Domnall
mac Causantín (Donald II) Domnall
mac Causantín (Donald II)Domnall (Donald), a very obscure king, was referred to as "ri Alban" (king of Alba, i.e., Scotland) in his obituary in the Annals of Ulster [AU], the first of his family so styled in the Irish annals, whereas his father, uncle, grandfather, etc., had been styled "rex Pictorum" (king of the Picts) in the same annals. The period leading up to Donald's reign is extremely obscure, and it is not clear what significance (if any) the change in terminology has. Donald is called Donald II in the numbering of kings that starts with the Donald's famous grandfather Cináed mac Ailpín (Kenneth I), but that numbering leaves out two or three kings of that name who ruled over Scottish Dál Riata, the small kingdom that eventually evolved into the kingdom of Scotland.
Date of Birth: Unknown.
Place of
Birth: Unknown.
Date of Death: 900.
["Domnall m. Caustantin, ri Alban, moritur."
AU, s.a. 900]
Place of Death: Forres.
["Donald macConstantine xl [sic - read xi]
a. reg. et mortuus est in Fores et sepultus in Iona insula."
Regnal List "D", and similarly in Lists "F"
and "I", KKES 267, 274, 283; see also ESSH 1: 396]
Father:
Causantin mac
Cináeda (Constantine I),
d. 876, king of the Scots and Picts.
["Máel Coluim mc Cináeda mc Máel C[h]olum mc Domnaill
mc C[h]usantín mc C[h]ináeda mc Alpín."
Genelaig Albanensium, Bannerman (1974), 66]
[See ESSH 1: 395-8, KKES 250 ff]
Mother: Unknown.
Spouse: Unknown.
Child:
Máel Coluim mac
Domnaill (Malcolm I), d. 954,
king of Scotland.
[See the genealogy quoted above]
See Commentary for supposed additional child.
Falsely attributed additional child:
Owen, king of Strathclyde, living 934.
According to Symeon of Durham, Æthelstan, king of Wessex, put to flight Owen, king of the Cumbrians, in 934 [See SAEC 68]. Based on statements by the fourteenth century historian John of Fordun, some later historians have accepted that Strathclyde was ruled during the tenth century by members of the Scottish royal family, and Fordun's statement that Owen (or Eugenius, the Latinized form of the named use by Fordun) was the son of a certain Donald has led some to place Owen as a son of Donald II [See Hudson (1988), 147-8]. However, a more plausible father of Owen would be the Donald who died as king of Strathclyde in the reign of king Constantine I ["Et mortui sunt in tempore huius Doneualdus rex Britanniorum, ..." Poppleton MS, KKES, 251]. In fact, it is highly probable that Strathclyde was ruled by its own native dynasty until it ceased to be an independent kingdom in the early eleventh century [See Hudson (1988) and sources cited therein for more details].
AU = Seán Mac Airt and Gearóid Mac Niocaill, The Annals of Ulster (Dublin, 1983). See also the CELT website.
Bannerman (1974) = John Bannerman, Studies in the History of Dalriada (Edinburgh & London, 1974).
ESSH = Alan Orr Anderson, Early Sources of Scottish History, 2 vols. (Edinburgh, 1922, reprinted Stamford, 1990). [Contains English translations of many of the primary records]
Hudson (1988) = B. T. Hudson, 'Elech and the Scots in Strathclyde', Scottish Gaelic Studies 15 (1988), 145-9.
KKES = Marjorie Ogilvy Anderson, Kings and Kingship in Early Scotland (Edinburgh, Totowa, NJ, 1973).
SAEC = Alan Orr Anderson, Scottish Annals from English Chroniclers (London, 1908, reprinted Stamford, 1991). [Similar to ESSH, but from English sources]
Compiled by Stewart Baldwin
Originally uploaded 5 August 2001.
Minor revision uploaded 26 April 2007.