After the Roman legions had left, the British kingdoms of southern Scotland fought to maintain themselves against the Picts and the Scots to their north, and against the expansionist English of Northumbria to their south. In their Welsh language the earliest surviving Scottish poem was composed, telling of the defeat of the Gododdin heroes by the English; and this poem contains far the earliest reference to the British resistance leader, Arthur. When the old British kingdoms of Gododdin, Strathclyde and Rheged had vanished, the traditions of the Men of the North were preserved in Wales - the only part of the once predominantly British isles in which their language remains to this day. The story of Arthur traveled south until he was given a new setting as far south as Tintagel in Welsh-speaking Cornwall.
Meanwhile Arthur’s Seat commemorated him in the lands of the Gododdin, while to the north of Strathclyde the Mac Arthur's were tracing their descent in the 13th century from the legendary hero. It was a Mac Arthur who at this time married the heiress of Duncan mac Duibhne of Loch Awe. This was before the nickname Cam beul gave rise to the surname of Campbell, who are also called the Clanh Ua Duibhne. Mac Arthur may therefore be regarded as an earlier name of the same race. It was also one of considerable consequence until James I returned from his long captivity in England, and fell like a thunderbolt on the magnates of his realm. In 1427 lain Mac Arthur shared the fate of the king’s nearest relatives who had suffered execution and forfeiture. Thereafter it was the surname of Campbell which flourished in this region beyond the ancient capital of Strathclyde on Dumbarton Rock.
But in modern times the name of Mac Arthur has been carried to the ends of the earth. John Mac Arthur (1767-1834) belonged to a family that had already emigrated, since he was born in Devonshire. In 1790 he arrived with his regiment in New South Wales, where he was Commandant at Parramatta from 1793 until 1804. In 1794 he laid the foundations of the wool industry in Australia by crossing Bengal with Irish sheep, and then introducing merino sheep from Africa. Later he traveled throughout Europe with his sons, studying wine production, and in 1817 he planted the first Australian vineyard. When Bligh of the Bounty was appointed Governor, he attempted to arrest Mac Arthur in 1807, but he had met his match. Mac Arthur arrested Bligh in turn. He was a quarrelsome man, as two Scots who followed Bligh in the post of Governor, Sir Thomas Makdougall Brisbane of Brisbane and Lachlan Mac Quarie, were to discover to their cost. But he founded a continent’s two great industries of wine and wool, and justly ranks as a Father of Australia.
His name has been carried to even greater renown in the United States of America, where it was brought in about 1840 by an emigrant from the former lands of Strathclyde, in which Glasgow now lies. His son Arthur Mac Arthur entered the army, a career that was followed by his son General Douglas Mac Arthur (1880-1964).