Skene distinctly
affirms that Hugh Macdonald of Sleat was the son of Earl Alexander
by a daughter of this Gille-Padruig ('Celtic Scotland,' Vol. III. p.
298) while Gregory suggests that the words naturalis and carnalis
used by Hugh's father and brother in the charters already quoted
"were used to designate the issue of those handfast or left-handed
marriages which appear to have been so common in the Highlands
and Isles." ['Western Highlands and Isles,' p.41] Whether the Sleat
district of Skye was or was not carried for the first time to the
Macdonald Earls of Ross and Lords of the Isles by this union with
a member of the family of the original O'Beolan Earls, it is
perfectly clear that the latter had an intimate connection with
the Sleat district at a much earlier period.
Saint Maelrubba, who is first heard of in Britain in 671, two years
later, in 673, founded the original Church of Applecross "from
which as a centre he evangelised the whole of the western districts
lying between Loch Carron and Loch Broom, as well as the south and
west parts of the Island of Skye, and planted churches in Easter
Ross and elsewhere." ['Celtic Scotland,' Vol.
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