On May 1, 1984, by decree of the Court of the Lord Lyon, the 21st Lady Saltoun was made "Chief of the name and arms of the whole Clan Fraser".
The Lord Lyon did not grant the Chiefship of the Clan Fraser, simply a description of "Chief of the name and arms."
When Simon the Pater's descendants first acquired the Lovat lands of the Ard, in the Highlands, they took to the Gaelic customs of the area.
By the time Simon's son came of age to lead the family, he was deemed to be the 1st Chief of Clan Fraser, the MacShimidh.
According to Alexander Fraser, 18th Lord Saltoun, his family "continued to have their principal seat in the Lowlands, and those of the surname who remained in that section of Scotland, where Teutonic institutions prevailed, and whence the patriarchal system of Clans and Clanships had long been banished, had nothing to do with the origin or formation of the Highland Clan, and never belonged to it.