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MacDuff
Motto: Deus juvat (God assists)
Clan Duff looks to the original Royal Scoto-Pictish line for their hereditary, which includes Queen Gruoch, wife of MacBeth. After Malcom III seized the Crown, his son Aedh married Queen Gruoch’s only granddaughter. He was created Earl of Fife, and hereditary abbot of Abernethy. Gille-michael MacDuf was one of the witnesses to the great charter of David I to the Abbey of Dunfermline.
At the coronation of Robert the Bruce in 1306 Duncan Macduff, Earl of Fife, was a minor held by Edward I as his ward. He married Mary Monthermer, niece of Edward I, and took his side against the Bruce. Following his death while being incarcerated in Kildrummy Castle in 1336, the earldom went to Robert Stewart, later Duke of Albany and Regent of Scotland.
David Duff received a charter for lands of Muldavit from Robert II in1404 but this was sold in 1626. They extended estates in Banffshire through marriage and latterly they acquired a title in Fife when Will Duff, MP was created Earl of Fife and Viscount Macduff in 1759. He commissioned the building of Duff House but never lived in it following an argument with the architect.
The MacDuffs made another royal connection when Alexander, the sixth Earl Fife, married HRH Princess Louise, the Princess Royal, eldest daughter of the Prince of Wales, the future King Edward VII. Many MacDuff tartan setts can be traced to Wilsons of Bannockburn, a weaving firm founded c1770 near Stirling. The Pattern books are in the National Museum of Antiquities, Edinburgh.
Choose from one of the MacDuff tartans listed below:
