Strathearn

Strathearn, as the name implies, it comprises the very wide and fertile vale of the River Earn, from Lochearnhead right down to the river s confluence with the Tay estuary near Bridge of Earn, with all its feeder glens and flanking territories. Crieff is its largest town, with the more ancient Auchterarder, however, its capital. The sheer extent and rich fairness of this magnificent strath has to be seen to be appreciated--and nowhere is it better observed than from high on the north-facing Ochil Hills that separate it from the Forth plain, above Dunning or Forteviot. From one of the side-road summits up there, on a clear day, Strathearn is a splendid sight indeed, one of the finest in the land--although seldom remarked upon. Some two hundred square miles of Scotland's best is spread out below, great fields, rich pastures, ancient parkland, rolling woodlands, villages, castles and mansions innumerable, all flanking the noble, coiling river, and all contained within the vast bowl of the hills, the green Ochils to the south, the infinity of the Highland giants to the north.

All this splendid heritage was the domain of another line of Celtic earls. The Strathearn earldom, if slightly less strategically placed, was much richer than that of Menteith; and for the same reason, was finally incorporated into the Crown--so that, for instance, one of Queen Victoria's sons was Duke of Connaught and Strathearn. But the place was royal even before the earls, for this was Fortrenn, the Pictish kingdom, with its capital at Forteviot--in the parish church of which there are still sculptured stones dating from that early period. The famous Dupplin Cross near by, too, is one of the finest early Christian monuments in the country. At Forteviot was the palace of Angus MacFergus (A.D. 731--61) of St. Andrew's Cross fame, and a long succession of kings thereafter until Malcolm Canmore. Here died the great Kenneth MacAlpine who, conquering the Picts, finally united the Dalriadic Scots kingdom with that of the Picts to form the Scotland we know today. Perhaps, because of these royal origins, the Celtic Earls of Strathearn always styled themselves 'by the Indulgence of God'!