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Scottish Tattoo Designs >> MacGillvray

MacGillvray Clan Tattoos The Macgillivrays were an important clan in the western isles even before King Somerled, Lord of the Isles, drove the Norsemen out of the area in the middle of the 12th century. When Alexander II subdued Argyll in 1222, the Clann Mhic Gillebrath were dispersed. Some of the clan remained in Mull and Morvern.Tradition asserts that the Gillivray, thew progenitor of the clan, placed himself under the protection of the chiefs of the Clan Macintosh. The clan thereafter belonged to the Clan Chattan confederation.

The Macgillivrays were first accurately recorded in Dunmaglas in 1549. At the great gathering of the Clan Chattan in 1690, when all bound themselves in loyalty to the young Macintosh chief and in mutual support, the 'haill kin and race of Macgillivray ' was represented by Malcolm Dalcrombie and Duncan Macfarquhar of Dunmaglas. This is a classic example of the use of patronymics and territorial designations common in the Highlands before the use of what would now be popularly consid-ered surnames became widespread in the 18th century.The Macgillivrays were supporters of an episcopacy in the church, and this caused them to be persecuted by their Calvanist and Presbyterian neighbours. In common with most of the confederated Cla Chattan families, the Macgillivrays were

Staunch Jacobites, and they fought in both the '15 and in the '45.In 1745 the chief of the Macintoshes was an officer in a Hanoverian regiment. His wife, a formidable lady with distinct Jacoboite sympathies, summoned Alexander Macgillivray and placed him in command of the regiment raised by Clan Chattan. Macgillivray was at the head of his men at Culloden where he fell along with many of his followers, and the graveyard at Dunlichity commemorates many Macgillivray fallen.

Clan MacGillvray Motto:
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See also: Claddagh, Thistle Tattoos, Scottish Lion Tattoo Designs, Welsh Dragon Tattoos, Scottish Tattoo Designs, Celtic Tattoo Designs, Family Crests,