Somerled (died 1164), known in Middle Irish as Somairle, Somhairle, and Somhairlidh, and in Old Norse as Sumarliði [ˈsumɑrˌliðe], was a mid-12th-century Norse-Gaelic lord who, through marital alliance and military conquest, rose in prominence to create the Kingdom of Argyll and the Isles.

His father, GilleBride, of royal Irish ancestry, appears to have conducted a marriage alliance with Máel Coluim mac Alaxandair, son of Alexander I of Scotland, and claimant to the Scottish throne.

In the last year of his life, he attempted to persuade the head of the Columban monastic community, Flaithbertach Ua Brolcháin, Abbot of Derry, to relocate from Ireland to Iona, a sacred island within Somerled's sphere of influence.

By the time he took as his wife Ragnhild, daughter of Olafr Godredsson, King of the Isles, a member of the Crovan dynasty, Somerled was already Lord of Argyll, Kintyre and Lorne.

The late provenance and partisan nature of these histories means that their uncorroborated claims, particularly those concerning early figures such as Somerled and his contemporaries, need to be treated with caution.

[25][note 4] In May of that year, the reigning David I, King of Scotland died, and was succeeded by his twelve-year-old grandson, Malcolm IV, son of Henry, Earl of Northumberland (d.

[28] Less than six months later Somerled emerges into recorded history: the Chronicle of Holyrood states that he rose in rebellion that November, allied with his aforementioned nepotes, against the recently inaugurated king.

[29] A further account of this rising may also be preserved in the Carmen de Morte Sumerledi, which recounts Somerled's devastating sack of Glasgow, its cathedral, and surrounding countryside.

[31] Succession by primogeniture was not an established custom in 12th-century Scotland, and surviving sources reveal that Alexander's heirs received substantial support for their claims to the throne.

[32] The remarkable haste with which Malcolm IV succeeded his grandfather further exemplifies the perceived risk that David's line faced from rival royal claimants.

[41] Surviving charter evidence reveals that, on at least two occasions before about 1134, David temporarily based himself at Irvine in Cunningham,[42] a strategic coastal site from where Scottish forces may have conducted seaborne military operations against Malcolm's western allies.

[44] Furthermore, this chronicle reveals that men from the Isles and Lorne or Argyll formed part of the Scottish army at the Battle of the Standard, when David was defeated by the English, near Northallerton in 1138.

It appears to concern a regular payment of produce or foodstuffs,[53] raised not only from a lord's personal possessions, but also from more remote regions that acknowledged his overlordship.

The bloodshed attributed to the latter, a shadowy figure who appears to have violently sought the inheritance of the Mormaer of Moray in the late 1140s, suggests that Olafr may have struggled to maintain authority throughout his expansive island-kingdom.

[70] In one particular clash, recorded in the Annals of the Four Masters, a savage sea-battle was fought near Inishowen, where Toirdelbach's forces encountered Muirchertach's mercenary fleet, mustered from Galloway, Arran, Kintyre, Mann, and "the shores of Scotland"[71] (which possibly refers to Argyll and the Hebrides).

[72] The ensuing conflict saw Toirdelbach's Connachtmen crush Muirchertach's mercenaries,[71] and the losses suffered by the forces supplied by Godred appear to have undermined the latter's authority in the Isles.

[73] Possibly about two years later, although the chronology of events within the relevant sources is unclear, Godred appears to have suffered another setback, when he unsuccessfully attempted to secure control of the Kingdom of Dublin.

[63] Somerled's stratagem does not appear to have received unanimous support, since the chronicle relates that, as Dugald was conducted throughout the Isles, the leading Islesmen were made to render pledges and surrender hostages to him.

[78][note 9] According to the History of the MacDonalds, Somerled had previously aided Godred's father in military operations (otherwise unrecorded in contemporary sources) against the "ancient Danes north of Ardnamurchan".

[104] The Chronicle of Mann, Orkneyinga saga, and later tradition preserved in the 18th-century Books of Clanranald, reveal that the claim of Somerled and his descendants to the kingship in the Isles rested upon Ragnhild's descent from the Crovan dynasty.

[106] The Latin rex insularum was a translation of the Gaelic rí Innse Gall, a title accorded to Kings of the Isles since the late 10th century.

[118] However, Somerled's attempt to relocate the Columban leadership to Iona in 1164, when Cistercians were already established in the Isles, may be evidence that he found newer reformed orders of continental Christianity unpalatable.

[131][note 15] The Carmen de Morte Sumerledi, written by an eyewitness, records that Somerled was "wounded by a [thrown] spear and cut down by the sword", and states that a priest severed his head and delivered it into the bishop's hands.

[138] The early 1160s saw a period of Scottish consolidation in the maritime region between the Lennox and Cowal, and along the eastern[clarification needed] coast of the Firth of Clyde towards Galloway.

[139] David may well have begun the infeftment[clarification needed] and settlement of this coastal district decades earlier, to counter the seaborne threat that the rulers of Argyll posed during the dynastic challenges of the 1130s.

[142] Although Somerled may have sought to eliminate or reduce this perceived threat,[140] the massive scale of his seaborne assault suggests that he may have nursed even greater ambitions.

[167][note 21] The results of a later study, published in 2011, revealed that, of a sample of 164 men bearing the surname MacDonald, 23% carried the same marker borne by the clan chiefs.

[176] Until recently, modern scholarship, heavily influenced by 19th-century historiographical perceptions of ethnicity, has placed Somerled's conflicts with the Scots in the context of supposed native Celtic conservatism against the spread of foreign feudalisation.

[177][note 22] More recent scholarship, however, has emphasised the remarkable receptiveness of natives to so-called feudal customs introduced into northern Scotland during this period.

The more recent realisation that this brother-in-law was instead a son of Alexander I, however, places Somerled's conflict with the Scottish crown in the context of participation in the continuous inter-dynastic insurrection faced by David I and his descendants, rather than a clash between pro- and anti-feudal partisans.