The Clan MacNicol

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Arms: Or, a chevron between three hawks' heads erased Gules
Badge: Gules, a hawk's head erased
Motto: "GENEROSITATE NON FEROCITATE" (Generous not Ferocious)
Tartans: MacNicol, dress, MacNicol, hunting
Plant Badge: Trailing Azalea
Septs: MacNeacail Nichel Nickle MacNichel Nichoal Nickoles MacNichol Nichol Nickols MacNicholas Nicholas Nickolson MacNicholl Nicholassen Nickson MacNicholls Nicholds Nicol MacNichols Nicholl Nicoll MacNickel Nicholls Nicolls MacNickell Nichols Nicols MacNickels Nicholson Nicolson MacNickle Nickel Nix MacNickols Nickell Nixon MacNicol Nickells Nuccle MacNicoll Nickels Nuckel MacNicolls Nickells Nuckels MacNicols Nickelson Nuckelson Necoles Nickedrson Nickols Nicail Nickisson Nycoll Niccols Nycolls

In the western Highlands and the Hebrides, Clan MacNeacail IMacNicol) has a long and proud history. The Nicolsons have been a Hebridean clan for over 700 years, the Chief taking his designation from Scorrybreac, near Portree, in Skye. The islands of Lewis and Skye remained part of the Scandinavian kingdom of Mann (the Isle of Man) and the Isles, under the suzerainty of Norway, until 1266. It seems likely that, like the MacLeods of Dunvegan, the Nicolsons are of high Norse descent.

The name-father of the Nicolsons, Nicail or Nicholas, a name popular in Scandinavia, must have flourished in the mid-13th century. The MacLeods of Lewis appear to have inherited their considerable possessions through marriage with a Nicolson heiress in the 14th century. The ancestral Nicail, therefore, probably lived in Lewis, where he and his ancestors would have servied the kings of Mann and the Isles in a mixed Norse and Gaelic environment.

The first Nicolson on record, early in the 14th century, is John, son of Nicail. He appears in the company of leading Hebridean Chiefs, the MacDonald, MacDougall and MacRuairi descendants of Somerled (k. 1164), who had wrested control of the southern Hebrides from the king of Mann. John was perhaps the leading man on Lewis. In the next generation most of the Nicolson lands passed to the Lewis MacLeods, but the male line of the Nicolsons continued finding a home in the Trotternish peninsula of Skye.

Later in the Middle Ages the Nicolsons followd the MacDonald Lords of the Isles and sat on their council. In 1540, James V, King of Scots landed at Portree during a naval expedition, and tradition maintains he was entertained at Scorrybreac. Another tradition is that Bonnie Prince Charlie, fleeing after the defeat of the Jacobites at Culloden, was hidden overnight in a cow-shed by the then Chief.

In the 19th centruy the Nicolsons were badly affected by the Highland Clearances. The Chief was forced to abandon Scorrybreac, and his family settled in Tasmania, where the present Chief was born. Clansmen were evicted from their crofts and also sought refuge in emigration , Prince Edward Island being a favored destination.

Over the centuries, Clan MacNicol has given the world numerous poets and preachers, writers and warriors, historians ahd heraldists. The greatest Gaelic poet of modern times, Sorley MacLean, is a Nicolson on his mother's side. Oral tradition in his family has preserved some Nicolson songs of considerable antiquity and great beauty.