Chapter 3 - On the mythical (Clan) Gunn Chiefs before Coroner Gunn
3. On the mythical ‘Gunn Chiefs’ from Ottar Snaekollson to Coroner Gunn
The individual chapters can be downloaded as pdfs from latrobe.academia.edu/AlastairGunn
The … line of (the supposed early ‘Gunn Chiefs’) descent is very shadowy …[1]
Mark Rugg Gunn
There are various versions of the names, years and sequences of the supposed ‘Gunn Chiefs’ between Ottar and Coroner Gunn; at one point I had six competing descent lines. This is in itself unusual as Clans normally have a clear sequence for the Chief line.
Mark Rugg Gunn used the New Hebrides[2] ‘Gunn Chief’ line of
He noted the Rev. Alexander Gunn of Watten omitted James de Gun from his ‘Gunn Chief’ line.[3]
The insurmountable problems with the first two ‘Chiefs’ mentioned, namely Snaekoll Gunnison and Ottar Snaekollson, have already been discussed in chapter 2; they were not Gunns. Problems of a similar magnitude exist for the other ‘Chiefs’ before Coroner Gunn (often wrongly called ‘Crowner’ Gunn – see chapter 8). Coroner Gunn existed but he was not a Chief, rather he was the first Gunn known to history.
The supposed ‘Clan Gunn Chiefs’ onwards from Ottar were –
3.1 James De Gun / de Gunn (or Jakop / James Gunn)
Primary source proof for James De Gun[4] is missing. The name comes from a mid 1800s family tree some five hundred years or so after James de Gun was supposedly born. That’s a big gap; it implies fiction at work.
The next problem with James De Gun (and the other ‘Chiefs’) is the patronymic surname already discussed in chapter 2.1. To briefly restate –
‘Many Scottish surnames originated in patronymics, whereby a son’s surname derived from the father’s forename, e.g. John Donaldson’s son might be Peter Johnson, whose son might be Magnus Peterson, and so on. Patronymics present something of a challenge for the family historian in that the surname changed with each successive generation. This practice died out in Lowland Scotland after the 15th century, as patronymic surnames became permanent family names. It persisted, however, in the Highlands & Islands well into the 18th century….’[5]
Now, given Snaekoll’s birth around 1200 this meant his supposed son Ottar ought to have been born say 1220-1230 which means a James De Gunn (if he existed) was born around 1250-1260. It seems extremely unlikely that a normal family in the Scottish Highlands would have a fixed surname[6] hundreds of years before the rest of the Scottish Highlands had fixed surnames. Lord Lyon’s position is that Scottish ‘surnames were generally adopted in the 17th century’[7] so the supposed surname De Gunn occurred at the earliest four hundred years before surnames were generally adopted by Scotland. That is impossible.
And consider ‘De Gunn’[8] with its powerful, aristocratic Norman invader connotations, if somehow Gunns had become De Gunn, then De Gunn would have been how the name stayed but that is not what happened. And why and how would a Norman addition be applied to the word Gunn? If somehow Gunns married into a Norman family then Gunns would have taken on the whole Norman surname as the Normans had he money and the power.
There is a suggestion[9] that James De Gun was really a Jakop / James Gunn. That name is marginally better as it loses the Norman problem of De Gun and Jakob is a valid Norwegian translation for James. But the issue of a fixed surname when they were not adopted by the rest of Scotland remains a major issue. And Jakob / James Gun suffers from the same key problem of James De Gunn; there is no evidence of his life, parents or children.
3.2 Ingram Gunn
After one or other of the James we are meant to have Ingram, or Sir Donald Gunn of Clyth and Ulbster (see 4.3) if you support the Watten Tree. Mark Rugg Gunn’s sole proof for the existence of ‘Chief Ingram Gunn’ is that he ‘witnessed a Charter in the time of David II (1329-1370)’.[10]
The Ingeram de Gynis who was the said witness was cousin of King Alexander III of Scotland and was actually Enguerrand de Guines, later Lord of Coucy. He was also witness to letters of King Alexander III c. 1285 which were later mentioned in an Inspection of King David II in 1369.[11] ‘Enguerrand de Guines, went to Scotland to make his fortune under his cousin, Alexander III. The king arranged his marriage to Christiana de Lindsay, daughter of William de Lindsay of Lamberton and a niece of John de Bailleul (a future King of Scotland). She was the heiress to the Barony of Durisdeer and Enoch in Galloway and held lands in southern Scotland and in England at Kendal in Westmoreland. Their marriage and his kinship to the king catapulted his career and included him in the core of the Scottish court….’[12] It makes sense – a King would have witnesses from amongst his family or well-known courtiers, not a random, unknown Gunn from the Highlands of Scotland who then disappeared from the history books. Burke’s Peerage[13] has just a token ‘Gun’ for the period around Ingram’s time.
3.3 The knighthood ‘Chief Gunn’ problem
Mythically the ‘Gunn Chiefs’ then went[14] Sir Donald Gunn of Clyth and Ulbster followed by Sir James Gunn of Clyth and Ulbster[15] but there is no supporting primary evidence for either ever being alive nor, obviously, having anything to do with Clyth and Ulbster. After them came Coroner Gunn. They are also not mentioned in Sir Robert Gordon’s text; that is a major problem.
We are back to the James De Gun problem; the knighted Gunns were ‘found’ in the 1800s some five hundred plus years after they supposedly lived so fiction has to be assumed. And Donald and James are such English names; they do not ring true for Celtic / Norse Scotland of the 1300s which supports the fictional nature of these knights.
The knighthood problem.
An additional problem for these knighted Gunns is that knighthoods were not traditional in Scotland even by 1507-1508.[16] In fact, there was no Scottish knighthood order by 1558.[17] Coroner Gunn lived in the first half of the 1400s so a Gunn to be knighted before him would have had to have done something amazing which royalty really appreciated[18] and therefore made that Gunn into a knight, and such a Gunn would consequently be known to history and none is so known. Without historical support the idea of an amazing Gunn being knighted is so unlikely it can be ignored.
The second problem is that knighthoods were an Anglo-Norman import and ‘when knights appear in Scotland they bear names that indicate an English or even Continental origin’[19] – in other words knights were not local Scottish families like the Gunns.
The third problem is that Scottish knighthoods mattered when they were introduced; the ‘absence of any class dividing line below the rank of baron, between noble and non-noble, in Scottish freeholding landed society made knighthood important as an index of high standing, especially for the upwardly mobile. That, and the endurance of feudal bonds and of the forty day military service obligation of knights, gave the knight a social significance that was relatively sharper than that which it enjoyed in, say, the English sub-baronial genteel society of knights and esquires’[20] So, with Scottish knights we are talking important figures in local history, much more than with English knights of the time but, as said, there are no primary sources for these Gunn knights and there should be as Scottish knights were significant figures. The lack of all evidence adds support to the fictional nature of these knights.
And finally, there are the problems inherent in the myths. The mythical ‘Gunn Chiefs’ did not have knighthoods, then they do and then the knighthood disappeared before Coroner Gunn. But knighthoods were inheritable so why wasn’t Coroner Gunn a knight if he was the eldest son of Sir James Gunn (if Sir James existed)?[21] If Coroner Gunn was not the oldest son he needed a knighted older brother to inherit the title. But no mention of this brother exists and he would have been mentioned as Coroner Gunn was so important. In other words, the knighthood of Sir James Gunn would have been inherited by his eldest son[22] but that eldest son does not appear in history nor mythology. Again, evidence that the knighted Gunns did not exist.
3.4 Conclusion
The list of the supposed ‘Gunn Chiefs’ before Coroner Gunn fails.
Three of the names existed but had nothing to do with the Gunns, the other two lack the slightest bit of supporting evidence – or logic - for their existence. As well, the total lack of links from one generation to the other show that this ‘Gunn Chief’ tree should be ignored.
Overall the ‘Clan Gunn Chiefs’ before Coroner Gunn only live in fantasy land.[23]
***
[1] Page 35, Mark Rugg Gunn, Clan Gunn.
[2] Page 35, Mark Rugg Gunn, ibid. Charles Mosley, editor, Burke's Peerage, Baronetage & Knightage, 107th edition, 3 volumes (Wilmington, Delaware, U.S.A.: Burke's Peerage (Genealogical Books) Ltd, 2003, volume 2, page 1705. Hereafter cited as Burke's Peerage.offers a different descent but shares three of the ‘Chiefs.’
[3] There are a suggested seven generations from Snaekoll born 1200 to Coroner Gunn born about 1410; this required each generation to be born about thirty-five years after the previous generation which seems a remarkably big year gap especially in the days before contraception. If this was accurate – which it isn’t – generations are missing.
[4] The only ‘de Gunn’ I have found anywhere is a British Engineer mentioned in Pepys ‘Diary’, see also page 438, Granville Penn, Memorials of the Professional Life and Times of Sir William Penn, Knt. Admiral and General of the Fleet during the interregnum; Admiral and Commissioner of the Admiralty and Navy, After the Restoration from 1644-1670.
[5] From ‘Scotlands People’ http://www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk/Content/Help/index.aspx?r=551&560 accessed 1 May 2014.
[6] As mentioned in chapter 2.1 a few, very elite families had early, fixed surnames and these families fill the history books; for example, the Lords of the Isles. Gunns were nowhere near that social league.
[7] Court of the Lord Lyon, ‘Coat of Arms and Crest Badges’ 2013 booklet. Even in 1652 the name Gunn was not fixed; Gun and Gune / Gune / Gunes were used by Alexander Gunn (MacHamish). See chapter 1.4.
[8] All sorts of Norman surnames begin with ‘De’ – see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_Lucy for an example.
[9] Page 1705, Burke's Peerage.
[10] Page 35, Mark Rugg Gunn, Clan Gunn.
[11] See https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=L-2qBgAAQBAJ&pg=PA186&lpg=PA186&dq=Regesta+Regum+Scottorum+VI:+The+Acts+of+David+II,+no.+436&source=bl&ots=bbXdaAjNkh&sig=umugg_VcROhOEO21D-U2eoMMJUA&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjQw-u3-fHSAhWmIMAKHXUrAIwQ6AEIHzAB#v=onepage&q=gynis&f=false page 247 for further detail. Accessed 21 June 2014.
[12] Page 196, M. A. Pollock, Scotland, England and France after the loss of Normandy 1204-1296; ‘Auld Amitie’.
[13] Page 1705, Burke's Peerage.
[14] With slight variations from tree to tree.
[15] According to Burke’s Peerage without Clyth and Ulbster.
[16] Page 192, Andrea Thomas ‘The Renaissance’ in ed. T. M. Devine and J Wormald’s The Oxford Handbook of Modern Scottish History says ‘despite popular tradition and rather surprisingly, it seems that there was no formally established Scottish order of knighthood at this time.’
[17] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_of_the_Thistle accessed 31 January 2013 confirms no Scottish order of Knighthood by 1558. And the Gunns, in remote Caithness, were meant to have knighthoods in the 1300s!
[18] It was possible to become a knight through exceptional royal service; ‘it was through royal service that (gave) ... final legitimisation for entry into knighthood’ Page 14, K Stevenson’s Chivalry and Knighthood in Scotland 1424-1513 but that would be fully documented in royal archives and Gunns are not so mentioned. If Coroner Gunn had been knighted that would make some sense; but the ‘knighted’ Gunns have no history nor stories attached to them.
[19] Pages 154-155, David Crouch, The Image of the Aristoctacy in Britain 1000-1300.
[20] Being from a review of K Stevenson’s Chivalry and Knighthood in Scotland 1424-1513 by Dr Maurice Keen, University of Oxford http://www.history.ac.uk/reviews/review/613 accessed 31 January 2013.
[21] Page 13-14, K Stevenson’s Chivalry and Knighthood in Scotland 1424-1513. Scottish knights (1424-1513) ‘First and foremost a knight was expected to have a noble lineage and prove he was directly descended from a line of knights... heredity was a prime concern with regard to eligibility for knighthood in the fifteenth century.’
[22] Or perhaps one might argue that Sir James Gunn did exist but Coroner Gunn was not his son - that fails as a solution due to knighthood issues and it wrecks the mythic ‘Clan Gunn Chief’ line.
[23] Donald Sage Page 57 Memorabilia Domestica makes reference to the church at Kildonan (around the 1800s-1830s) having ‘the burial places of the Chiefs of the Clan Gunn’ – this can be ignored as folk gossip as there is no evidence of any Gunn Chief, nor is there any proof known of the ‘Chief’ graves. It may be better viewed as the place the main (‘chief’ if you prefer) Gunns of the district were buried. Sage here is repeating what he was told, not what he personally knew.
The individual chapters can be downloaded as pdfs from latrobe.academia.edu/AlastairGunn
The … line of (the supposed early ‘Gunn Chiefs’) descent is very shadowy …[1]
Mark Rugg Gunn
There are various versions of the names, years and sequences of the supposed ‘Gunn Chiefs’ between Ottar and Coroner Gunn; at one point I had six competing descent lines. This is in itself unusual as Clans normally have a clear sequence for the Chief line.
Mark Rugg Gunn used the New Hebrides[2] ‘Gunn Chief’ line of
- Snaekoll,
- Ottar,
- James de Gun,
- Ingram,
- Sir Donald Gun of Clyth and Ulbster,
- Sir James Gun of Clyth and Ulbster,
- ‘George’ the ‘Crowner’
He noted the Rev. Alexander Gunn of Watten omitted James de Gun from his ‘Gunn Chief’ line.[3]
The insurmountable problems with the first two ‘Chiefs’ mentioned, namely Snaekoll Gunnison and Ottar Snaekollson, have already been discussed in chapter 2; they were not Gunns. Problems of a similar magnitude exist for the other ‘Chiefs’ before Coroner Gunn (often wrongly called ‘Crowner’ Gunn – see chapter 8). Coroner Gunn existed but he was not a Chief, rather he was the first Gunn known to history.
The supposed ‘Clan Gunn Chiefs’ onwards from Ottar were –
3.1 James De Gun / de Gunn (or Jakop / James Gunn)
Primary source proof for James De Gun[4] is missing. The name comes from a mid 1800s family tree some five hundred years or so after James de Gun was supposedly born. That’s a big gap; it implies fiction at work.
The next problem with James De Gun (and the other ‘Chiefs’) is the patronymic surname already discussed in chapter 2.1. To briefly restate –
‘Many Scottish surnames originated in patronymics, whereby a son’s surname derived from the father’s forename, e.g. John Donaldson’s son might be Peter Johnson, whose son might be Magnus Peterson, and so on. Patronymics present something of a challenge for the family historian in that the surname changed with each successive generation. This practice died out in Lowland Scotland after the 15th century, as patronymic surnames became permanent family names. It persisted, however, in the Highlands & Islands well into the 18th century….’[5]
Now, given Snaekoll’s birth around 1200 this meant his supposed son Ottar ought to have been born say 1220-1230 which means a James De Gunn (if he existed) was born around 1250-1260. It seems extremely unlikely that a normal family in the Scottish Highlands would have a fixed surname[6] hundreds of years before the rest of the Scottish Highlands had fixed surnames. Lord Lyon’s position is that Scottish ‘surnames were generally adopted in the 17th century’[7] so the supposed surname De Gunn occurred at the earliest four hundred years before surnames were generally adopted by Scotland. That is impossible.
And consider ‘De Gunn’[8] with its powerful, aristocratic Norman invader connotations, if somehow Gunns had become De Gunn, then De Gunn would have been how the name stayed but that is not what happened. And why and how would a Norman addition be applied to the word Gunn? If somehow Gunns married into a Norman family then Gunns would have taken on the whole Norman surname as the Normans had he money and the power.
There is a suggestion[9] that James De Gun was really a Jakop / James Gunn. That name is marginally better as it loses the Norman problem of De Gun and Jakob is a valid Norwegian translation for James. But the issue of a fixed surname when they were not adopted by the rest of Scotland remains a major issue. And Jakob / James Gun suffers from the same key problem of James De Gunn; there is no evidence of his life, parents or children.
3.2 Ingram Gunn
After one or other of the James we are meant to have Ingram, or Sir Donald Gunn of Clyth and Ulbster (see 4.3) if you support the Watten Tree. Mark Rugg Gunn’s sole proof for the existence of ‘Chief Ingram Gunn’ is that he ‘witnessed a Charter in the time of David II (1329-1370)’.[10]
The Ingeram de Gynis who was the said witness was cousin of King Alexander III of Scotland and was actually Enguerrand de Guines, later Lord of Coucy. He was also witness to letters of King Alexander III c. 1285 which were later mentioned in an Inspection of King David II in 1369.[11] ‘Enguerrand de Guines, went to Scotland to make his fortune under his cousin, Alexander III. The king arranged his marriage to Christiana de Lindsay, daughter of William de Lindsay of Lamberton and a niece of John de Bailleul (a future King of Scotland). She was the heiress to the Barony of Durisdeer and Enoch in Galloway and held lands in southern Scotland and in England at Kendal in Westmoreland. Their marriage and his kinship to the king catapulted his career and included him in the core of the Scottish court….’[12] It makes sense – a King would have witnesses from amongst his family or well-known courtiers, not a random, unknown Gunn from the Highlands of Scotland who then disappeared from the history books. Burke’s Peerage[13] has just a token ‘Gun’ for the period around Ingram’s time.
3.3 The knighthood ‘Chief Gunn’ problem
Mythically the ‘Gunn Chiefs’ then went[14] Sir Donald Gunn of Clyth and Ulbster followed by Sir James Gunn of Clyth and Ulbster[15] but there is no supporting primary evidence for either ever being alive nor, obviously, having anything to do with Clyth and Ulbster. After them came Coroner Gunn. They are also not mentioned in Sir Robert Gordon’s text; that is a major problem.
We are back to the James De Gun problem; the knighted Gunns were ‘found’ in the 1800s some five hundred plus years after they supposedly lived so fiction has to be assumed. And Donald and James are such English names; they do not ring true for Celtic / Norse Scotland of the 1300s which supports the fictional nature of these knights.
The knighthood problem.
An additional problem for these knighted Gunns is that knighthoods were not traditional in Scotland even by 1507-1508.[16] In fact, there was no Scottish knighthood order by 1558.[17] Coroner Gunn lived in the first half of the 1400s so a Gunn to be knighted before him would have had to have done something amazing which royalty really appreciated[18] and therefore made that Gunn into a knight, and such a Gunn would consequently be known to history and none is so known. Without historical support the idea of an amazing Gunn being knighted is so unlikely it can be ignored.
The second problem is that knighthoods were an Anglo-Norman import and ‘when knights appear in Scotland they bear names that indicate an English or even Continental origin’[19] – in other words knights were not local Scottish families like the Gunns.
The third problem is that Scottish knighthoods mattered when they were introduced; the ‘absence of any class dividing line below the rank of baron, between noble and non-noble, in Scottish freeholding landed society made knighthood important as an index of high standing, especially for the upwardly mobile. That, and the endurance of feudal bonds and of the forty day military service obligation of knights, gave the knight a social significance that was relatively sharper than that which it enjoyed in, say, the English sub-baronial genteel society of knights and esquires’[20] So, with Scottish knights we are talking important figures in local history, much more than with English knights of the time but, as said, there are no primary sources for these Gunn knights and there should be as Scottish knights were significant figures. The lack of all evidence adds support to the fictional nature of these knights.
And finally, there are the problems inherent in the myths. The mythical ‘Gunn Chiefs’ did not have knighthoods, then they do and then the knighthood disappeared before Coroner Gunn. But knighthoods were inheritable so why wasn’t Coroner Gunn a knight if he was the eldest son of Sir James Gunn (if Sir James existed)?[21] If Coroner Gunn was not the oldest son he needed a knighted older brother to inherit the title. But no mention of this brother exists and he would have been mentioned as Coroner Gunn was so important. In other words, the knighthood of Sir James Gunn would have been inherited by his eldest son[22] but that eldest son does not appear in history nor mythology. Again, evidence that the knighted Gunns did not exist.
3.4 Conclusion
The list of the supposed ‘Gunn Chiefs’ before Coroner Gunn fails.
Three of the names existed but had nothing to do with the Gunns, the other two lack the slightest bit of supporting evidence – or logic - for their existence. As well, the total lack of links from one generation to the other show that this ‘Gunn Chief’ tree should be ignored.
Overall the ‘Clan Gunn Chiefs’ before Coroner Gunn only live in fantasy land.[23]
***
[1] Page 35, Mark Rugg Gunn, Clan Gunn.
[2] Page 35, Mark Rugg Gunn, ibid. Charles Mosley, editor, Burke's Peerage, Baronetage & Knightage, 107th edition, 3 volumes (Wilmington, Delaware, U.S.A.: Burke's Peerage (Genealogical Books) Ltd, 2003, volume 2, page 1705. Hereafter cited as Burke's Peerage.offers a different descent but shares three of the ‘Chiefs.’
[3] There are a suggested seven generations from Snaekoll born 1200 to Coroner Gunn born about 1410; this required each generation to be born about thirty-five years after the previous generation which seems a remarkably big year gap especially in the days before contraception. If this was accurate – which it isn’t – generations are missing.
[4] The only ‘de Gunn’ I have found anywhere is a British Engineer mentioned in Pepys ‘Diary’, see also page 438, Granville Penn, Memorials of the Professional Life and Times of Sir William Penn, Knt. Admiral and General of the Fleet during the interregnum; Admiral and Commissioner of the Admiralty and Navy, After the Restoration from 1644-1670.
[5] From ‘Scotlands People’ http://www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk/Content/Help/index.aspx?r=551&560 accessed 1 May 2014.
[6] As mentioned in chapter 2.1 a few, very elite families had early, fixed surnames and these families fill the history books; for example, the Lords of the Isles. Gunns were nowhere near that social league.
[7] Court of the Lord Lyon, ‘Coat of Arms and Crest Badges’ 2013 booklet. Even in 1652 the name Gunn was not fixed; Gun and Gune / Gune / Gunes were used by Alexander Gunn (MacHamish). See chapter 1.4.
[8] All sorts of Norman surnames begin with ‘De’ – see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_Lucy for an example.
[9] Page 1705, Burke's Peerage.
[10] Page 35, Mark Rugg Gunn, Clan Gunn.
[11] See https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=L-2qBgAAQBAJ&pg=PA186&lpg=PA186&dq=Regesta+Regum+Scottorum+VI:+The+Acts+of+David+II,+no.+436&source=bl&ots=bbXdaAjNkh&sig=umugg_VcROhOEO21D-U2eoMMJUA&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjQw-u3-fHSAhWmIMAKHXUrAIwQ6AEIHzAB#v=onepage&q=gynis&f=false page 247 for further detail. Accessed 21 June 2014.
[12] Page 196, M. A. Pollock, Scotland, England and France after the loss of Normandy 1204-1296; ‘Auld Amitie’.
[13] Page 1705, Burke's Peerage.
[14] With slight variations from tree to tree.
[15] According to Burke’s Peerage without Clyth and Ulbster.
[16] Page 192, Andrea Thomas ‘The Renaissance’ in ed. T. M. Devine and J Wormald’s The Oxford Handbook of Modern Scottish History says ‘despite popular tradition and rather surprisingly, it seems that there was no formally established Scottish order of knighthood at this time.’
[17] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_of_the_Thistle accessed 31 January 2013 confirms no Scottish order of Knighthood by 1558. And the Gunns, in remote Caithness, were meant to have knighthoods in the 1300s!
[18] It was possible to become a knight through exceptional royal service; ‘it was through royal service that (gave) ... final legitimisation for entry into knighthood’ Page 14, K Stevenson’s Chivalry and Knighthood in Scotland 1424-1513 but that would be fully documented in royal archives and Gunns are not so mentioned. If Coroner Gunn had been knighted that would make some sense; but the ‘knighted’ Gunns have no history nor stories attached to them.
[19] Pages 154-155, David Crouch, The Image of the Aristoctacy in Britain 1000-1300.
[20] Being from a review of K Stevenson’s Chivalry and Knighthood in Scotland 1424-1513 by Dr Maurice Keen, University of Oxford http://www.history.ac.uk/reviews/review/613 accessed 31 January 2013.
[21] Page 13-14, K Stevenson’s Chivalry and Knighthood in Scotland 1424-1513. Scottish knights (1424-1513) ‘First and foremost a knight was expected to have a noble lineage and prove he was directly descended from a line of knights... heredity was a prime concern with regard to eligibility for knighthood in the fifteenth century.’
[22] Or perhaps one might argue that Sir James Gunn did exist but Coroner Gunn was not his son - that fails as a solution due to knighthood issues and it wrecks the mythic ‘Clan Gunn Chief’ line.
[23] Donald Sage Page 57 Memorabilia Domestica makes reference to the church at Kildonan (around the 1800s-1830s) having ‘the burial places of the Chiefs of the Clan Gunn’ – this can be ignored as folk gossip as there is no evidence of any Gunn Chief, nor is there any proof known of the ‘Chief’ graves. It may be better viewed as the place the main (‘chief’ if you prefer) Gunns of the district were buried. Sage here is repeating what he was told, not what he personally knew.