. We know for instance that Godred Crovan, a Norse-Gael ruler who would go on to rule Dublin as well as the Isles, conquered the Isle of Man with a force of Hebrideans around 1079 AD.

There were often fractures in the kingdom and competing claims over the rightful ruler of the isles. When the Norse-Gael lord Somerled died in 1164, the kingdom spilt into two parts. At various points, Norway took direct control of the isles. In 1266, the Hebrides and the Isle of Man became part of the Kingdom Scotland after the Treaty of Perth was signed, ending hostilities between Magnus VI of Norway and Alexander III of Scotland.

Sources:

#scotland #vikings #history

[celtichistorydecoded]

Thanks for watching! Please let me know your thoughts below...

[facoulac]

As someone with no celtic heritage, these videos are really enlightening!

[LonersGuide]

The Norse-Gaels were some really cool and badass cultural synthesis. The Norse and the Gaels were a convergence of cultures and gentetics which themselves by and large had diverged from common cultural and genetic roots. So were the Norse-Gaels in some sense a throwback to earlier Farmer, etc., stocks? For certain this has happened many times in human history, but the Norse-Gael are one case that stands out to me. For certain there was warfare and enmity between the two, but at some point they began to accept, appreciate, and even admire each other. Rather than one canceling out the other, they in some sense amplified one another. More Gaelic than the Irish, more Vikingr than the Norwegians.

[chriscoburn]

My Mum's family are McGill's from County Down, descended, patrilinealy, from Gall Gael mercenaries that arrived from Galloway in the 14th century. The family identify as Irish, but are very proud of their Scots Gallowglas heritage.

Interestingly, my Scots Dad's lowland family are of patrilineal Norse descent. You'd be surprised at how many Norsemen settled in the lowlands and the borders, marrying into the Anglian and Cumbric people that were already there.

[kh]

I have Norse-Gael ancestry, and it is my earliest recorded ancestry which wasn't too much a surprise to me. But now I know this fact, and when I hear a Scottish accent, I can hear a little bit of Norwegian... an echo of the distant past and this intermingling of cultures

[nikkicalovich]

Somerled was one of my great grandfathers. The founder of Nova Scotia was too.

[violetmoonofthenorth]

Interesting thank you! I have Scandinavian & Celtic ancestry but I’m from the northeast of 🇬🇧 booo 😆 Really enjoy your informative videos of the British isles.

[correctpolitically]

Youre getting better at this . Very good video . Well done. Direct, to the point and clear. I also appreciated the example much im sure like most of your viewers .

[DM-fjwv]

Aussie of N-G ancestry here, thank you for the great video, concise, interesting, to the point, sub'd.

[lobo]

Im from the isle of lewis my surname is Macdonald, and I can still speak gaelic, my dna test came back as 85% celtic, 11% norse and the rest was middle Eastern (no idea how that got in there) its fascinating stuff, btw the word gallowglass is a corruption of the old gaelic which when translated just meant young foreigners

[Snekbeard]

this explains alot of future history....

[maryannmoran-smyth]

Interesting show about Irish history, my parents are from Ireland and when I did my DNA scan, it was 98% Irish and 2% Scandinavian, which surprised me. It seems like your DNA goes back a long time and it doesn’t lie. Probably going way back my family was related to the Vikings during their invasions Ireland in England and Scotland

[IIJOSEPHXII]

McCafferty here, we get our name from Ihemarc who succeeded Sygtrigg Silkbeard as king of Dublin and the Isles though he's thought to be a nephew or cousin. He lost Dublin and later vassalised the Kingdom of the Isles to King Canute. He was one of three kings who vassalised their kingdoms to Canute along with the much more famous Malcolm II and Macbeth. He then left on a pilgrimage to Rome where he died in 1064.

One of the spookiest shocks I got in my life was when I first saw the head of Sygtrigg Silkbeard on a coin from the 11th century. It was the spitting image of my dad.

[sirrobinofloxley]

From my research all names with Mac are Norse-Gael. Also, have a look at "The Viking history of North West England", we're still here :)

[MCLottotv]

Long live Scotland 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 and love to all my female Scottish Matriarchs:

Jaine Jane Jean Glas Glass
Born: 1570 Edinburgh, Scotland (Central Lowland)
Death:

Issobel Liddalil Ure (Anglicized: Black)
Born: 1605 Edinburgh, Scotland (Central Lowland)
Death: ? Scotland

Margaret Wairdendownie Anderson
Born: 1650 Culross, Scotland (Northwest Lowland)
Death: 1728 Culross, Scotland (Northwest Lowland)

Dame Elizabeth Dunbar
Born: 1677 Inverness (Isle of Sky), Scotland or Aberdeenshire, Scotland (Northeast Highland/Lowland)
Death: 1756 Edinburgh, Scotland (Central Lowland)

Lucia Anna Gordon
Born: 1700 Iverness (Isle of Sky), Scotland or Moray (Drainie), Scotland (Northeast/Southern Highland)
Death: 1725 or 1726 Screven, Georgia

Effie Mary Maclean
Born: 1726 Inverness, Scotland (Northeast Highland)
Death: 1843 Walton, Florida or Laurel Hill (Okaloosa), Florida

Margaret Campbell
Born: 1754 Strathglass, Scotland (Northwest Highland)
Death: ? North Carolina

[TheRampagingGallowglass]

Fascinating! Though calling the Norse-Gaels half Viking even back then would be a bit of a stretch.
For these days the percentage of Norse blood that most living on the Isle of Skye can discern via DNA testing rarely exceeds 10-12 percent, if that. And my friend's uncle, a native of Cape Breton in Nova Scotia & of full Scottish Highland descent, took a DNA test that revealed him to be 82 percent Gaelic-Pictish in his genetic lineage, 14 percent Norse & about 4 percent Anglo-Norman.
Even in the Shetlands, the part of Britain where the inhabitants have the highest levels of Scandinavian ancestry, the Norse Viking DNA of the majority of the natives scarcely goes higher than 30 percent, tops.
Point is in the Inner & Outer Hebrides the ancient Gaelic-Pictish aspect always outweighed the amount of Norse influence, genetically & biologically speaking.
Thus the early Gallowglass mercenaries from the Hebrides leaned more indigenous Celtic than Norse Viking in their bloodlines, the substantial Norse influence in the military, political & seafaring sphere notwithstanding.

[redhorsburgh..]

I am Norse Gael on my mothers side MacDonald and my father's side Horsburgh..

[heathmahaffey]

My son had his genetic testing done just for fun recently and his mother is Faroese. We were surprised to find that he had nearly 40 percent Norwegian which means his mother must have a very high percentage of Norwegian. I would have assumed more Scottish/Irish and even Danish but most of those he got from my side. Perhaps the Faroese and modern Shetland Islanders have gone separate ways with their Norse ancestry due to their different paths nationally.

[_nz]

Like video very interesting my granddad was from Scotland 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 but I was born in New Zealand 🇳🇿 I’m Ivan and my surname MacSwain I’m still learning about my granddad side I no I’m with the MacQueen clan still about it

[pjumnuss]

Timely topic! This helps with my DNA backstory research- I'm 45% Celtic (Irish & Scottish), 42% Scandinavian and 13% Basque ( just found out that men are Indo-European- Goth- Swedish & women are Celtic )
U5 haplogroup).
This video presented some historical context for Celtic/Scandinavian gene intermingling. Thanks!