The diarist, John Evelyn visited Audley End in 1654 describing it as something between ‘ancient and modern’. He added that it was one of the ‘stateliest palaces in the kingdom’. He and Celia Fiennes who visited at the end of the seventeenth century commented on the river that ran through the park. Samuel Pepys was more interested in the quality of the wine and the prettiness of the landlord’s daughter at the inn where he was staying.
Pepys visited the home of the Earl of Suffolk at Saffron Walden on 27 February 1659. He was shown around by the housekeeper there – who was a man… ” the stateliness of the ceilings, chimney-pieces, and form of the whole was exceedingly worth seeing. He took us into the cellar, where we drank most admirable drink, a health to the king.” He visited again in 1667 and ‘mighty merry’ he was – which comes as no surprise to his readership.
Celia Fiennes, who completed her journeys riding side saddle, often with only two servant to accompany her, visited in 1697. Her journal described the building in more detail – “built round three courts. There are thirty great and little towers on the top, and a great cupola in the middle. The rooms are large and lofty, with good rich old furniture, tapestry, et cetera, but no beds in that part we saw. There are 750 rooms in the house. The canal in the midst of the park looked very fine. It’s altogether a stately palace, and was built for one of the kings.”
Thomas Audley, Henry VIII’s Lord Chancellor from 1533 until 1544 shortly before the 1st Baron Audley’s own death built the house on the proceeds of his service to the Crown. I’ve enjoyed researching Colchester’s former recorder for my A-Z of the city. He was created Baron Audley in 1538 and acquired the land at Saffron Walden with the dissolution of the monasteries.
Audley’s only surviving child, Margaret Audley, was married to Thomas Howard, 4th Duke of Norfolk. Their son, Thomas Howard, became the first of the Howard earls of Suffolk – hence the ownership of the property from that time onwards. Thomas Howard was born at Audley End in 1561. He inherited the house in 1564 after Margaret’s death. Just as an aside, Margaret was a cousin of Lady Jane Grey.
Royal Connections to Audley End
King James, who was fond of Margaret’s grandson, visited twice in 1614 by which time the earls of Suffolk had modified Thomas Audley’s original house. The improved grand design was based on the premise that royalty would make the most of the hospitality that the earl could provide. Which brings me to the Stuarts and the royal connection mentioned by Celia Fiennes. Charles II liked the house so much that he purchased it in 1668. James Howard 3rd Earl of Suffolk was not so enamoured of the Stewart kings that he wanted to ruin himself during the English Civil Wars – instead he lived quietly at Audley. After the Restoration he sold the house and the park to Charles II who renamed it New Palace and stayed there when he wanted to watch the races at Newmarket.
In 1701 the earls of Suffolk were restored to their former home in return for not demanding more of the £20,000 that Charles II promise but apparently never paid for the property.
And that as they say is that.
The History of Audley End, Richard Lord Braybrooke, (London: Samuel Bentley, 1836)Â
Finally, as promised – Elizabeth, daughter of James I of England, and her husband Frederick V of the Palatinate had thirteen children but she outlived most of them.
Elizabeth denied that she was pregnant with her first child, Frederick Henry, named after her husband and her brother who was born on 1 January 1614. As his father’s heir Frederick Henry went with his father to Prague when the elector accepted the Crown of Bohemia in 1618. When Prague was threatened by the Holy Roman Emperor’s armies, Frederick Henry went to safety with his Uncle Louis – and his mother’s jewels – in Holland but he didn’t rejoin the rest of his family until the Spring of 1621 in exile in The Hague.
Frederick Henry set up a court for their children at Leiden and it was there that the prince was educated before being sent to Leiden University. By 1629 he was coming to the end of his studies. He expressed a wish in January of that year to see the captured Spanish treasure fleet which was at Amsterdam. The prince and his father, who was home from campaigning to try to regain the Palatinate, travelled there on the 7 January. By the time they arrived darkness was falling, it was both foggy and cold. As they crossed the Haarrlemmermeer there was an accident with a barge and Frederick Henry drowned.
Elizabeth’s second child, Charles Louis, born in 1617, became heir to the Palatinate. Charles Louis and is mother had a difficult relationship after Charles regained the electorship in 1648. First of all, he supported Parliament during England’s Civil War – possibly because he blamed the king for not supporting Frederick and his family earlier. Secondly, he refused to pay his mother’s jointure and she was deeply in debt by that time . There were other irritations for Elizabeth to bear, so the relationship was strained. He was unhappily married to Charlotte of Hesse-Kessel and took the decision to divorce her. It was her children who inherited the Palatinate.
Elizabeth, born in 1618, was left with her grandmother, Louise Juliana, as was Charles Louis, when Frederick became king of Bohemia. It was Louise who fled with her grandchildren to Brandenburg in 1621 when the Holy Roman Empire invade the Palatinate. She only joined her mother in Holland in 1627. Elizabeth enjoyed an extensive classical education as well learning music, dancing and painting. She wrote letters to Descartes from 1643 until his death; refused a proposal because it would have meant changing her faith to Catholicsm and became an abbess at the Lutheran convent at Herford in Germany in 1667.
Rupert of the Rhine was born in 1619 while Elizabeth was Queen of Bohemia. When the family fled Prague he was discovered in his cradle in the royal nursery, on the verge of being forgotten.
Maurice of the Palatinate. Maurice is closely associated with his brother Rupert. He served in his uncle’s army during the English Civil War. He died in 1652, when as vice-admiral of his brother’s fleet, he was court in a hurricane and went down with his ship.
Louise Hollandine was born in 1622. It is said that she was in love with James Graham, 1st Marquess of Montrose. In 1657 she fled to France, converted to Catholicism and became a nun. She went on to become the Abbess of Maubuisson Abbey. Her mother attempted to have her arrested before she lief Holland and never recovered from her daughter’s decision. She received no mention in Elizabeth of Bohemia’s will.
Edward, who was educated in France, married Anne Gonzaga who was a French aristocrat. She had claimed to be married to her cousin, the Duke of Guise, but he denied it. The pair married when Edward converted to Catholicism and lived comfortably on her inheritance. He died in 1663 after fathering three daughters.
Henritte Marie was born in 1626 and married, in 1651, into the Hungarian royal family. She died unexpectedly at the end of the same summer.
John Philip John Philip was educated at the French court along with his brother Edward. When they took Charles Louis prisoner, the pair were sent back to The Hague at their mother’s request. In 1646, John Philip killed a French exile and refused to answer for his actions in front of a Dutch court. it was said that Jacques de l’Epinay had boasted of a romantic liaison with John Phillip’s older sister, Louise, and also with Elizabeth of Bohemia. He chose to become a mercenary, in the service of the Duke of Lorraine. he was killed in 1650 at the Battle of Rethel.
Charlotte was born in 1628 and died at the beginning of January 1631.
Sophia married Ernest Augustus, Elector of Hanover. Her son George became George I of Great Britain after her death. From 1701 onwards she was heiress to the throne under the Act of Settlement. Charles II courted her but she thought he was after her mother’s political support.
Gustavus Adolphus was born in 1632. He was Elizabeth and Frederick’s last child. Frederick died the same year. Gustavus died in 1641 when he was 8-years-old.
Frederik Hendrik, Prince of Orange
*oil on panel
*64.5 x 53.8 cm
*inscribed c.l.: ‘Prince Maurice Aetatis 15. A1629 Prince Maurice’ et ‘Fridericus Henricus Aetatis. 15 A. 1629.
Frederick Henry of the Palatinate was born on 1 January 1614. His birth was celebrated by cannon fire in Heidelberg and bonfires in Scotland. Elizabeth of Bohemia was James VI/I’s daughter and at that time, soon after the death of her brother Prince Henry, the succession did not look as secure as it once had. Elizabeth’s surviving brother, Charles, was a sickly child and it was not certain that he would live to adulthood. The birth of Frederick ensured that there would be a male heir to the Scottish and English thrones. King James was so pleased that he granted his daughter 12,000 crowns per year.
In 1618, when his father became King of Bohemia, Frederick Henry accompanied his parents to Prague for their coronation and in 1620 went on a royal progress through Bohemia and part of the Palatinate. Within two years, the Holy Roman Emperor made war on the Bohemians who had chosen to elect a Protestant king rather than a Catholic overlord. Frederick was sent with his uncle, Louis, and bags containing his mother’s jewels to safety in Holland. It was May 1621 before the prince was reunited with his parents who were now exiles without a kingdom.
As the number of the prince’s siblings increased, a royal nursery was set up at Leiden, known as the Prince’s court. Frederick’s education continued at Leiden University while his parents suggested possible matches for him that would see the Palatinate returned if not to their hands, at least to the Prince Palatinate.
The prince had finished his education when the West India Company, of which Elizabeth was a shareholder, captured a Spanish treasure fleet. The teenager expressed a desire to see it. He and his father, who was not campaigning against the Holy Roman Empire at that time, travelled to Amsterdam. They approached the port as darkness fell. It was cold and foggy. While crossing the Haalemmermeer there was an accident. The Elector was rescued but his son was not. Despite Frederick’s attempts to locate his heir, the body, which had become tangled in rigging, was not found until the next day.
Frederick Henry was privately buried at the Kloosterkerk in The Hague.
Robert Peake the elder, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
I’m very much enjoying my current research into the life of Elizabeth, Queen of Bohemia as a child. A particular delight has been the work of Robert Peake the Elder who died in 1619 and who was commissioned to paint several portraits of Elizabeth as well as her brothers, Henry Frederick and Charles .
Peake was an apprentice of the miniaturist Nicholas Hilliard. He became a freeman of the Company of Goldsmiths in 1576. By the 1590s he was a fashionable portrait painter at the court of Elizabeth I.
In 1607 he was appointed sergeant-painter to King James I having already been appointed, in 1604, as picture maker to Prince Henry. It was his task to paint the portraits that were sent as gifts to foreign kings and princes. And when not required to do that he was responsible for making sure that the royal collection was up to scratch and if the queen wanted some scenery for a masque that was his job as well.
After Henry’s death in 1612, Peake moved to the household of Henry and Elizabeth’s younger brother, Charles. He died in 1619, the same year as Anne of Denmark. His death and the death of Nicholas Hilliard (1619) saw a change in the way portraits were painted. The style would become increasingly baroque rather than full of the detail viewers often associate with the works of Holbein, Hilliard and Peake – but they also became more fluid. The pictures of Princess Elizabeth, lovely as they may be, as quite stiff in comparison to the work of later artists.
Auerbach, Erna. Tudor artists; a study of painters in the royal service and of portraiture on illuminated documents from the accession of Henry VIII to the death of Elizabeth I. (London: University of London, Athlone Press, 1954)
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.
27 July 1689, James VII/II has been turfed off his throne to be replaced by his son-in-law, William of Orange, and James’ own daughter, Mary. Having been forced from his throne in December 1688, war erupted in Ireland in March 1689 while in Scotland John Graham of Claverhouse, better known as Bonnie Dundee, led his own rebellion against the new regime. It was the first Jacobite rebellion, which always comes as something of surprise since it’s the 1715 one that most people think of in the first instance.
General Hugh MacKay, William and Mary’s general led the Scots Brigade in the Low Countries. He was a seasoned commander but then, Dundee was also a professional soldier who fought for both the French and the Dutch before returning to Scotland in 1677 to serve James VII/II and suppress the Covenanters. His suppression of the men who refused to take an oath of loyalty to the king while he was Sheriff of Wigtown earned him deep unpopularity in some quarters as well as the title Viscount Dundee.
If the truth was told no one was that enthusiastic about another civil war in 1689. Many families sought to avoid taking part in any conflict. John Murray, Marquess of Atholl whose home was at Blair Castle took himself off to England to avoid taking part in proceedings. The fact that Patrick Stewart who occupied the castle for the Jacobites was a trusted family retainer is neither here nor there. Dundee was short of men and resources, even though support for the deposed king was growing in the Highlands. He hoped to win a battle that would increase support to his cause.
When John Murray, who was Atholl’s eldest son withdrew from the castle leaving the Jacobites in control, General MacKay moved north to support Murray. Blair Castle was to be besieged. Dundee saw an opportunity to intercept MacKay’s army, win a victory and garner support for the cause of James VII/II. MacKay may have had between 4,000 -5, 000 men who were accompanied by a baggage train and some ordinance. Dundee had about 3,000.
When MacKay entered the Pass of Killiecrankie on the track from Dunkeld he did not realise that he was being watched or that an ambush had been prepared. The track by the River Garry is the same path that government troops used in 1689. It is narrow and muddy. Iain Ban Beag Macrae, from Atholl, was observing MacKay’s men as they scrambled up the valley. When they were close enough he fired the first shot and killed an officer as he was crossing the river.
The Jacobites were on the ridge above the pass. MacKay knew that it would have been madness to order a charge so simply gave orders for his own men to shoot at the enemy. When Dundee gave orders to advance at about seven o’clock in the evening, as the sun began to set, Mackay’s men were subject to a Highland charge. They did not have time to fix bayonets (rifles could either fire or be used as bayonets at that time – not both). It meant that they were ill equipped for the fighting that followed. It was all over in a few minutes. MacKay’s men fled – one of them, Donald McBane, made an 18ft (that’s more than 5m) leap across the River Garry from one rock to another, to escape from the Jacobites. Other men were not so lucky and drowned. Mcbane published his memoirs in 1728 describing events at Killiecrankie and his dramatic escape.
Killiecrankie was a victory – unfortunately it came at the cost of the viscount’s life and a third of his men. The sword that Dundee is rusted to have used is on display at Killiecrankie while his armour, and the hole left by the musket ball, can be seen at Blair Castle. The bullet that killed Dundee was likely to have been a stray one, although tradition states that it was made from a silver button because only silver could harm the viscount. It’s a nice story. Taken together with the fact that he died with his men and that he was also related to John Graham, Marquess of Montrose who had become something of a hero since his execution by Parliament in 1650 meant that Dundee was soon the subject of ballads – the most famous one being ‘Bonnie Dundee’ by Sir Walter Scott which is still played by pipers. It was/is a popular regimental march for various Highland Regiments.
The only squirrel, red or otherwise, I have yet to see – despite lots of signs telling me about their presence!
David Beaton was James V’s ambassador to France and by 1528 was the Keeper of the Privy Seal. It was he who helped to arrange the king’s French matches, first to Madelaine of France and then, following her death in 1537, to Mary of Guise. His rise in the church had been just as rapid thanks to his kinship to the Archbishop of Glasgow but in 1358 he was creed a cardinal and following his uncle’s death in 1538 he became the Archbishop of St Andrews. By 1542 he was one of the king’s most trusted advisors, encouraging the king to affiliate himself ever more closely to the French. St Andrew’s Castle, Beaton’s principal residence, reflected his wealth and status.
When James died leaving his infant daughter, Mary, the crown. Beaton was swift to produce a document purporting to be the king’s will and making the cardinal the Regent of Scotland along with a group of his own supporters. Instead of getting what he wanted the Earl of Arran, who was Mary’s heir, became regent but in a gesture of good will, or at least of political expediency, Beaton became Chancellor. Beaton and the queen’s mother, Mary of Guise, wanted to keep Scottish foreign policy tied to the French but across the border, in England, Henry VIII wanted his son, Edward, to marry the young queen and unify the two nations. The Protestant lords of Scotland also looked more favourably on that match than one that might be made with Catholic France.
When Henry VIII gave orders for the Rough Wooing, some of Scotland’s nobility felt that it was the French faction who provoked it. Beaton was not popular with his peer group. he’d risen to power through nepotism and had more than 20 illegitimate children. He personified all that was wrong with the catholic church. To make matters worse, Beaton began to arrest reformers and imprison them in St Andrew’s Castle bottle dungeon at the bottom of the Sea Tower. He regarded them not only as a threat to his religious beliefs but also dangerous to his political power.
In 1545 Beaton arrested George Wishart, a Protestant preacher, and then had him burned at the stake for heresy. His initials mark the spot outside St Andrew’s Castle where he died. Scotland’s protestant Lords decided enough was enough and on 29 May 1546 Beaton was captured by a group of men pretending to be stone masons. They killed the cardinal and displayed his naked body from the parapet before throwing it in the castle’s bottle dungeon.
Mary of Guise sent troop to regain control of the castle from the protestants. The siege was commanded by the Earl of Arran who ordered a mine be dug beneath one the castle’s towers to undermine it. The garrison, after a couple of false starts, dug a countermine. They also hoped that assistance would be sent by the English – but instead, in July 1547, the French navy arrived and bombarded the castle causing the castle’s garrison to surrender. The men that were captured, including John Knox (who was doing a spot of light tutoring in St Andrews, was an admirer of Wishart, and had somehow ended up as the Protestant chaplain in the castle), ended up as prisoners in France or forced to row in French galleys. Knox, who spent 19 months chained to an oar, returned to St Andrews in 1559 following his return from a decade of exile. After he preached a particularly fiery sermon St Andrew’s Cathedral was stripped of its wealth in the aftermath of an orgy of destruction.
Stirling is perched on top of a hill and between the start of the twelfth century and the Union of the Crowns in 1603 every Scottish monarch lived here at one time or another. The oldest parts of the castle date from the time of Robert II and I am not lingering on the Scottish Wars of Independence in this post and besides which the castle as it can be viewed today was the work of James IV and James V. And like everywhere else I’ve been in the last week, it’s featured on Outlander.
I guess the start of my particular story is when James II arrives at the castle, aged 6, for safety after the murder of his father in 1437. It commences the tradition of young Scottish monarchs and heirs being both protected and educated here.
James II, who was known for his somewhat irascible temper, threw his enemy, William 8th Earl of Douglas, out of a window into the garden beneath in 1452 having first murdered the lord.
James IV saw himself as a Renaissance Prince and it was he who began the transformation of the medieval fortification into something more comfortable as well as encouraging scholars and artists to visit him. He was particularly interested in alchemy and instituted a research laboratory at the castle. His alchemist, John Damian, was something of a favourite with the king from about 1501 onwards. He was employed as the king’s doctor, tried to turn base metals into gold and wanted to fly. In September 1507 he made himself a pair of wings from bird’s feathers and announced that he would fly from Stirling to France. It was a short-lived project saved from total disaster by crash landing into a dung-hill at the foot of the castle’s walls. The laboratory and its experiments concluded in 1513 with the death of James IV and accession of James V, whose regent was his mother Margaret Tudor.
James V sent for French masons to continue his father’s work. Like his English brother-in-law he wanted to be seen as a Renaissance Prince. He might also have wanted to impress his French bride. There are six rooms dating from this period – three for the king and three for the queen and the most notable thing about them is the ceiling in the king’s audience chamber which contains the Stirling Heads carved from oak. The originals were taken down in 1777 and can be seen elsewhere in the castle. Throughout the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries there were various building projects which turned Stirling into a Renaissance Palace.
James VI was born at Edinburgh Castle but quickly moved for his own safety to Stirling where he was baptised in a ceremony costing £12,000. He would be crowned at the nearby Church of the Holy Rude. His mother, Mary Queen of Scots, was crowned in the chapel in the castle and she spent most of her Scottish childhood there, out of reach of the English. Her son would also spend his childhood at Stirling. Come to think of it James V, who was born at Linlithgow, was also crowned at Stirling after the death of his father at Flodden.
It was only when James’ wife, Anne of Denmark, became pregnant that James VI returned and gave orders for the castle to be modernised. James VI had the medieval chapel torn down and a new far grander chapel royal built for the baptism of his heir Prince Henry in 1594. The outline of the medieval building can be seen in the cobbles of the courtyard.
The feast celebrating Henry’s baptism, which took place in James IV’s Great Hall (completed in 1503) included a fish course served in a full size boat that came accompanied by cannons that fired and some mermaids. The Great Hall is, apparently, the largest medieval hall in Scotland and had five fireplaces. As well as providing fine dining for Scotland’s nobility and other honoured guests, parliament used to occasionally sit there. After James moved to England in 1603 the castle ceased to be so important.
In 1746 Bonnie Prince Charlie tried and failed to capture the castle. It was the last of the castle’s eight sieges and given that it is protected on three sides by steep drops it’s reputation for security is perhaps not surprising.
Castle Wynd leading up the hill to the castle from the town contains houses with their own links to the Stewart/Stuart dynasty. Argyll’s Lodging dates from the sixteenth century but was extended in the seventeenth century, and is best known as the Stirling home of the 1st Earl of Stirling. It was owned for a time by Adam Erskine the administrator for Cambuskenneth Abbey and one of the players in the life of the young James VI. He originally supported Morton, tried to win favour with the king and in 1578 gained the pos of keeper of Stirling Castle having persuaded his cousin, the 2nd Earl of Mar, that he had a hereditary right to be the king’s guardian. There was something of a dispute that caused the king much distress. Later Adam would support the Earl of Gowrie who held the king at Ruthven Castle. After the collapse of Gowrie’s regime, Adam was banished and his properties forfeited to the crown.
In 1629 – by which time the royal family were ensconced in England- the property was sold to Sir William Alexander who was one of Prince Henry Stuart’s tutors during his life time. He went with the royal household to London in 1603 and by 1626 was appointed Secretary for Scotland. In 1630 he became Earl of Stirling. Stirling had the house on Castle Wynd remodelled when Charles I was going to visit Stirling for his Scottish coronation. Below the castle garden, known as the King’s Knot and the Queen’s Knot, were created to celebrate the occasion and the Chapel Royal in the Castle was also given a new paint job. In the event the king and court only stayed a few days but the frieze painted by Valentine Jenkin in the chapel can still be seen.
The coat of arms above the courtyard doorway at Argyll’s Lodging shows a mermaid and an Indigenous American. Alexander is principally remembered of this settlement of Nova Scotia. And why is it called Argyll’s lodging I hear you ask? Well Stirling died deeply in debt in 1640 – the town fathers claimed the house and then, during the 1660s, sold it to the Duke of Argyll.
Mar’s Wark, on the opposite side of the road, was the townhouse of John Erskine who built the house during the 1560s/1570s when he was regent for James VI. When Anne of Denmark first arrived in Stirling she moved into Mar’s Wark while work on the castle was completed. The facade is all that remains today and both buildings are in the hands of workmen at present – so photos are littered with scaffolding and bright orange safety barriers. Oh well.
Tomorrow? The bookshops of St Andrews await along with the cathedral of course and some of the towns award winning fish and chips!
The sun shone! The sky was blue! The people we met at the abbey and palace were lovely and the almond croissants at the Abbot House (the very pink building) were delicious. I was also quietly amused by the addition of a spider to the window depicting Robert the Bruce. Last time we visited Dunfermline we had greater access to the ruins and in case you’re wondering my earlier photographs are all trapped on my misbehaving external hard drive.
The abbey became the burial place for Scottish royalty in the 1100s. St Margaret (the daughter of the Anglo-Saxon Edward the Exile) established the monastery in 1070, on the site where she married King Malcolm. It was enlarged by David I who was the youngest of Margaret’s six sons. David arranged for masons to come from England to complete the building work and appointed Geoffrey, who was Canterbury’s prior, as the first abbot. Even on the eve of the reformation, thanks to David’s devotion to the abbey, where his parents were buried, it was one of the wealthiest foundations in Scotland. It helped that across the centuries pilgrims had come to visit the shrine of Queen Margaret who was canonised in 1249.
Not that matters were always so trouble free. The Scottish Wars of Independence took their toll on the abbey and the town. Alexander III’s three children died before him as did his queen, Margaret, a daughter of King Henry III of England. In an attempt to secure his dynasty he remarried and was in such haste to spend the night with his beautiful young bride took a tumble off a cliff on his way to visit her in 1289 – he was buried at Dunfermline next to his first queen while his grand daughter the Maid of Norway was invited to wear Scotland’s crown. Her premature death in 1290 during her journey to Scotland was the trigger for the Scottish Wars of Independence.
Not far away from the abbey and palace, at Pittencrieff Park, visitors can find Wallace’s Well. William Wallace, he of Braveheart fame (and no he did not father Edward III…even if the Mel Gibson film of 1995 suggests that he did) is supposed to have taken refuge here in 1303 after the Battle of Falkirk. How true the story might be is another matter entirely (it’s the uninspiring mini stone shed with the littler on top of it in the gallery of images). Wallace’s mother is also said to be buried in the churchyard on the northern side of the building and after Wallace’s execution a bit of him made it back to Dunfermline where it was interred with his mother’s remains. Inevitably. Edward I and his court spent some time here as well. Having spent the winter of 1303 at the abbey when he left Dunfermline in May 1304 he gave ordered for the monastery to be burned. Perhaps he heard rumours that the abbot had helped Wallace or perhaps he was just as unpleasant as he can, on occasion, sound.
Robert I financed the rebuilding of Dunfermline’s abbey. The huge new building made an impressive statement as did the rest of Scotland’s programme of monastic construction. After his death, in 1329, Robert was buried there in front of the high altar. His heart is, of course, went on crusade and is interred at Melrose. The Stewarts/Stuarts stayed in the abbey guest house which doubled as a royal residence when they visited. It underwent several remodellings including that of James V at the beginning of the sixteenth century. James VI/I eventually gifted the abbey and its accommodation to his queen, Anne, in 1598 and she turned it into a palace. The queen’s daughter Elizabeth and her son Charles were born here. Her young son Robert was the last of the Stuarts to be buried here in 1602.
After the Stuart kings travelled south Dunfermline’s importance diminished and it gradually turned into a ruin. A new parish church was designed to take the place of the old one at the turn of the nineteenth century. It was in 1818 that Robert the Bruce’s remains were found during building work along with 19 fragments from his tomb.
This year, to celebrate his 750th birthday Historic Scotland commissioned a reconstruction of the famous king’s head based on a scan of the scull found in 1818- although it cannot determine whether the king had leprosy at the time of his death or not. The reconstruction shows him without the illness dressed as he would have been at Bannockburn, while a second digital model makes the same reconstruction but with the effects of leprosy evident. There are no accurate descriptions of the king and, in case you’re wondering, the leprosy accusation came from English sources – and let’s face it, the accusation is a pretty good way of insulting Robert as well as suggesting that God wasn’t happy with him.
The sun came out- the sky was blue – briefly. Today we explored a little of the Fife coast and visited the home of James Douglas 4th Earl of Morton. He was instrumental in bumping off Mary Queen of Scots’ secretary, David Rizzio and encouraging her to abdicate while she was imprisoned in Loch Leven.
Which leads us to the reign of James VI. James Stewart, Earl of Moray was assassinated at Linlithgow in 1570. In 1571, the next regent, James’ grandfather Mathew Stewart, Lord Lennox was shot and died at Stirling. The third regent was the Earl of Mar…he died in 1572 and hey presto Morton, who was already one of the nation’s most influential men, became regent. He was forced to resign six years later much to the irritation of Elizabeth I.
In 1580 he was accused of playing a part in the murder of Lord Darnley. He was condemned and executed in Edinburgh. The consummate politician had finally gone the way of so many of his predecessors. Morton’s wife, Elizabeth, was incapable of managing her own affairs. It seems that she and her sisters Margaret and Beatrix suffered from an inherited mental illness. Morton’s three surviving legitimate daughters were also declared mentally incompetent in 1581. The older women were grand daughters of James IV, through their mother Katherine (an illegitimate daughter of the king) and all of them, incompetent or not, were married to powerful men. It was through Elizabeth that Morton inherited his earldom and Aberdour. Elizabeth spent most of her time in seclusion at Tantalon Castle. An inquest after Morton’s death declared her to be incapable of managing her affairs, as she was an “idiot and prodigal”. King James VI signed a warrant appointing a legal guardian called an “administrator and tutor” to supervise her dower. (Fraser, William, eds., Lennox Muniments, vol.2 (1874), 321-322).
The earldom of Morton passed to Sir William Douglas of Lochleven (Mary Queen of Scots’ gaoler). He was eventually succeeded by his grandson who was one of James VI’s gentlemen of the bedchamber. He made several alterations to Aberdour including the gallery and walled garden. But it was Regent Morton who began the castle’s terraced gardens, planted the orchard and gave orders for the dovecot to be built.
And that leads me down an interesting rabbit hole that really has nothing to do with Aberdour or Regent Morton – What exactly did James V die from at Falkland. Was it one of the many diseases that plagued armies at the time? I’ve also seen cause of death described as pulmonary tuberculosis. And did he suffer from depression – famously having heard that his wife, Mary of Guise, had given birth to a daughter he turned his face to the wall and stayed there until he died having declared that the crown came into the Stewart family with a girl and would go with one .
Mary Queen of Scots was not without her own maladies – hardly surprising under the circumstances. I don’t suppose 19 years of captivity is going to do anyone the world of good. In all honesty being a royal Stewart, or even Stuart, wasn’t necessarily good for your health for a variety of reasons setting aside melancholy – James I was assassinated; James II was killed by one of his own cannon; James III – either died on the battle field or was assassinated trying to leave it; James IV – killed at Flodden; James V – having lost the Battle of Solway Moss either died from disease or because he was extremely peeved about the birth of a daughter; Mary Queen of Scots – beheaded. James VI/I died of natural causes in his own bed (although the tall tale that he was poisoned by the Duke of Buckingham still occasionally surfaces). Charles I – followed in granny’s footsteps and lost his head.
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