Ken is quite right about the Laird family in Ireland, as many of you will already know, as he points out, as "settlers". By this he refers to the process more commonly known as "transplantation". There was a huge effort, largely by the English to subdue the "unruly natives", largely Roman Catholic, by encouraging Scots, mostly Lowland and largely Protestant to move to Ireland with grants of land in the 17th Century. A dreadful thing for cousins, but convenient to have someone to blame, and it's usually the English (cf. "Braveheart?). It is this that is at the root of the problems in Ireland that have erupted again this century, as in the North, the population is still a majority Protestant and "loyalist", preferring to remain with the "Union" with England, Scotland and Wales rather than uniting with the largely Roman Catholic Republic of Ireland (Eire) in the South. There has rarely been peace or prosperity in Ireland for any significant period, which is why so many Irish are over there in the USA, and some came back to the mainland. This is too complicated an issue for just one e-mail and no judgement is intended here. My Great Grandmother's Father, Stuart Aitchison came to Glasgow from Londonderry! These "Irish" are offten referred to in the USA as "Scotch Irish", or over here as "Transplanted Scots". So there you have it. The Lairds are usually of Scots origin, and in our case of Norse ancestry and, before that, who knows? So who can really say who we really are! But we are all "Lairds" and invariably proud of it! Yours aye Iain http://ourworld.cs.com/INSLaird/