The ancestors of the Ogston family name are believed to be descended from the Pictish race. Legend, as related by noted historians Bede and O'Hart described this ancient founding race, which settled in North-Eastern Scotland, as coming originally from the shores of Brittany about the 5th century B.C. Migrating, they sailed northward to Ireland where the ancient monarchies of Ireland refused them permission to land and settle, but they were directed by those Kings to the eastern part of Scotland on the condition that all the Pictish Kings marry an Irish Princess, thus assuring the Irish of a colony which would always be a part of the Irish royal court. According to the Venerable Bede, England's oldest historian born in 673 A.D., known as the Father of English History, this Pictish settlement established a matriarchal hierarchy which was unique in the annals of British history.
One of the first Pictish Kings, as recorded in official, documented history, was Nechtan, about 724 A.D., although there had been many who had fought valiantly at Hadrian's Wall against the Roman invasion many centuries before. Roman history shows these unconquerable northern tribes as being the main reason for their vacating the British Isles in the 4th century. Rivals of the Picts to the west, were the Dalriadans or the Highlanders of the Western Isles, who were their constant foes in the battle for supremacy for power over all Scotland, known then as Alba, or Caledonia. Nechtan was finally expelled from Pictland by Alpin, half Dalriadan, half Pict, the result of a political marriage. Alpin's son, Kenneth MacAlpine, son of Alpin, became the first historically recorded King of Scotland as we know it today. The Picts, compressed by the northern invasion of the Orcadian Vikings who penetrated as far south as Caithness, sometimes even to Edinburgh, were left with a territory on the eastern coast of Scotland from Inverness, south to Edinburgh.
From examining such documents as the Inquisitio, 1120 A.D., the Exchequer Rolls of Scotland, The Ragman Rolls, the Chronicles of the Picts and Scots; as well as and various other cartularies of parishes in Scotland, we have determined that the Ogston name was first found Ogston in Aberdeenshire (Gaelic: Siorrachd Obar Dheathain), a historic county, and present day Council Area of Aberdeen, located in the Grampian region of northeastern Scotland, where they held a family seat from early times and their first records appeared on the early census rolls taken by the early Kings of Scotland to determine the rate of taxation of their subjects. Hogston was recorded in Sileby, Leicestershire in the 17th century.
Information taken from the Extended History of the Ogston Surname which is available to purchase from the House of Names website. This is not a sponsored post or affiliate link.