Battle of Renfrew 1164
Recorded location from Wikidata; battle sites are often approximate.
About the battle
The Battle of Renfrew was fought between the Kingdom of the Isles and the Kingdom of Scotland in 1164, near Renfrew, Scotland. The men of the Isles, accompanied by forces from the Kingdom of Dublin, were commanded by Somerled (Sumarliði / Somairle mac Gilla Brigte, King of the Isles). The identity of the Scottish commander is unrecorded and unknown. Herbert, Bishop of Glasgow, Baldwin, Sheriff of Lanark/Clydesdale, and Walter fitz Alan, Steward of Scotland are all possible candidates for this position. The battle was a disaster for the Islesmen and Dubliners. Somerled was slain in the encounter, apparently by local levies, and his forces were routed.
Somerled first appears on record in the 1150s, when he is stated to have supported the cause of Máel Coluim mac Alasdair in a rebellion against Malcolm IV, King of Scotland. Máel Coluim was a member of a rival branch of the Scottish royal family, and his sons were closely related to Somerled. At about the time of the rebellion's collapse, Somerled appears to have shifted his energies from Scotland towards the Isles. In 1156, he wrested about half of the Kingdom of the Isles from his brother-in-law, Guðrøðr Óláfsson, King of the Isles. Two years later, Somerled decisively defeated Guðrøðr, gaining complete control of the kingdom.
The reasons for Somerled's invasion of Scotland are uncertain. One possibility is that he was renewing his support for the sons of Máel Coluim.
Text adapted from the Wikipedia article Battle of Renfrew (revision 1379612073), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Changes: excerpted from the article lead section; shortened by selecting paragraphs and trimming at a sentence boundary; formatting and citations removed. No text added.
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