Kings of Man - Part 1 of 4
Stewart Baldwin
Composer, making significant use of different font sizes, bold face,
italic, and so forth, and was copied as text only for the posting to
soc.genealogy.medieval, so some awkwardness should be expected
regarding spacing, but it should not affect the tables (provided that
you pay attention to the directions). It will be posted in four
parts.
Stewart Baldwin
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Begin part 1 of 4
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The Kings of the Isle of Man
by Stewart Baldwin
This material is a combination of several of my postings to
soc.genealogy.medieval, with some new material added,
and significant revisions on the old material. It is an attempt to
give the genealogy of the Norse rulers of the Isle of Man, as
completely as the limited sources will allow. While an attempt has
been made to use primary sources (or translations thereof),
there are still a few cases (clearly marked, and generally using good
secondary sources like The Complete Peerage) where I have
not tracked statements back to the primary sources. Hopefully, this
will change in future revisions as I get access to the
appropriate material. Table 1 sets the background by showing the
realtionships of several kings of Dublin who were (or might have
been) related to the kings of Man. Tables 2 through 5 then give the
main genealogical relationships, with a section discussing the
possible parentage of Godred Crovan, and an appendix showing the
problems of identification involving several men named
Ragnall. Because of the uncertainties involved, the kings of Man are
difficult to number, and the kings given here have been
assigned lowercase Romas numerals for purposes of identification.
This numbering is done for the purposes of this article, and has
no official status whatsoever, a fact which will hopefully be
emphasized by the use of lowercase. The first three tables are based
mostly on the Irish annals, and the last two mostly on the Chronicle
of the Kings of Man. Bibliographic abbreviations are given at
the end. I would like to thank Peter Murray for pointing out some
corrections to the earlier versions of this material.
Note: The tables given here were designed to work with a fixed-width
font and a line length of seventy or more characters. To
test whether or not the tables are displaying correctly on your
computer, look at the characters below this paragraph. If the line of
periods and the line of W's have the same length, and neither spills
over to form two lines, then everything should be OK. If not,
the tables might not all be displaying correctly.
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Table 1: The Kings of Dublin
The kingdom of Dublin was established by the Norse invaders of Ireland
in the ninth century. By the early tenth century, it had
become a hereditary kingdom ruled by the descendants of the ninth
century ruler Ivar (d. 873). The kings of Dublin were also
often kings of York during the early period, and cadet branches of
this dynasty appear to have also ruled in Limerick, Waterford,
the Isles, and Man, although it is not always possible to determine
the exact relationship to the "main line" ruling in Dublin. The
principle Dublin branch descends from Sitric (d. 927), who is
consistently referred to in the Irish annals as a grandson of Ivar,
the intervening generation being uncertain. No attempt is made here
to give a complete table for the Dublin kings, and the only
individuals shown are the principle kings of Dublin and the
individuals relevant to the possible connections with the rulers of
Man discussed below.
Sitric, d. 927 [AU],
grandson of Ivar
king of Dublin and York
______________________|.............? [see Note]
| |
Olaf Cuaran, d. 981 Harald, d. 940 [AI, CS]
king of Dublin and York king of Limerick
abdicated 980 [CS] [see Table 2]
________|_____________________________________________
| | | |
Ragnall, d. 980 [AU] Glun Iarainn Sitric Silkbeard Harald
[see discussion d. 989 [AU] d. 1042 [AT] d. 999 [AU]
below of identity king of Dublin king of Dublin |
of men of this name] deposed 1036 Ivar,
d. 1054 [AU]
king of
Dublin
|
later kings of Man?
see discussion below
Note: Harald ("Aralt") is referred to as the grandson of Ivar in AI.
CS calls him a son of the grandson of Ivar, i.e., of Sitric
("Aralt mac .h. Imair .i. mac Sitric, Rí gall Luimnigh, do marbad la
Connachtoíbh"). If the account of CS is literally true, and the
"grandson" of AI just means descendant in general, then Harald would
probably be a brother of Olaf Cuaran, as shown in the
table. However, Ivar also had a son named Sitric (d. 896), so if the
"mac .h." is a mistake for just ".h." (a common abbreviation for
the word "ua" ["grandson'] and its various declensions), then Harald
may have been son of this earlier Sitric.
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Table 2: Kings of "the Isles" (including the Isle of Man?)
During the late tenth and early eleventh centuries, a dynasty briefly
appears whose kings were called kings of the Isles (i.e.,
principally the Hebrides), and at least one of these kings (Godred,
who is called king of Man in Njal's Saga, an Icelandic source)
appears to have ruled in Man (See also, HBC, ESSH, and CGG). The use
of the rare name "Lagman" among the later kings of
Man also suggests that they regarded themselves as the successors of
these kings of "the Isles".
Harald (Aralt), d. 940 [AI, CS],
king of Limerick
[see Table 1]
|
|[see Note 1]
|
Godred (Goffraid) i, d. 989 [AU]
king of the Isles
____________|________________ [see Note 2]
| |
Reginald (Ragnall) i Lagmann i, ruling 1014
king of the Isles, d. 1004/5 king of the Isles
|
Olaf (Amlaib), d. 23 Apr 1014
killed at Clontarf [AU]
Note 1: The Harald who was father of Godred is not identified in the
primary sources, but the king of Limerick of that name
seems like the most likely individual. In the list of the kings of
Man, NHI (vol. 9, p. 466) suggests that the Harald who was father
of Godred might have been Harald of Denmark (son of Gorm the Old), but
this seems unlikely. Some would include a certain
"Magnus", also a son of Harald, as another king during this period,
but it is likely that this is a mistake. The existence of a
"Magnus" son of Harald is given only in late sources, and seems to be
a error for "mac Arailt" in the earlier sources, in which
"mac" became "Maccus" and then "Magnus" in successive corruptions of
the records. In further support of this, observe that the
personal name "Magnus" is based on the Latin word magnus ("great"),
and, if we are to give any credence to the account of
Heimskringla, the name derives more directly from Charlemagne
("Carolus Magnus" in Latin), with king Magnus "the Good" of
Norway being the first individual of that name. This would seem to
exclude the possibility that a Viking bore that name as early as
the tenth century. While it is possible that "Maccus" is a corruption
of some other Scandinavian name, it seems much more likley
that the "mac Arailt" who appears in the annals was the son of Harald
about whom we already know, i.e., Goffraid mac Arailt.
Note 2: AU, in listing those who fell at the famous Battle of
Clontarf on 23 April 1014, names a certain Olaf son of Lagman
("Amlaim m. Laghmaind") as one of the Norse leaders who fell. CGG,
written in the early twelfth century, also mentions the same
individual, where the different manuscripts call him Amlaf Lagman son
of Goffraidh, Amlaf son of Lagmann son of Gofraidh, or
Amhlaibh son of Laghman. Given the testimony of the other witnesses
(and AU in particular), it would seem that the first of these
manuscripts accidently left out a "son of", and that the Amlaib who
was killed at Clontarf was son of Lagman, son of Goffraid.
William of Jumiéges, in describing the events just after the death of
king Svein Forkbeard of Denmark (1014), states that his son
Cnut sought support from two kings, Lacman of the Swedes and Olaf of
the Norsemen (i.e., of Norway) ["... Lacman equidem
Suauorum et Olauum Noricorum" - See GND, vol. 2, pp. 19-27]. Since no
king named Lacman was ruling in Sweden at the time,
the reasonable suggestion has been made that "Suauorum" was a scribal
slip for "Sudrorum", and that Lacman was king of the
Hebrides (i.e., "the Isles"), and this seems like a safe emendation,
given the evidence of AU and CGH
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End part 1 of 4