North of Cupar, however, was the thanage of Alyth, in which was situated the royal castle of Invercuych, as we find Robert the Second granting to Sir James de Lyndesay All and Whole the lands of Aberbothry, as also the place of the royal castle of Invercuyth and all the lands which belonged to John de Welhame and John de Balcasky, in the thanage of Alyth, to be held as a barony; and the same monarch includes the thanage of Alyth with its pertinents in a subsequent charter to Sir James de Lyndesay of the castle and barony of Crawford and other lands;[391] and in connection with this thanage there appears to have been a forest, as in two charters of King David the Second to the canons of Scone, Alyth is mentioned among the royal forests.[392] As Alyth with its royal castle was at the north-east extremity of Gowry, so we find at its north-west boundary the thanage and royal castle of Kinclaven, on the west bank of the Tay, near its junction with the river Isla. We find notices of the repair of the castle in 1264, while the sheriff of Perth accounts for its _firma_, and King Robert the Second grants to his illegitimate son, John, his lands of Ballathys, Invernate, and Mukirsy in the thanage of Kynclevin, with its tenandries and services of the freeholders, the native-men, bondmen, and their bondages and followers.[393] [Sidenote: Thanages south of the Forth.] The thanages of which we have thus given shortly the history were all situated north of the Firths of Forth and Clyde, and in those eastern districts which formed originally the seat of the Pictish tribes, and afterwards fell under the dominion of a dynasty of kings of Scottish race. The Scots were thus a dominant race over a subject population, and under the succeeding dynasty, who adopted Norman customs and assimilated the laws and institutions of the country to those of a feudal monarchy, these districts became the theatre of a Saxon colonisation and of a gradually increasing settlement of Norman barons, who held the land on a feudal tenure from the Crown; and thus the more ancient tenures represented by the thanages were comparatively speaking few in number, and scattered in isolated situations. But while the thanages in general were thus situated, there was one thanage south of the Firth of Forth which appears to belong to the same class. It was situated on the south bank of the river Carron, and represented that small district, distinguished in the Irish Annals by the name of _Calathros_, and in Latin documents and chronicles as Calatria,—a name preserved in the more modern Callender. The name of _Ecclesbreac_ by which the church was known, and by which it is still called in the Highlands, indicates that it was inhabited by a Gaelic-speaking people, and the term _Breac_ is usually associated with those of Pictish race. They were probably the remains of the old Pictish population which gave their name to the Pentland Hills. Be this as it may, the notices of this thanage are in