46 Transactions. 



aiming at nothing else than the extirpation of the vanquished- 

 During the 5th century Britisli tribes held the country. The 

 Anglo-Saxons next overran it, intermarrying with the natives. 

 Colonists from the Irish coasts made frequent descents, and ulti- 

 mately overawed the inhabitants. Large swarms from the Irish 

 hiv^ in the 9th and 10th centuries, and settlements of their- 

 kindred Scots from Cantyre, who arrived in curraghs by sea, 

 strengthened the Celtic invasion. The Scandinavians confined 

 themselves to settlements on the coast. From the Gaelic settlers 

 is said to have come the name of Galloway. The Normans 

 obtained a certain ascendancy in Galloway, but were never 

 popular. After the Galloway contingent returned from England, 

 having there witnessed William the Lion taken captive, the clan- 

 chieftains of them threw themselves upon the Galloway Normans, 

 demolished their castles, slew their possessors, or forced them to 

 fly. Burton thinks this story likely to be true from the paucity 

 of Norman names in Galloway. 



Alexander Comyn laid the foundation of his family's extensive 

 possessions in Kirkcudbrightshire. The success of Bruce soon 

 afterwards was unfavourable to the Comyns. Galloway was 

 conferred upon Edward Bruce by his brother King Robert. 

 Edward Baliol, assisted by Edward III., obtained a strong footing 

 in Galloway, and resided at Buittle. Sir William Douglas in 

 1353 over-ran Baliol's territories, and compelled M'Dowal, the 

 hereditary enemy of the Bruces, to change side in politics. 



Archibald Douglas, the Grim, the illegitimate son of the 

 famous Sir James Douglas, who fell fighting on the battlefield of 

 Otterburn, obtained in 1388 the superiority of all Galloway. 

 On an islet of the Dee, which several members of our Society 

 have visited, and upon the site of an ancient fortlet, the residence 

 of a former lord of Galloway, he constructed the substantial 

 Castle of Thrieve, the ruins of which are still a figure in the 

 landscape. From this feudal castle, as from a centre, the 

 Douglases for nearly three-quarters of a century ruled Kirk- 

 cudbrightshire with a rod of iron. As an instance of their 

 feudal tyranny, I may be permitted to quote from Burton. 

 Herries of Terregles having offered resistance to Douglas was 

 slain. Next, Douglas called a great muster of his own proper 

 vassals, and of those neighbouring landholders whom he counted 

 as under his banner. One of these, named M'Lellan, and called 



