Tanistry

A note on tanistry (or why early medieval Scots kings were constantly being murdered by their uncles, nephews and cousins):

In ancient Ireland, the High Kings of Tara were chosen by a group of lesser kings from one of their number based on fitness. Not a bad method. In ancient Pictland, a ruling group of seven nobles families chose from their numbers based on matrilineal descent, with a twist involving the notion of rotating between the families. Very complex and not well understood by the historians.

The Gaels of Dalriada, having brought their Stone of Destiny with them to Alba, developed a system called tanistry which incorporated some elements of both Irish and Pictish tradition. Originally, a Gaelic king would be elected from a wide circle of anyone whose great grandfather had been a king. The heir apparent was called the "tanist". Under Pictish influence, this system resolved into a rotation between the two main branches of the royal house. This led to a lot of rivalry and violence between the houses.

As the idea of direct hereditary descent became current, kings would seek to annihilate claimants of the rival house to ensure succession by their sons and grandsons. MacBeth is the great historical example. Malcolm II had no sons and wanted to secure the kingdom to his grandson, Duncan. So, he killed his predecessor's grandson (of the rival house). However, MacBeth was stepfather of the murdered man's heir and fought for and gained the throne on that basis. In turn, Duncan murdered MacBeth and regained the throne for himself (this short note leaves out quite a bit of the ins and outs).

The Canmore kings were able to establish direct hereditary descent (not without opposition), which made things considerably easier, but primogeniture as practiced in England did not prevail in Scotland until much later. In a nutshell, succession fell to the closest male relative of the old king, until all in that first generation were dead. For example, let's say King Joe had three sons. Each of them would rule in succession (oldest to youngest) before the son of the oldest son could gain the throne. Very messy and confusing when drawing the genealogical charts.


History from heartoscotland.com