Crossing the range of the Ochils and entering the ancient earldom of Stratherne, we find one of the earliest residences of the old Scottish kings appearing as a thanage. In the reign of Alexander the Third the thane of Forteviot has to answer to the king for twenty merks, and we find the sheriff of Perth subsequently accounting for the _firma_ or rent-charge of the land of William of Forteviot;[375] while King Robert the First grants in 1314 to the church and canons of Inchaffray his lands of Cardnay and Dolcorachy in the thanage of Forteviot. It appears in the retours as a barony.[376] In this earldom we meet for the first time with a thanage held of the earl and not of the Crown. The foundation-charter of the abbey of Inchaffray, granted by Gilbert, earl of Stratherne, in the year 1200, is witnessed among others by Anechol Theinus or thane of Dunine, now Dunning; and in a subsequent charter the same earl terms him ‘Anechol, my thain of Dunyn.’ In 1247 a charter is granted by Malise, earl of Stratherne, to the abbey of Inchaffray, of twenty merks annually from the thanage of Dunyne and Peticarne, to be received for all time in future from the hands of those who hold the said lands for the time being; and in confirmation of this grant he addresses a mandate to Bricius, thane of Dunin, to see twenty merks at Dunin from the _firma_ due to the earl, paid to Inchaffray. The descent of these thanes of Duning can, however, be ascertained from the Chartulary. The most powerful family next to the earls was that of the seneschals or stewards of Stratherne. They descend from Gilleness, seneschal of Stratherne in the time of Earl Gilbert, who had two sons—Malise, who appears as seneschal in 1220, and Anechol, who was thane of Duning. From Malise proceeded a line of seneschals, the succession to which was carried by a daughter to the Drummonds. Anechol was succeeded as thane of Duning by Bricius, who likewise appears as thane of Duning; but in the time of Robert, earl of Stratherne, the son of Malise, the seneschalship had fallen to him likewise, and he witnesses a charter of that earl as ‘Bricius de Dunin, his seneschall.’[377] The lands of Duning and others were erected into the barony of Duncrub in favour of Andrew Rollo of Duncrub in 1540; and among the lands we find the thane lands also called Edindonyng.[378] One of the charters by Earl Gilbert, which is witnessed by Anechol, thane of Dunin, is likewise witnessed by Duncanus, Thanus de Struin. This is the only notice of this thanage, but the name corresponds with that of the parish of Strowan on the south bank of the Earn above Crieff. It is now united with the parish of Monzievaird, from which it is divided by the river. It was probably a thanage also held of the earl, and the old family of the Toschachs of Monzievaird no doubt derived their name and descent from its _Toschach_ or thane.[379] [Sidenote: Thanages in Atholl.]