page_title: Aonghus Óg of Islay
section_title: Rewarded service to the Scottish Crown, and a contested chiefship
hierarchical_section_title: Aonghus Óg of Islay / Rewarded service to the Scottish Crown, and a contested chiefship
caption_attribution_description: English: Seal of Robert I, King of Scotland (died 1329).
context_page_description: Aonghus Óg Mac Domhnaill, or Angus Og MacDonald, was a fourteenth-century Scottish magnate and chief of Clann Domhnaill. He was a younger son of Aonghus Mór mac Domhnaill, Lord of Islay. After the latter's apparent death, the chiefship of the kindred was assumed by Aonghus Óg's elder brother, Alasdair Óg Mac Domhnaill.
  Most of the documentation regarding Aonghus Óg's career concerns his support of Edward I, King of England against supporters of John, King of Scotland. The latter's principal adherents on the western seaboard of Scotland were Clann Dubhghaill, regional rivals of Clann Domhnaill. Although there is much uncertainty concerning the Clann Domhnaill chiefship at this period in history, at some point after Alasdair Óg's apparent death at the hands of Clann Dubhghaill in 1299, Aonghus Óg seems to have taken up the chiefship as Lord of Islay.
  Pressure from Clann Domhnaill and other supporters of the English Crown evidently compelled Clann Dubhghaill into coming onside with the English in the first years of the fourteenth century.
context_section_description: In 1307, at about the time of Edward I's death in July, Robert I mounted a remarkable return to power, first striking into Carrick in about February. By 1309, Robert I's opponents had been largely overcome, and he held his first parliament as king. Clann Domhnaill clearly benefited from their support of the Bruce cause. Although no royal charters associated with the kindred exist from this period, there are seventeenth-century charter indices that note several undated royal grants. For instance, Aonghus Óg was granted the former Comyn lordship of Lochaber and the adjacent regions of Ardnamurchan, Morvern, Duror, and Glencoe; whilst a certain Alasdair of the Isles received the former Clann Dubhghaill islands of Mull and Tiree.
  Although the indices fail to note any Clann Domhnaill grants concerning Islay and Kintyre it is not inconceivable that the kindred received grants of these territories as well. Later in the fourteenth century, Aonghus Óg's son, Eóin Mac Domhnaill, was granted the territories of Ardnamurchan, Colonsay, Gigha, Glencoe, Jura, Kintyre, Knapdale, Lewis, Lochaber, Morvern, Mull, and Skye. It is possible that the basis for many of these grants laid in the clan's military support of the Bruce cause, and stemmed from concessions gained from the embattled king in about 1306. If this was indeed the case, the fact that Robert I later granted a significant portion of these territories (Lochaber, Kintyre, Skye, and lands in Argyll) to other magnates suggests that his conceivable concessions to Clann Domhnaill may have been undertaken with some reluctance.
  There is reason to suspect that the Clann Domhnaill chiefship was contested during this period. For example, the royal grants to Aonghus Óg and Alasdair of the Isles—a man whose identity is uncertain—could be evidence that these two were competitors. Another apparent claimant to the chiefship, a certain Domhnall of Islay—whose identity is likewise uncertain—was present at the parliament of 1309. Furthermore, the Bruce states that when Robert I fled to Dunaverty Castle in 1306 he was fearful of treason during his stay. One possibility is that this statement preserves a record of the king's vulnerability to competing regional factions. Although the Bruce specifies that the Clann Domhnaill dynast to whom the king owed his salvation was Aonghus Óg, there is reason to question this claim. If Robert I indeed found protection at a Clann Domhnaill fortress—like Dunyvaig Castle—the attestations of Domhnall of Islay could indicate that it was he who assisted the king.
  The Bruce was certainly influenced by later political realities, and was composed during the reign of Robert II, King of Scotland (reigned 1371–1390), the father-in-law of Eóin Mac Domhnaill. The fact that this son of Aonghus Óg ruled as chief when the poem was composed could account for the remarkably favourable light in which Aonghus Óg is portrayed. If the account of Rathlin Island given by the Bruce actually refers to Islay and Dunyvaig Castle, the description of the island's reluctant inhabitants being forced to assist the king could indicate that he did not trust the Clann Domhnaill lord. Furthermore, the claim that Aonghus Óg was Lord of Kintyre during this period could stem from the fact that, by the time the Bruce was composed, Eóin Mac Domhnaill was married to a daughter of the Robert II, and had gained this contested lordship by way of her tocher.
  Seemingly in 1310, whilst in the service of the English Crown, Aonghus Óg inquired of Edward II, King of England as to whether Alasdair Mac Dubhghaill was within the king's peace, and entreated the king on behalf of several unnamed members of Clann Ruaidhrí—men were then aiding Aonghus Óg's English-aligned forces—to grant these Clann Ruaidhrí clansmen feu of their ancestral lands. An indication of the military might at Clann Dubhghaill's disposal may be Aonghus Óg's expressed opinion that, if he were able to join forces with Alasdair Mac Dubhghaill, Edward II would have nothing to fear from his enemies. The fact that Aonghus Óg styled himself "of Islay" 
caption: The seal of Robert I.[91] After seizing the throne for himself, this embattled king appears to have partly owed his survival to efforts of Clann Domhnaill and Clann Ruaidhrí.[90]
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