Alasdair mac Mhaighstir Alasdair

Alasdair mac Mhaighstir Alasdair (c. 1698–1770), legal name Alexander MacDonald, or, in Gaelic Alasdair MacDhòmhnaill, was a Scottish poet, satirist, lexicographer, and memoirist.

He was born at Dalilea and is believed to have been homeschooled before briefly attending university. MacDhòmhnaill was multilingual literacy in the vernacular Scottish Gaelic language. Alasdair began composing Gaelic poetry while teaching at a Protestant school at Kilchoan, run by the Society in Scotland for Propagating Christian Knowledge. He published the first secular book in Scottish Gaelic, the glossary Leabhar a Theagasc Ainminnin (1741). Hearing Alasdair 's Jacobite poetry read aloud was said to have helped persuade Prince Charles Edward Stuart to sail from France to Scotland and begin the Rising of 1745. Alasdair fought as a captain in the Jacobite Army. He was chosen to teach Gaelic to the prince. After the Battle of Culloden, Alasdair, his wife, and children remained in hiding until the Act of Indemnity was passed.

In 1751, Alasdair published the second secular book in the Gaelic language, Ais-Eiridh na Sean Chánoin Albannaich (The Resurrection of the Old Scottish Language); a poetry collection. Due to his Jacobitism, frank treatment of sexuality, and vocal attacks in verse against the House of Hanover and the ideology of the ruling Whig political party, all known copies were publicly burned at the Mercat Cross in Edinburgh. Even so, twelve copies of the first edition still survive. The 1751 publication of Ais-eridh na Sean Chánoin Albannaich inspired, "an increasing number of important collections of Gaelic poetry." After another two decades of composing Gaelic poetry, Alasdair Mac Mhaighstir Alasdair died at Arisaig and was buried locally in St Máel Ruba's Roman Catholic cemetery in 1770.

Alsasdair has been mentioned as one of Scotland's national poets and even as a complimentary figure to Robert Burns. After over two centuries of bowdlerisation, the first complete and uncensored collection of Alasdair's poetry was published at West Montrose, Ontario in 2020. Ballachulish-based vocalist Griogair Labhruidh has also recorded Alasdair's Òran Eile don Phrionnsa ("Another Song to the Prince"), titled by its first line Moch sa Mhadainn 's Mi a' Dùsgadh, as part of the soundtrack for the 2nd and 4th seasons of the TV series Outlander.