Margaret, the sister of Edgar the Atheling, was the child of Edward the Exile and Agatha, a German princess. She was born in Hungary in 1046. When Edward the Confessor took the throne he invited the last of the Royal House of Wessex to return from their exile. Edward, Agatha and their children – Edgar, Margaret and Christina cam back to England but Edward died in suspicious circumstances shortly after their arrival.
Edgar submitted to William the Conqueror but became involved in a rebellion in 1068. His family fled England. They initially, possibly, intended to return to Hungary but bad weather drove their vessel to Scotland where Margaret married the King, Malcolm Canmore at Dunfermline Abbey in 1069. Incidentally Canmore translates according to Alison Weir as ‘big head.’
The widowed king who was aged about forty loved his young Saxon bride and trusted her advice. Queen Margaret became known not only for her piety but also for her learning. Malcolm could not read but such was his love for his wife that he would send her books to be ornamented with covers of gold. She wielded so much power that she changed the way that the Scottish court behaved and dressed. She bought the sophisticated continental behaviour of her childhood to Canmore’s court which included closer links with the Roman Catholic church. During this time Mass was said in Latin in Scotland rather than Gaelic. She was also the patron of Benedictine monks who arrived on Scottish shores for the first time. Malcolm allow this wife to support the church and to guide the policies as to its practice. She supported monks, hermits and spent much of her time and money providing charity to the poor and to orphaned children.
Inevitably relations with William of England were difficult. Malcolm took advantage of the difficulties that William faced in his early years to extend the border of Scotland south so that it included most of Cumberland. Malcolm was killed at the Battle of Alnwick along with Margaret’s eldest son Edward in 1093. She died three days after receiving the news of her bereavement in Edinburgh Castle which was being besieged by Malcolm’s brother Donald Bane on 16th November. Margaret’s remaining sons escaped from the castle in a thick mist along with the body of their mother which they carried to Dunfermline Abbey where it was buried as she had wished. It was she who’d commissioned the ferry that crossed the Firth of Forth taking pilgrims to the abbey.
Margaret bore Malcolm Canmore eight children including Edward. Her daughter Edith married one of William the Conqueror’s sons (King Henry I) and took on the Norman name Matilda. Her other daughter Mary married the Count of Boulogne and her daughter (Margaret’s granddaughter married King Stephen becoming yet another Queen Matilda.) One son, Ethelred, became the Abbot of Dunkeld while four more sons became kings of Scotland in their turn – Edmund, Edgar, Alexander I and David I.
For further information including St Margaret’s Chapel in Edinburgh Castle the Freelance History Writer http://thefreelancehistorywriter.com has a great entry about the life and times of a Saxon Princess who became a queen and a saint.
