Macbeth,

Macbeth, hereditary mormaer or ruler of Moray, married Gruoch, granddaughter of Kenneth mac Dubh, king of Alban. In 1040 he slew Duncan, king of Scotia, near Elgin, and succeeded him on the throne, though to Thorfinn, the Norwegian earl of Orkney, he had to yield the region north and east of the Tay, and Cumbria and Lothian seem to have remained faithful to Duncan's infant sons. His seventeen years' reign is commemorated in the chronicles as a time of plenty. He granted lands to the Culdees of Lochleven 'with the utmost veneration and devotion;' and, alone of Scottish kings, he made a pilgrimage to Rome (1050), and there gave large alms to the poor. Malcolm Canmore, King Duncan's eldest son, had fled to England on his father's death; and in 1054 his uncle Sivard, Earl of Northumbria, led an army into Scotland against Macbeth. A bloody but indecisive battle was fought near Scone; and it was not till three years later that Malcolm, making a fresh independent attempt, drove Macbeth into Aberdeen-shire, and killed him at Lumphanan, 15th August 1057. Such practically is all that is known for certain of the 'liberal king,' as St Berchan styles Macbeth. The fables immortalised by Shakespeare's genius have for pedigree Raphael Holinshed, out of Hector Boece, out of Boece's fertile fancy and Wyntoun. See Skene's Celtic Scotland (1876).