Category Archives: Anglo-Scottish history

Spare the rod and spoil the child…and the importance of godly parents

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Eleanor Hay – Lady Eleanor Livingston, Countess of Linlithgow

Well it’s a bit different but it’s almost inevitable that the raising of sixteenth and seventeenth century children should bring me to this point. Fletcher records that there are 22 printed guides for parents, often drawing on the Bible, advocating physical punishment. One went so far as to say that it purged corruption from the child – always good to find a Puritan viewpoint (forget Romantic images of children trailing clouds of glory), the Stuart period was definitely more into the sinfulness of infants. And let’s be clear this was applied to girls as well as boys.

Not that beating was the first recourse of a Protestant household. It was essential to bring a child up in fear and obedience. This meant that manners were an essential part of childhood education, as they had always been. Silence could be added to the list – seen and not heard was an essential during church services. Mothers and nurses were expected to teach young children their prayers, to read their Bible and the correct behaviour in a place of worship. In an age associated with cheap print, catechisms of questions and answers were readily available for the authoritative mother.

For Elizabeth Stuart born at the end of the sixteenth century and raised by her governess Lady Eleanor Livingston there was the additional problem of Eleanor’s faith. She was known to be a Catholic. The Presbyterian Church were alarmed by the way she raised her own five children, accusing her of keeping them from attending services at one point. The thought that a royal princess might be indoctrinated with Catholic beliefs was a source of friction between king and Church.

Even worse, Elizabeth, a girl, was expected to learn obedience and Eleanor Livingston was not obedient. Her husband, Andrew Livingston, 7th Lord Livingston was Protestant so it seemed to the Scottish Church that his wife ought to accept his faith. They even arranged for a chaplain from Stirling to teach her. She ended up being accused of obduracy. Eleanor was not a good role model for obedience, especially as she challenged male superiority of thought and mind in her continued refusal to accept Presbyterianism. Whatever else she might have been Princess Elizabeth’s governess was neither weak nor passive.

And for whatever reason, James VI concluded that the Livingstons were the best people to raise his daughters. The nursery at Linlithgow was closer to Dunfermline than Stirling, so although it was difficult for Queen Anne to visit her son it was much easier for her to visit Elizabeth, and a short lived sister Margaret. Anne was also firm friends with Eleanor and while James would not permit his wife to oversee the royal nursery he did care for her at the start of their marriage. He might not have expected that in 1601 Anne would become Catholic, further complicating the business of raising the royal brood.

Interested in the Winter Queen? Block of seven Zoom classes about the life and times of Elizabeth Stuart beginning 20 January 2025.

The formation of the Anglo-Scottish border – part three.

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Smailholm

My last post saw Henry II ascend the throne in England and David I die in Scotland. David was predeceased by his eldest son, Henry Earl of Northumberland. His son, Malcolm the Maiden inherited the throne. The nickname has nothing to do with unknightlyness- think more poor health, religious fervour and an early death before marriage. He was succeeded by his brother, William the Lion. Ultimately William, who spent time at Henry II’s court and who backed Henry’s sons in their rebellion against their father, was forced to recognise Henry as his feudal overlord thanks to various unfortunate occurrences in Scotland, including a rebellion in Gallowegians. William was even forced to pay Henry for the English army in Scotland and had a bride selected for him.

As an aside Ermengarde de Beaumont was part of the extended Plantagenet family thanks to Henry I’s sizeable illegitimate family. The terms of the wedding were agreed according to the Treaty of Falaise. And while we’re on the subject William’s mother was Ada de Warenne whose father was one of William the Conqueror’s most trusted advisers while her mother who had something of a scandalous past was descended from the kings of France – the House of Dunkeld was looking decidedly normanised one way and another.

Anyway, when Richard the Lionheart came to the throne there was a shift in power. he just wanted to go on Crusade so he accepted 10,000 marks from the Scots in return for The Quitclaim of Canterbury – which basically meant that the Scots were inn charge of themselves and that Richard agreed that he wasn’t their overlord. For a time the status quo was maintained. It was bad form to attack the kingdoms of monarchs who were away on holy war and if good manners weren’t sufficient, the threat of excommunication carried more weight.

However, the reign of John and his son Henry III saw a continuation of the tensions on the northern border of England. Where exactly did one kingdom end and the other begin? In 1200, for instance William claimed Northumberland as part of Scotland when they met at Lincoln. The Treaty of Norham followed in 1203 and in 1209 when John arrived on the border with an army, William submitted before an invasion took place. In 1210, William’s heir, Alexander, gave John an oath of loyalty at Alnwick – but in England the political situation was becoming more tense.

Alexander became king in 1214 but the following year saw the First Barons War and Magna Carta in England. In the north, barons like Eustace De Vesci, Lord of Alnwick (The one who is famously said to have substituted a sex worker for his wife in the bed of King John. The said wife being Margaret of Scotland, an illegitimate daughter of William the Lion.) chose to offer their allegiance to the Scottish king rather than John. It was 1216 before John was able to drive the Scots from Northumbria. And that’s all without mentioning Carlisle which found itself under siege.

Alexander II came to terms with Henry III’s regency government while Alexander III married Henry’s daughter Margaret. Their respective ages were 10 and 11. Henry III began plotting to seize overlordship of Scotland – the young king and his wife were kept apart, seized by opposing factions and Margaret wrote that she hated Scotland. Eventually though, Alexander attained his majority and the couple went on to have three children who all predeceased their father.

Alexander spent the decade after Margaret’s death as a widower but without an adult male heir to succeed him he was urged to take a new bride. So, he married Yolande de Dreux in 1285. He died following a fall from his horse the fallowing year on his way to visit her. The new queen of Scotland was his granddaughter the Maid of Norway who died before she arrived in Scotland.

There were various claimants to the crown and Edward I claimed that he should choose by right of being overlord of the Scottish monarchs – just let’s not go there – these last three posts have demonstrated that it all depended on who had the most stable kingdom and the biggest army – and yes I know that the Earl of Huntingdon owed feudal duty to the English king and no this isn’t the time to get into that kind of discussion. And it was Edward I who gave orders for the boundary to be identified by 6 Scottish knights and 6 English knights – who were required to travel its length, not once but twice.

Ultimately the thirteenth century ended with armies crossing the border one way or the other. While the border was established the next 300 years saw national armies on occasion but on a regional level there were raids, looting and kidnappings…in which became a way of life.

The formation of the northern borders -part deux.

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Carlisle Castle

The kingdom of Northumbria did not enter Norman rule placidly but Gospatric, who was related to Malcolm Canmore was eventually stripped of his power and died in Scotland. The Scottish king had given him Dunbar Castle and his eldest son became the Earl of Dunbar. Another, Dolphin, ruled Carlisle on Malcolm’s behalf.

We had arrived at the Treaty of Abernethy in 1072.

1079 The Normans invade Scotland to remind Malcolm not to keep raiding Northumbria and to reinforce the Treaty of Abernethy.

1092 William II, better known as William Rufus, drives Dolphin out of Carlisle. Malcolm doesn’t immediately respond to this.

13 November 1093 Malcom III killed with his eldest son by Margaret of Wessex at the Battle of Alnwick on his way home from a spot of light raiding. It is said that Margaret died from a broken heart three days later. Malcolm’s brother Donald Bane took the throne as Donald III but was driven from it six months later by Duncan – who had been handed to William the Conqueror as a hostage at the signing of the Treaty of Abernethy. Rufus accepted Duncan II’s homage – however, despite the political expedient, it wasn’t long before Donald regained the throne. The turmoil in Scotland was matched by the dispute in England between William Rufus and his elder brother Robert Curthose who was Duke of Normandy but who wanted his brother’s crown as well.

1095 Duncan II murdered.

1097 Edgar, the fourth son of Malcolm, takes the Scottish throne. He has received English support.

1100 William Rufus killed in a hunting accident in the New Forest. His brother Henry ascends the throne as Henry I and marries Edith of Scotland – the daughter of Malcolm III and Margaret of Wessex. As well as helping to secure his northern border, it also helps to stabilise his throne. Edith changes her name to Maud when she marries.

1107 Edgar dies and his younger brother, Alexander the Fierce, became king in his stead – with the approval of King Henry I. This accord was cemented by Alexander’s marriage to Sybilla of Normandy who was one of Henry’s illegitimate daughters.

Henry is able to cement his control of the north and establish lordships to rule Cumbria and the borders on his behalf – e.g the de Hottons of Hutton.

1124 Alexander died without children and was succeeded by his brother David who becomes King David I.

King Henry I died on 1 December 1135. He had wanted his only legitimate child, the Empress Matilda, to rule after him but despite having made his barons agree to the plan, its actually his nephew Stephen of Blois who nabs the crown. In 1138 a civil war known as the Anarchy erupts between supporters of Stephen and Matilda.

King David I had already seized the opportunity to extend his kingdom south once more on the pretext of supporting Matilda’s claim. The local militia and baronial retinues of Yorkshire and the North Midlands  fight back against the Scottish incursion to the West and south. In Northumbria the castles at Bamburgh and Wark  hold out against the Scots

January 1136 Treaty of Durham – King Stephen cedes Cumberland to the Scots – Carlisle is part of Scotland once more. The earldom of Huntingdon and its associated land is transferred to David’s son Henry.

22 August 1138 •The Battle of the Standard on the Great North Road – north of Northallerton. The Scots are defeated but retreat in good order they regrouped in Carlisle. There is another meeting and another treaty at Durham. Cumberland would remain part of Scotland for the next 20 years and Northumberland was ceded to Earl of Huntingdon as a fief.

It was King David I who built the first stone castle at Carlisle and where he died on 24 May 1153. He had extended his rule to both the north and the south and through the Second Treaty of Durham he was an independent king who did not have to take oaths of vassalage to the English… which brings us to the end of the Norman period.

The Plantagenets in the form of King Henry II, son of Empress Matilda and Geoffrey of Anjou, ascended the throne in 1154. Obviously Henry had other plans for the north but for the time being Scotland held the upper hand in the matter of the borders.

When is Watling Street not Watling Street? – answer when you’re visiting Rome’s northern most town on Hadrian’s Wall

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Vicar’s Pele, St Andrew’s Churchyard, Corbridge

I’m currently working on the Stuarts so am enjoying a break in sunny Scotland – a continuation, if you will, of the Mary Queen of Scots world tour upon which I intermittently indulge. So yesterday we joined some camels for breakfast off the A66 before heading in the direction of Hadrian’s Wall. There was a pause at Corbridge so that I can re-photo the Vicar’s Pele in the churchyard of St Andrew’s. Once upon a time, the vicar during time of trouble between England and Scotland the vicar would shut himself into the defensive building and hope for the best. It was built in the fourteenth century just at the point when the wars of independence were warming up. Its builders used dressed stone from Coriosopitum Roman camp known locally as Coria and by the modern world as Corbridge.

So far so good but I must admit to being slightly bewildered to seeing the street name Watling Street. For a moment I thought I’d got things very badly wrong over the years. I thought the famous Roman Road started in Kent made its way to St Albans and then cut across country towards Wroxeter. By the ninth century it was effectively the border between the Saxons and Scandinavian ruled Danelaw. So why does a short stretch of Watling Street suddenly turn up in Corbridge in Northumberland?

The answer is that the Romans did not build a small extension to the road in Northumberland. Dere Street Stretches from York north into Scotland (quite some way beyond Hadrian’s Wall) up to the Antonine Wall. Error arose because of the written record. The Antonine Itinerary which was created during the Roman period and which was reproduced by the Anglo-Saxons between the seventh and tenth centuries is a good example of the way confusion could arise. It was basically a road map of the Roman Empire with a British section. The second route listed in the British part of the itinerary misidentified a route between York and Carlisle as Watling Street. And by the Middle Ages short stretches of Roman Roads were being called Watling Street whether it was accurate or not. You can find a Watling Street from Catterick to York; from Knaresborough to Ilkley; there’s an example in Preston; and of course – the proudly named section of Dere Street in Corbridge.

And yes – we stopped off in a very misty and damp Corbridge Roman town to have a look at the Corbridge hoard which was buried during the second century AD and which was rediscovered in 1964. The Roman segmented armour is the star turn of the hoard which is thought to have been buried for safekeeping by a smith but there are also leather and textile artefacts. Until its discovery no one quite knew how the armour was manufactured. The museum also boasts a dodecahedron, an artefact that is something of a mystery because no one has yet established what its purpose was.

Then it was on to Otterburn, the site of the battle in 1388 between the Scots and the English – for an account look at Froissart but don’t expect to find a photograph of the site here. By the time we arrived it was like wondering around inside a very damp cloud and I fully expected to become lost. We stopped at the mill shop to see if I could find a waterproof that actually is waterproof and I was pleased to find a field full of tenterhooks so it wasn’t all in vain.

Tenterhooks at Otterburn Mill

Thankfully we made our way to our overnight accommodation without mishap and were shown to the ‘wobbly room’ which proved an apt description of the floor. Much to my delight I was staying in a pele tower – something I’ve always wanted to do. This particular one, at Clennell, was a bit like the little doll in the middle of a set of Russian dolls. Like the Vicar’s Pele it was built during the fourteenth century. It may have evolved into something slightly more comfortable by 1567 but the emphasis would still have been on defence. A new range was added in the seventeenth century around the original building and then more additions were made in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries – actually perhaps I should have described the hall as being a bit like a many layered onion. In any event I was delighted by the whole thing.

Clennell Hall, pele tower.

The Dacre beasts

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The Dacre beasts on display at the V & A

Not royal but impressive none-the-less standing at 6ft tall. Thomas Lord Dacre fought at Bosworth. Fortunately for him he backed Henry Tudor. Three years later he eloped with the heiress Elizabeth Greystoke. Think I might want to do a bit more research about that – one person’s elopement is another person’s kidnap and abduction of an heiress. Anyway, Henry VII didn’t seem bothered about the abrupt nature of the union and in 1503 Thomas was knighted. Henry VIII made him a knight of the garter after the Battle of Flodden.

Dacre died in 1525 and the Dacre beasts were used for his funeral. All four of the animals were carved from a single piece of oak and its speculated that they were created before 1525 for a tournament of some description. They avoided disaster in 1844 when Naworth Castle went up in flames.

The creatures are the so-called Dolphin of Greystoke; a ram which is probably the Multon lamb; the red bull of Dacre and the de Faux griffon.

The Treaty of Perpetual Peace…which wasn’t very long lasting

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Reference: National Library of Scotland
MS, Seaton Armorial, Acc. 9309, f. 18 (date: early 17th century)
By kind permission of Sir Francis Ogilvy. https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/utk/scotland/popup/james.htm

In 1497, Henry VII, a man who avoided war when possible, sought to end the ongoing conflict between England and Scotland by the Treaty of Ayton which reinforced march law and sought to prevent cross-border feuding and cattle theft erupting into full scale conflict. The treaty was ratified in London on 24 January 1502 and sealed by a diplomatic marriage between Tudor’s daughter Margaret and King James IV of Scotland. The following year the Pope also ratified the treaty.

Margaret travelled to Edinburgh to marry in August 1503. She was not yet fourteen but had not left England any sooner because her grandmother, Lady Margaret Beaufort, was insistent that she was of an age to be married. She was not yet six when she was betrothed to James IV who was twenty-two-years old in 1497. Inevitably he already had a mistress and children by the time Margaret arrived in Scotland but as things turned out James was a kindly husband who treated his new bride with consideration.

It wasn’t a particularly popular match with the English who did not take kindly to the Scots after two hundred years of intermittent warfare not to mention James IV’s involvement with Perkin Warbeck which had resurrected the Wars of the Roses for a short time.

Unfortunately for all concerned, James IV was tied by the Auld Alliance to France which meant that when Tudor’s son Henry VIII resumed the centuries old habit of going to war against the French that James was obliged to open up a northern front breaking the perpetual treaty and getting himself killed at the Battle of Flodden on 9 September 1513.

Sir Andrew Murray – Guardian of Scotland

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Battle of Dupplin Moor

Sir Andrew Murray’s father, also named Andrew, fought with William Wallace. Our Sir Andrew was married to Christina Bruce the sister of King Robert I although his two sons were the issue of a previous marriage. He came to prominence during the Second Scottish War of Independence which started when Edward Balliol, one of the so-called ‘Disinherited’ made his claim to the kingdom of Scotland during the minority of King David II. Having won the battle of Dupplin Moor near Perth, Edward was crowned king.

However, supporters of David continued to fight on. Amongst them was Sir Andrew. In December 1332 he won the Battle of Annan which sent Edward packing to Carlisle, dressed it was reported only in his underclothes – where he presumably spent a miserable Christmas trying to drum up local support as well as some new togs. Having promised Edward III all of Lothian the king marched north with an army and besieged Berwick – not quite breaking the Treaty of Edinburgh-Northampton as I don’t think he crossed the Tweed.

Rather than taking Edward and his army on and lifting the siege, the Scots tried to draw the king away by raiding England. Sir Andrew got himself caught and imprisoned in Durham in April 1333. His replacement Guardian was Sir Archibald Douglas who rather unfortunately lost the Battle of Halidon Hill in July. Rather bizarrely, and in what can only be described as an own goal, the English ransomed Murray and allowed him to return to Scotland in 1334 – where he proceeded to besiege Balliol’s ally Henry de Beaumont (both names betraying their Anglo-Norman ancestry.)

Edward III was unable to bring Murray to battle, as the wily knight recognised that this was a sure fire way to lose any advantage. Instead, Murray harried the English with guerrilla tactics. When Edward and his army left Scotland he resumed the capture of castles fallen to supporters of Balliol. It was March 1337 before he recaptured his own castle of Bothwell.

The way into England was now clear and the burghers of Carlisle were faced with a Scottish army.

Having made his point, Murray retired in 1338 to Avoch Castle where he died. By that time King Edward III of England had turned his attention to France but Murray’s actions turned the tide in David II’s and Scotland’s favour. Meanwhile in Bute, Robert the Stewart was also taking action to secure the revival of the Bruce cause.

After 1341 the Second Scottish War of Independence reached a stalemate and the seventeen-year old king returned from France where he had been sent for his own safety after Dupplin Moor. The Auld Alliance would see David invading England with disastrous consequences for his rule.

The Ragman Rolls

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Ragman Roll

When King Alexander III fell off a cliff one dark and stormy night in 1286, it created a problem. His heir was his granddaughter the Maid of Norway. Sadly she died when she was still a child – possibly as a result of extreme seasickness when she made the crossing from Norway to the Orkneys.

And so dear readers we arrive at 1291. There are many claimants. It swiftly became obvious that no one was going to back down and graciously recognise someone else as king. Scotland was on the edge of a civil conflict. The two key contenders were John Balliol and Robert Bruce, Lord of Annandale. King Edward I of England met with Scottish nobles at Norham on Tweed. He graciously volunteered to look at the cases of the claimants to determine who should rule Scotland. The only fly in the neighbourly gesture was this demand that everyone signs an oath of loyalty to him and that whoever he selected should recognise English overlordship…sounds decidedly Machiavellian. And ultimately it was. But at the time Edward was concerned that if he made an unpopular choice his decision would be ignored.

Many of the nobility refused to sign an oath but others did. The rolls of signatures became known as Ragman Rolls. Some people think that the name ‘ragman’ came abut because of all the seals attached to the document. An alternative theory is that is comes from the papal tax record compiled by a man named Ragimunde. There is more than one Ragman Roll. The one signed at Norham in 1291 is smaller than the roll signed in 1296 when Edward invaded Scotland.

And I’m informed the word rigmarole derives from ragman roll – and that ladies and gentlemen made my evening!

Quitclaims

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Pontefract Castle

A quitclaim was basically a waiver of all legal rights – usually to do with property. it’s a document that stops someone from turning up later to claim a possession back. The two most famous examples that I can think of are the Quitclaim of Canterbury dated 1189 and John of Gaunt’s quitclaim to Katherine Swynford dated 14 February 1382 – but that may be because I’m currently exploring the Scottish Wars of Independence and finishing off some work on medieval mistresses.

Essentially the Duke of Lancaster received something of a shock with the Peasants Revolt of 1381. His estates were attacked, his London home turned into a pile of smouldering rubble, his servants murdered and his son Henry of Bolingbroke had to be smuggled out of the Tower shortly before the rebels broke in and dragged the Archbishop of Canterbury out to his death. No one knows where his long term mistress, and mother of four of his children, Katherine Swynford was during those dangerous weeks. She may also have been hiding John’s daughter Philippa of Lancaster with the rest of her family. There is a theory that she was in Pontefract Castle because when John’s wife Constanza of Castile arrived the castellan refused to open the gates to her and she was forced to find shelter at Knaresburgh Castle. Lancaster who had been negotiating with the Scots at Berwick crossed into Scotland and returned only when it was safe to do so. He swore to forego his sinful ways – which included setting aside the woman he loved.

The quitclaim was a legal document that Lancaster used to give up all rights and claims to any property or gifts that he had given to Katherine in the past. He quite literally quit all claims to anything that once belonged to him that he had granted to his mistress.

The Canterbury Quitclaim of 5 December 1189 was a treaty that reversed the feudal overlordship claimed by King Henry II over Scotland’s kings at the Treaty of Falaise when he had the good fortune to capture William the Lion during a confrontation of Alnwick. Henry’s heir, Richard the Lionheart accepted 10,000 marks from William to help finance his part in the Third Crusade and Scotland was independent once more. Simples…

The Royal House of Wessex – Scotland’s and England’s Kings since St Margaret

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It’s sometimes helpful to see something in a diagrammatic form to make sense of what’s happening. Beginning with the Royal House of Wessex -King Æthelred was married twice. His second wife was Emma of Normandy who was the mother of Edward the Confessor . Æthelred had a brood of sons by his first wife but the one we need to look at is Edmund Ironside who briefly co-ruled England with King Cnut before being murdered in 1016 whilst in the toilet if the chroniclers are to be believed – and for those of you who like the gory details the assassin was given his orders by Edmund’s own brother-in-law Eadric Streona who was possibly one of the least pleasant political figures in English history, which is saying something as there’re plenty of contenders.

Cnut now claimed the whole of England and married the widowed Queen Emma. He may have hoped that Edmund Ironside’s sons Edward and Edmund would be quietly bumped off when he sent them overseas. Edward the Exile as he became known had three children, only two feature on my table. He was invited back to England by his uncle, Edward the Confessor who succeeded King Cnut’s sons Harold Harefoot (the son of Cnut’s hand fasted wife but now’s not the time to go into that) and Harthacnut (the son of Emma.) Edward the Exile died a very short time after landing on English shores and the suspicion is that he was also bumped off – but in a rather more subtle way than his father.

Whilst he was in exile he married Agatha of Hungary. The couple had three children (yes I know there’re only two on the diagram.) The child I’m interested in today is St Margaret. She married Malcolm Canmore after she fled to Scotland following the Conquest. Her daughter Edith married King Henry I, changed her name to Matilda and was the mother of the Empress Matilda. Every monarch since King Henry II has been descended from the Royal House of Wessex.

The descent of Scottish kings is more complex but it is, I think, also true to say that every king since King David I has been descended from the Royal House of Wessex. King David fathered a line that led to the eight-year old Maid of Norway who died after making the sea crossing from Norway to the Orkneys in 1090. There was no direct claimant to the Scottish Crown- but there were very many contenders. The First Interregnum began whilst King Edward I of England looked at the thirteen competitors who had a claim to the Crown. The man Edward chose, John Balliol was descended from King David on his mother’s side of the family tree. The House of Bruce was also descended from King David. Unsurprisingly the Stewarts are also descended from King David. One of Robert II’s ancestors was the base born daughter of William the Lion and another married the daughter of the Earl of Huntingdon – a title which King Henry I of England gave to King David and which he passed on to his son to avoid the complications of vassalage and overlordship

St Margaret’s ancestry – British Library BL Royal 14 B VI