North of the firth, for example, he gave the lands of Ardmore to the Culdees of Loch Leven “with every freedom, and without any exaction or demand whatever in the world from bishop, king, or earl.” South of the firth, in Midlothian, he founded the church and parish of Hales, giving the lands of Hales to the Church of the Holy Trinity at Dunfermline.”[2] Ethelred was often said to have held the office Mormaer (Earl) of Fife, but this is now disputed.
The source of the confusion was the Gaelic notitia of a grant to the Céli Dé (Culdee) monks of Loch Leven, later translated into Latin and incorporated in the Register of the Priory of St Andrews.
The grant, dated between 1093 and 1107, begins with the words, “Edelradus vir venerandae memoriae filius Malcolmi Regis Scotiae, Abbas de Dunkeldense et insuper Comes de Fyf.” Translated, this is "Ethelred, man of venerable memory, son of King Máel Coluim of Scotland, Abbot of Dunkeld and Mormaer of Fife."
Sir James Dalrymple theorized that the phrase "comes de fyfe" referred not to the title of Earl, but to the area where the lands were situated, a slip made by a monk working with the manuscripts.
“After her death, and during the so-called usurpation of Donalbane, he [Ethelred] conveyed her lifeless body secretly out of the western gate of the castle, taking, as is said, the advantage of a fog, on to Dunfermline, and in all probability he died soon afterwards, and was buried not at St Andrews, as some seem to say, but at Dunfermline, in the same resting-place where the bodies of his father and mother and eldest brother were laid.”[6] In his metrical chronicle, Andrew of Wyntoun narrated those events, thus: Hyr swne Ethelrede, quene thys felle That wes hys modyr nere than by Gert at the west yhet prewaly Have the cors forth in a myst Or mony of hyr endying wyst; And wyth that body thai past syne But ony lat til Dwnfermelyne.