CLAN

(Said to be derived from the Gaelic clann, descendants or i ue.) The clans of the Scottish Highlands are tribes consisting of many families all bearing the same surname, which according to tradition descend from a common ancestor. But it is more probable that most clans were formed of an aggregate of different families, the inferior standing to the superior in the same sort of relation as the Roman clients to their patrons, and by degrees a uming the same name. Some clans, however, are divided into branches, each po e ing a distinct surname. The chieftainship of every clan descends regularly through heirs male; but in the earliest times of their history the rights of primogeniture were not very distinctly defined. The Gaelic clans occupy the northern and western with part of the central shires o! the country. A Gaelic manuscript lately discovered containing genealogies of the Highland clans, and supposed to have been written about the year 1440, should seem to carry back the antiquity of the singular institution of clanship even to a remoter period than was previously believed. [s. 250]