THE WILD BOAR. 91 



sunt 16 digitorum et latitudinis 4, relegati catenulis ad 

 cellas Divi Andrew."* 



Reference to a Boar-hunt in Scotland at an earlier 

 date than this, however, is to be found in a Latin 

 MS. history of the Gordon family, dated 1545, 

 compiled from older MSS. by John Ferrarius, of 

 Piedmont, a monk in the Abbey of Kinloss, Moray- 

 shire, who also wrote a Supplement to the work of 

 Boethius. A copy of the MS. referred to made for Sir 

 Robert Gordon in 16 13 and entitled " Histories com- 

 'pendium de origine et encremento Gordonice familioe in 

 Scotia, apud Kinloss, anno 1545," is preserved in the 

 Advocates' Library, Edinburgh, and from this we 

 learn that amongst those who assisted Malcom III. 

 of Scotland against the English about the year 1057 

 was one Gordon, who some time previously had slain 

 a fierce Boar which had committed great depreda- 

 tions in the neighbourhood of the Forest of Huntly. 

 For this act of prowess he was rewarded by the 

 King, who bestowed upon him the lands of Gordon 

 and Huntly, and sanctioned his carrying on his 

 banner three boars' heads, or, in a field, azure. In 

 the English translation of this work, from which 

 Pennant quoted (vide antea, p. 19), the animal slain 

 by Gordon is called a Bear, but this, as we have 

 already shown (p." 24), was the Scottish pronunciation 

 of Boar, and reference to the Latin original shows 

 that the animal in question was unmistakably a Boar, 



* This must have been a splendid pair of tusks. The Eoman digit, 

 it should be remembered, was the sixteenth part of a foot ; and these 

 tusks were doubtless measured along the outside curve. 



