The Scottish king was still occupied in the province of Moray, where he appears to have assembled a considerable force, to which Ireland contributed her share. Strengthened by the return of Thorkell Fostri, and by the arrival of the friendly clans from the Highland districts of the north and west, Thorfin crossed the Moray Firth, and assuming the offensive, attacked the royal army, which is said to have been stationed in the neighbourhood of Burghead.[139] Duncan was defeated after a severe struggle, and Thorfin, following up his success, plundered the country to the frontiers of Fife, and returned without molestation to his northern earldom; whilst the double failure in Northumbria and Moray hastening the catastrophe of the youthful king, he was assassinated “in the Smith’s bothy,” near Elgin, not far from the scene of his latest battle, the Mormaor Macbeth being the undoubted author of his death.[140] The reigns of this king and his predecessor have been adorned in the pages of Buchanan and Boece with numerous victories gained over the Northmen which were totally unknown to the earlier authorities Wynton and Fordun. Many difficulties beset the path of the early compiler of Scottish history. The dearth of materials; the English claims so thoroughly interwoven with the accounts which the rival chronicler was fain to accept for his principal authorities; the necessity under which he lay of distinguishing the “genuine Scots”--as he considered them--as well from the “Irishry” to the northward of “the Mounth,” as from the English to the southward of the Tweed, all combined to render it a matter requiring no little trouble and ingenuity to compose an appropriate history of his country. Under these circumstances the numerous tumuli along the coast, each marking some spot where the men of the olden time repulsed or fell before the invaders, suggested the groundwork of a historical fabric which might at any rate escape much questioning; and of these memorials of bygone conflicts Boece has availed himself without scruple. Lords of the Isles and Thanes of Strathearn valiantly sustain the contest against Sueno or Camus, Olave or Onetus; and at a time when surnames were as yet unknown, a Keith or a Hay, a Graham or a Dunbar, revives the failing courage of his countrymen and points the way to victory. The fate of Loncarty must attend upon the triumphs of Malcolm and his grandson. The crumbling bones of the dead bear faithful witness to the reality of the battles, but the circumstances and the characters called into existence by the pen of Boece, must fade away from the page of history, and pass into the realm of fiction.[141] THE LINE OF MORAY. _Macbeth_ 1040–1058. _Lulach_ 1058. [Sidenote: A. D. 1040.]