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Laird Connections with Clan Sinclair



In Norman French Legend there was a Cockerel called "
Chanticleer", documented in Geoffrey Chaucer's Canterbury Tale, The Nun's Priest's Tale, signifying  possibly = "Chanter Clair" = "Sing-Clair"



Badge: Whin (in English "Gorse" or "Furze")
© Iain Laird: photographed in Roslin Glen May 2006

 

Music: "Hail to the Chief!" from
Taylor's Traditional Tunebook - dedicated to our Clan Chief, the Earl of Caithness
For more Scots Tunes visit Allan M. Ferguson's website at
http://members.home.net/amferguson/music/music1.html#Scotmusic. To stop the music, go the the control panel.

Hunting_Sinclair_Wallpaper.GIF (8568 bytes)

Ancient Sinclair

Ancient Hunting Sinclair

To set Tartan as "Wallpaper", right click on image and use command

We are members of the Clan Sinclair Society in Caithness, and I was a Trustee of the Clan Sinclair Trust, and created the Chief's Clan Sinclair website until in 2008. The Sinclairs are the noble family of Caithness and are described as the "Lordly Line of High Sinclair" by Sir Walter Scott, in The Lay of the Last Minstrel. The Clan motto is "Commit thy work to God". The Sinclairs of Roslin, just south of Edinburgh, had come over before William the Conqueror, and take their name from the village of Saint Clair in Normandy. In the 14th Century William Sinclair forged an alliance with his relatives in Norway by marriage and his son, Henry, was granted the title of Earl (Jarl) of Orkney by King Håkon VI in 1379. Prince Henry led the first documented voyage to North America in 1398. (There were many transatlantic voyages before that by fishermen, Vikings and Irish monks. Columbus was very late in the day). The Sinclairs later ceded the Orkneys to the Crown and were given the Earldom of Caithness.
At the time James IV led his Army to
Flodden field in 1513, the Sinclairs were in disgrace for some unrecorded reason. When James saw them in his ranks he sent for them and hastily wrote a pardon on a Sinclair drumhead. The pardon was so significant the Earl of Caithness sent it home with the drummer boy, a Gunn. He was the only survivor of the Sinclair force as the billhooks of the Earl of Surrey's Army overcame the traditional long spears of Scotland. To this day a Sinclair will not cross the Ord of Caithness on a Monday wearing the Green, as it is deemed unlucky, as they wore it on their way to the tragic defeat in 1513 that is remembered in the pipe lament "Flowers of the Forest".



 


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