Alexander was not the name his family
and friends called him. More likely it was Alistair , the
gaelic version of the name. But on the records of the Isle
of Man his descendants' family name was written as Mac Alexander...Son
of Alexander...the name historians say was our family name
before it was Callister. The scribes wrote in latin, or
it would have been Mac Alistair or Mac Allister.
My search for Alexander began with
microfilmed land-records and wills of from the middle ages,
and led me back through the stories of the Scottish Clans
over a thousand years to a time when the Vikings sailed
boldly into the Irish sea and made it their dominion. Do
we know who Alexander was? Perhaps. There are intriguing
clues scattered across the centuries, and it's possible
to get a sense of his life and times, and glimpses of the
lives of the generations who followed him. Emerging details
over the centuries bring them eventually into sharp focus.
We know for a certainly that there were MacAlexanders at
Kirk Michael as early as 1411, and by 1511 we know where
some of their lands were located and the names of the owners.
We can track the ownership of those parcels, and see when
the name changed...
