Alban Gael and Gall Gael

After the evacuation of Britain by the Romans, the country north of the Firth of Forth was occupied by a Pictish people designated the Alban Gael, Cruithne of Ireland, and whose language was a type of the modern Scottish Gaelic. This people probably came first to Scotland between 500 BC and 300 BC. To the south, the Scots of Dalriada occupied part of Argyll, and the country of Mull, Islay and the Southern Isles. The Alban Gaels or Picts, north of the Forth, were divided into the Northern Picts, who held the country north of the Grampians, and the Southern Picts. When, in 844, the Dalriada, Scots and Southern Picts were united in one kingdom by Kenneth MacAlpin, the Northern Picts remained unaffected by the union. Included in the territory occupied by these Picts, or Alban Gael, were the Western Islands, known to the Gael as Innse-Gall, or the Islands of the Strangers, which later formed part of the dominion of the Kings of the Isles, progenitors of the Clan Donald.

The islands were frequently invaded by the Norse, and as such a these Norse sea rovers allied with a Pictish people, called the Gall Gael, and Dr. Skene, the historian, claims that from the Gall Gael sprung the ancestors of the clan Donald.

The name Gall has always been applied by the Gael to strangers, and Skene maintains that the Western Gaeis came, by association, to resemble their Norwegians allies in characteristics and mode of life, and thus acquired the descriptive name of Gall.

Source: History of the Clan Donald, the Families of Macdonald, McDonald and McDonnell, by Henry Lee

Images: Pict via Milady and The Knight Gentleman