page_title: Ragnall mac Somairle
section_title: Family and legacy
hierarchical_section_title: Ragnall mac Somairle / Family and legacy
caption_attribution_description: A photo of particular part of the genealogy of Clan Donald in the MS 1467. The photo was taken under ultra-violet light. The text reads in three lines: "mhic domnaill", "mhic raghnaill", and "mhic somairle". This translates into English: "son of Domnall", "son of Ragnall", "son of Somairle". The names refer to the following men: Domnall, Ragnall, and Somairle.
context_page_description: Ragnall mac Somairle was a significant late twelfth century magnate, seated on the western seaboard of Scotland. He was probably a younger son of Somairle mac Gilla Brigte, Lord of Argyll and his wife, Ragnhildr, daughter of Óláfr Guðrøðarson, King of the Isles. The twelfth-century Kingdom of the Isles, ruled by Ragnall's father and maternal-grandfather, existed within a hybrid Norse-Gaelic milieu, which bordered an ever strengthening and consolidating Kingdom of Scots.
  In the mid twelfth century, Somairle rose in power and won the Kingdom of the Isles from his brother-in-law. After Somairle perished in battle against the Scots in 1164, much of his kingdom was probably partitioned between his surviving sons. Ragnall's allotment appears to have been in the southern Hebrides and Kintyre. In time, Ragnall appears to have risen in power and became the leading member of Somairle's descendants, the meic Somairle. Ragnall is known to have styled himself "King of the Isles, Lord of Argyll and Kintyre" and "Lord of the Isles". His claim to the title of king, like other members of the meic Somairle, is derived through Ragnhildr, a member of the Crovan dynasty.
context_section_description: The name of Ragnall's wife, "Fonia", as recorded in their grant to the priory of Paisley, may be an attempt to represent the Gaelic name Findguala in Latin. According to late Hebridean tradition, preserved in the garbled Sleat History, Ragnall was married to "MacRandel's daughter, or, as some say, to a sister of Thomas Randel, Earl of Murray". This tradition cannot be correct due to its chronology, since Thomas Randolph, the first Earl of Moray, and his like-named son and successor, both died in 1332. One possibility, however, is that the tradition may instead refer to an earlier earl—Uilleam mac Donnchada (died 1151–1154). If so, Ragnall's son, Domnall, may have been named after Uilleam's son, Domnall (died 1187). The latter was a leading member of the meic Uilleim, a kindred who were in open conflict against the Scottish kings from the late twelfth- to early thirteenth centuries.
  Ragnall is known to have left two sons: Ruaidrí (died 1247?) and Domnall. Domnall's line, the meic Domnaill (or Clann Domnaill), went on to produce the powerful Lords of the Isles who dominated the entire Hebrides and expansive mainland-territories from the first half of the fourteenth- to the late fifteenth centuries. Ruaidrí founded the meic Ruaidrí (or Clann Ruaidrí), a more obscure kindred who were seated in Garmoran. Ruaidrí seems to have been the senior of Ragnall's sons, and is first recorded by name in 1214. Four years previous, Áengus and his sons are recorded by the Chronicle of Mann to have been slain on Skye. This particular record could be evidence that Áengus had succeeded Ragnall, after which the latter's sons extinguished Áengus's line, and Ruaidrí assumed control of the meic Somairle succession.
  It is very likely that either Ragnall or Ruaidrí had daughters who married Rǫgnvaldr and his younger half-brother, Óláfr Guðrøðarson (died 1237). The chronicle states that Rǫgnvaldr had Óláfr marry "Lauon", the daughter of a certain nobleman from Kintyre, who was also the sister of his own (unnamed) wife. The precise identification of this father-in-law is uncertain, although historical sources concerning the contemporary meic Somairle link this kindred with Kintyre more than any other region, and both Ragnall and Ruaidrí were contemporaneously styled "Lord of Kintyre". It is possible that the first marriage took place sometime before 1210, perhaps not long after 1200, considering the age of Rǫgnvaldr's son, Guðrøðr. These unions appear to have been orchestrated to patch up relations between the meic Somairle and the Crovan dynasty, rival kindreds who had bitterly contested the kingship of the Isles for about sixty years. In fact, it is possible that Rǫgnvaldr's kingship was formally recognised by Ruaidrí, the leading meic Somairle dynast, who thereby established himself as a leading magnate within a reunified Kingdom of the Isles.
  Ragnall is chiefly remembered in early modern Hebridean tradition as the genealogical link between Somairle and Domnall later's descendants. Unsupported claims made by the Book of Clanranald present Ragnall as "the most distinguished of the Gall or Gaedhil for prosperity, sway of generosity, and feats of arms", and report that he "received a cross from Jerusalem". The latter statement may imply that Ragnall undertook (or planned to undertake) a pilgrimage or crusade. Although Ragnall's involvement in such an enterprise is not impossible, the claim is uncorroborated by contemporary sources. The mid sixteenth-century description of the Hebrides and the Islands of the Clyde authored by Donald Monro (died in or after 1575) reveals that Ragnall's reign was still remembered in the Isles during the sixteenth century. In this account, Monro credited Ragnall with establishing the law code administered by leading Hebrideans hundreds of years after his floruit.
caption: Part of the meic Domnaill pedigree on folio 1v of National Library of Scotland Advocates MS 72.1.1 (also known as MS 1467). The excerpt shows the names of Ragnall's son Domnall (top), Ragnall himself (middle), and Ragnall's father (bottom).[211]
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