In 1303 Edward again visited the county, halting at Kildrummy Castle, then in the possession of Robert the Bruce, who shortly afterwards became the acknowledged leader of the Scots and made Aberdeen his headquarters for several months.

This policy culminated in the invasion of Aberdeenshire by Donald of Islay, Lord of the Isles, who was defeated at the Battle of Harlaw in 1411 by the Scottish army under Alexander Stewart, Earl of Mar.

The Gordons reached the height of their power in the first half of the 16th century, when their domains, already vast, were enhanced by the acquisition, through marriage, of the Earldom of Sutherland in 1514.

Opposition to the changes to Protestant forms of worship and church leadership saw rioting in Aberdeen, with St Machar's Cathedral being damaged.

The people of Aberdeenshire responded so grudgingly to this demand that James Graham, 1st Marquess of Montrose, visited the shire in the following year to enforce acceptance.

The Cavaliers, not being disposed to yield, dispersed an armed gathering of Covenanters in the affair called the Trot of Turriff in 1639, one of the first skirmishes in the Civil Wars.

[6] On 6 September 1715 John Erskine, Earl of Mar initiated the Jacobite rising of 1715 at Braemar in support of the claim of James Francis Edward Stuart to the throne.

[11] Elected county councils were established in 1890 under the Local Government (Scotland) Act 1889, taking most of the functions of the commissioners (which were eventually abolished in 1930).

[23] The historic Aberdeenshire is traditionally divided into five districts:[24] The interior mountains of the Cairngorms provide the most striking of the physical features of the county.

[25] In the upper parts of the valleys of the Dee and the Don they form well-marked groups, of which the most characteristic are:[25] These divisions are folded on highly inclined or vertical axes trending north-east and south-west, and hence the same zones are repeated over a considerable area.

A belt of slate which has been quarried for roofing purposes runs along the west border of the county from Turriff by Auchterless and the Foudland Hills towards the Tap o' Noth near Gartly.

[25] Though consisting mainly of biotite granite, these later intrusions pass by intermediate stages into diorite, as in the area between Balmoral and the head-waters of the River Gairn.

[25] Serpentinite and troctolite, the precise age of which is uncertain, occur at the Black Dog Rock north of Aberdeen, at Belhelvie and near Oldmeldrum.

Where the schists of sedimentary origin have been pierced by these igneous intrusions, they are charged with contact minerals such as sillimanite, cordierite, kyanite and andalusite.

[25] A banded and mottled calc-silicate hornfels occurring with the limestone at Derry Falls, west-northwest of Braemar, has yielded malacolite, wollastonite, brown idocrase, garnet, sphene and hornblende.

[25] A larger list of minerals has been obtained from an exposure of limestone and associated beds in Glen Gairn, about four miles (6 km) above the point where that river joins the Dee.

[25] Narrow belts of Old Red Sandstone, resting unconformably on the old platform of slates and schists, have been traced from the north coast at Peterhead by Turriff to Fyvie, and also from Huntly by Gartly to Kildrummy Castle.

The strata consist mainly of conglomerates and sandstones, which, at Gartly and at Rhynie, are associated with lenticular bands of andesite indicating contemporaneous volcanic action.

The ice moved eastwards off the high ground at the head of the Dee and the Don, while the mass spreading outwards from the Moray Firth invaded the low plateau of Buchan; but at a certain stage there was a marked defection northwards parallel with the coast, as proved by the deposit of red clay north of Aberdeen.

[25] The committee appointed by the British Association proved that the Greensand, which has yielded a large suite of Cretaceous fossils at Moreseat in the parish of Cruden, occurs in glacial drift, resting probably on granite.

At the royal lodge on Loch Muick, 411 m (1,348 ft) above the sea, grow larches, vegetables, currants, laurels, roses, etc.

Poor, gravelly, clayey and peaty soils prevail, but tile-draining, bones and guano, and the best methods of modern tillage, greatly increased the produce.

Spring Barley is the predominant crop, and in lowland Winter Wheat, Oil Seed Rape & Potatoes would be more common than oats.

In 1911 a large fishing population in villages along the coast engage in the white and herring fishery, fostering the next most important industry to agriculture.

The herring season for Aberdeen, Peterhead and Fraserburgh lasts from June to September, at which time the ports become crowded with boats from other Scottish districts.

[2] In 1911 the chief mineral wealth comes from the noted durable granite, quarried at Aberdeen, Kemnay, Peterhead and elsewhere including for causewaying stones.

The shire imports mostly coal, lime, timber, iron, slate, raw materials for the textile manufactures, wheat, cattle-feeding stuffs, bones, guano, sugar, alcoholic liquors, fruits.

The exports include granite (rough-dressed and polished), flax, woollen and cotton goods, paper, combs, preserved provisions, oats, barley, and live and dead cattle.

On the south, Aberdeen has rail links with Stonehaven, Montrose and Dundee, and to the north-west a line runs to Inverness via Huntly, Keith and Elgin.

The local Scots dialect, affectionately known as the Doric, appears broad, and rich in diminutives, and is noted for the use of /i/ in bane and stane and muin but /wi/ before /g/ and /k/ in guid and cuit etc., the /f/ realisation of wh, /d/ for medial th /ð/ etc.