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The Seal of Robert II, King of Scots. 1316-1390
Half of all men in the United Kingdom with the surname Stewart, or Stuart, can claim ancestry from Scotland’s Royal family. Research released by ScotlandsDNA has revealed for the first time the individual in the 13th century who founded a branch of the Royal Stewart line.
In the United Kingdom alone there are about 70,000 people with the surname, meaning that around 17,5000 men can now claim descent from the royal bloodline. The source of the line is Sir John Stewart of Bonkyll, who met his demise at the Battle of Falkirk in 1298 fighting alongside William Wallace. The Stewart family’s well-documented pedigree allowed ScotlandsDNA to carry out tests on his descendants, and those of his brother James, the 5th High Steward of Scotland and the grandfather of Robert II, the first Stewart king.
Dr Jim Wilson, the group’s chief scientist, discovered a marker that originated more than 700 years ago when ancestry tests were carried out on the descendants of James and Sir John’s sons Richard and Angus. The results show that that the modern descendants of both sons of Sir John carry a Y chromosome marker S781+ that is absent in the descendants of James.
Dr Wilson added: “By a straightforward process of deduction that means that the marker arose in Sir John Stewart of Bonkyll, and not in his father. If it had, the descendants of James would also carry it, and they do not.” Having made the discovery, ScotlandsDNA checked its database of ancestry tests for men with the Stewart surname and found that 20 per cent of them share Sir John’s lineage, while 30 per cent are descended from his brother James.
James’s son Walter, married Marjorie Bruce, the daughter of Robert I, having helped him win the great victory at Bannockburn, and their son became Robert II.
Alistair Moffat, co-founder of ScotlandsDNA, added: “In the year of the 700th anniversary of Bannockburn, thousands of Scottish men can claim to be directly descended from the Stewarts who fought alongside Bruce, and they can directly identify with generations of famous figures who shaped Scotland and Britain.” The Duke of Buccleuch, Scotland’s biggest private landowner, who is directly descended from Sir John, and a long line of Scottish and British kings, said he was fascinated by the DNA detective work.
He added: “My family’s history has always been closely involved with the history of Scotland and Britain, but the fact that the rise of a DNA marker has been identified in an individual brings the past even closer, and makes it more personal.
“I am delighted to have been a guinea pig for the sort of history it is now possible to write thanks to DNA research.” The sampling has also, for the first time, distinguished clearly between different cadet branches of the royal Stewarts.
The four branches are the Appin Stewarts who fought at Culloden, the Lennox Stewarts who were direct ancestors of James VI and I, and the Albany and Moray Stewarts who acted as regents.
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Family history website ScotlandsPeople has uploaded a tranche of birth, marriage and death records from across the country, dating from 1913, 1938 and 1963 respectively. The records are available to view on the web for the very first time.
The documents – which consist of over 220,000 separate scans – were released on New Year’s Day as embargoes on their public access were lifted.
Although the documents date from three individual years, they join an existing collection of scans dating back to 1855, when Scotland first began systematically recording its citizens’ births, marriages and deaths – a process known as Statutory Registration.
Users can search the records by name and date, revealing a range of crucial details about the individual. In the case of the 1913 births, the scans not only show the infant’s date and place of birth, but additional clues about their parents, including the father’s occupation.
The total number of BMD (birth, marriage and death) images that were added to the website early in the morning of 1st January 2014 is 94,537 – comprising 46,109 birth images, 23,310 marriage images and 25,118 death images.
“The new images represent a new chapter of Scotland’s story now available to the public,” says Cabinet Secretary for Culture and External Affairs, Fiona Hyslop.
“I’d urge anyone who is interested in finding out more about their history, or that of their family or the place where they live, to have a look at the wealth of records now available as part of our wonderful online resources.”
A spokesperson for Scotlands People said: “We’ve been looking at some of these new BMD records and have uncovered some terrific personal stories behind the documents. In particular, we loved the story about the marriage in Glasgow on 5 January 1938 between a German poetess and a lion tamer – we do hope that she was an ailurophile and he a lover of poetry!”
The records can be viewed by visiting the Statutory Registers section on the left side of the ScotlandsPeople webpage. Choose the set of records you wish to search – i.e. Births, Marriages or Deaths – and then do a search for the record you’re looking to view.
The records can also be viewed in person by visiting the ScotlandsPeople Centre in Edinburgh, and at local family history centres in Glasgow, Kilmarnock, Hawick and Inverness.
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