Isabella, Countess of Atholl

Isabella of Atholl was countess or ban-mormaer of Atholl, Scotland, from the death of her father Henry in 1211 until the accession of her son Padraig in 1236/7. Two men accompanied her as effective Mormaers during the minority of her son:

• Thomas of Galloway, 1211-1232 (father)

It has often been thought that, after the death of Thomas of Galloway in 1232, she married again, this time to the powerful political figure Alan Durward; this however, rests solely in the fact that Alan styles himself "Count of Atholl" in a few documents between 1233 and 1234. However, as Matthew Hammond has shown, this more is more likely to refer to fact that Alan, as a grandson of Máel Coluim, Earl of Atholl, probably sought to inherit the province.

Bibliography

• Anderson, Alan Orr, Early Sources of Scottish History: AD 500-1286, Vol. II, (Edinburgh, 1922), p. 478, n. 8
• Hammond, Matthew H., "The Durward family in the thirteenth century", in Steve Boardman and Alasdair Ross (eds.), The Exercise of Power in Medieval Scotland, c.1200–1500, (Dublin/Portland, 2003), pp. 118–38
• Roberts, John L., Lost Kingdoms: Celtic Scotland in the Middle Ages, (Edinburgh, 1997), pp. 54–5