Dundarg Castle (10)
The foundations of the buildings on the promontory, with the probable chapel in the foreground.
The Book of Deer, probably in the 'marginalia' because the rest of it contains gospels, contains a reference to a 'Cathair of Abbordobor', which Mormaer Bede the Pict made over to St Drostan on his arrival at Aberdour in the 6th century. Although Aberdour (Abbordobor) is a little west of here, it is thought that the cathair referred to was the fort here at Dundarg.
In 1212, William Comyn married Marjorie, heiress to Fergus, the last Celtic Earl of Buchan, thus becoming earl in right of his wife. He was already Warden of Moray and was later given the Lordship of Badenoch, which meant that he was the most powerful man in the north of Scotland, with direct control of a territory that stretched from one coast to the other.
It is thought that it was WIlliam Comyn that turned the Pictish fort into a medieval castle. The evidence for this is circumstantial, there being no solid evidence, either documentary of archaeological - indeed until 1911 when the first of three archaeological digs took place, nobody knew very much about Dundarg at all. If Dundarg Castle was built in the mid-13th century, it lasted less than a century, as it must have been destroyed by Bruce in 1308 following his defeat of the Comyn Earl of Buchan at the Battle of Barra - but again, there is no evidence of this taking place.
Dundarg Castle (10)
The foundations of the buildings on the promontory, with the probable chapel in the foreground.
The Book of Deer, probably in the 'marginalia' because the rest of it contains gospels, contains a reference to a 'Cathair of Abbordobor', which Mormaer Bede the Pict made over to St Drostan on his arrival at Aberdour in the 6th century. Although Aberdour (Abbordobor) is a little west of here, it is thought that the cathair referred to was the fort here at Dundarg.
In 1212, William Comyn married Marjorie, heiress to Fergus, the last Celtic Earl of Buchan, thus becoming earl in right of his wife. He was already Warden of Moray and was later given the Lordship of Badenoch, which meant that he was the most powerful man in the north of Scotland, with direct control of a territory that stretched from one coast to the other.
It is thought that it was WIlliam Comyn that turned the Pictish fort into a medieval castle. The evidence for this is circumstantial, there being no solid evidence, either documentary of archaeological - indeed until 1911 when the first of three archaeological digs took place, nobody knew very much about Dundarg at all. If Dundarg Castle was built in the mid-13th century, it lasted less than a century, as it must have been destroyed by Bruce in 1308 following his defeat of the Comyn Earl of Buchan at the Battle of Barra - but again, there is no evidence of this taking place.