Donnchad II, Earl of Fife

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Mormaer Donnchad II (anglicized as Duncan or Dunecan) succeeded his father Donnchad I as a child. As a child of the previous Mormaer, he was entitled to succeed his father through primogeniture, but not to lead his kin-group, Clann MacDuib. That probably fell to his cousin, Aed mac Gille Míchéil. Like previous Mormaers of Fife, Donnchad II was appointed Justiciar of Scotia (i.e. Scotland North of the Forth). Donnchad's minority also meant that Ferchar, Mormaer of Strathearn, took supreme place as head of the Gaelic nobility and guide for the boy-king Máel Coluim IV.

The scholar Geoffrey Barrow suggests that it was during Donnchad's tenure that Beinn MacDuibh took its names, i.e. when Donnchad II acquired land in that area (Barrow, 1980, 86). Donnchad, like other Mormaers of Fife, kept in close association with the king. His name is recorded, among other places, in a charter granted to the priory on the Isle of May.

Donnchad's person was required to be a hostage following the defeat of William the Lion and the Treaty of Falaise, although in fact he certainly sent someone else in his place. (Barrow, 2003, 106).

He married Ada, who may have been the niece of King Máel Coluim IV. He probably had three sons, Mael Coluim, Donnchad and Dabíd.

The aforementioned Donnchad never succeeded to the Mormaerdom, but his son Máel Coluim did, when Donnchad died in 1204.

[edit] Bibliography

Bannerman, John, "MacDuff of Fife," in A. Grant & K.Stringer (eds.) Medieval Scotland: Crown, Lordship and Community, Essays Presented to G.W.S. Barrow, (Edinburgh, 1993), pp.20-38
Barrow, G.W.S., The Anglo-Norman Era in Scottish History, (Oxford, 1980)
Barrow, G.W.S., The Kingdom of the Scots: Government, Church and Society from the Eleventh to the Fourteenth Century, (Edinburgh, 2003)