One of the most difficult things to deal with when providing a balanced account of politically charged events in medieval times is contemporary bias as felt by those chroniclers of the day. Whilst court records and legal documents are by their very nature largely unbiased, chronicles show bias in various areas, including the bias caused by the nationality of the chronicler, their (usually) monastic view of the world, and more often than not, whether they were on the receiving end of hostile activity in one form or another. The war fought between Scots and English that started in 1296 did not end for many, many years.
The first phase supposedly ended with the truce signed between the minority government of Edward II and Robert Bruce in 1328, but Bruce’s death in 1329 and the accession of Edward III who viewed it as “shameful” meant it was only a matter of time before war broke out again, and the second phase lasted from 1332 to 1357, when Edward III decided that he would rather concentrate on France.
Clearly any and all chronicles and annals written between 1296 and 1357 will show evidence of bias. Most of those which were compiled closest to the action suffered from attack and destruction on a scale which most had not really experienced before, and there is a tendency to sensationalise, and there appears to be little difference between their depiction of marauding Scots (or English) and the accounts of Viking attacks several centuries earlier. And as those accounts are drawn in part from descriptions of war in the Bible, particularly with reference to atrocities, it is to more balanced and dry sources like accounts, charters, and archaeology that we are best advised to turn to.
However, our source material relating to the Scots themselves, particularly Robert Bruce, James Douglas and William Wallace, we are actually drawing most often from non-contemporary source material written during the reigns of Robert II and Robert III, the first of the Stewart kings, who ruled from 1371-1390 and 1390-1406, James I, who spent the first eighteen years of his reign in captivity in England, returning in 1424/5 and was assassinated in 1437, James II, who was accidentally killed by an exploding cannon in 1460, and James III, who was killed in a battle against an army led by his own eldest son.
The writing of John of Fordun (d1384), Walter Bower (d1449) and Blind Hary (d1492) are therefore written in an entirely different political environment, and were also written with a specific purpose in mind, that of promoting a Scottish national history in which the Scots are portrayed as an entirely separate people to the English – which was not actually the case in the closing years of the 13th century. After 70 years of peace with England, the upper ranks of society in both countries was much intermarried, and held lands in both countries.
To understand the political history of the period, I will attempt to summarise. A couple of years after Robert Bruce died, his five year old son David was sent to France for his safety along with Queen Joan, sister of Edward III. They remained in France until 1341, living at Chateau Gaillard in Normandy. In 1346 he was captured in battle near Durham, and remained in captivity in England until 1357, when he was released in return for a heft ransom. In his absence, his uncle, Robert Steward was able to secure a substantial rival power base to the king. As Robert was also David’s heir, this did not sit well with the king, who embarked upon a cold war with Robert when he returned, at one point even negotiating for Lionel of Clarence, a son of Edward III, to be made his heir. However, when he died suddenly in 1371, he still had no children, and Robert succeeded him.
King Robert II was 55 when he came to the throne. He is portrayed as a weak king, with his sons dominating national politics and foreign policy. Whether this is fair or not is questionable, but it is certain that he was removed from power in 1384 by his eldest son, John of Carrick, who acted as his regent. Carrick was dominant in southern Scotland until the defeat at Otterburn in 1388, whilst Alexander of Buchan was dominant in the north until 1390, when his destruction of Elgin Cathedral proved a step too far in asserting his authority.
It was Robert of Fife who proved the most politically astute of Robert’s sons, replacing Carrick as dominant in the south with the support of the Earl of Douglas, and countering Buchan in the north. It was Fife who was acting regent when his father died in April 1390.
King Robert III is also portrayed as weak, with Fife continuing to rule until 1393, when Carrick (now Robert III) was returned to power in conjunction with his 15 year old heir David. In 1399 David was styled sole lieutenant, but subject to the authority of Fife and his council. In 1402, David was starved to death in his uncle’s castle at Falkland, and it was decided to send his younger brother James to exile in France for his safety from his uncle. The vessel was captured by the English and James became the prisoner of Henry IV in 1406, his father dying soon afterwards.
Fife continued to rule Scotland until his death in 1420, and then Fife’s son Murdoch for four years after this. Neither seems to have made much effort to release King James I. When he did return to Scotland, James ruthlessly exterminated all opposition, starting with Murdoch, his sons, and their ally the earl of Lennox.
James was effectively brought to the throne by a faction of nobles led by the earl of Douglas, and by the cash-strapped council of the young Henry VI, and has a reputation as being “acquisitive” due to his desire to elevate the Stewart monarchy to a more impressive state, and the financial needs of doing so. This involved forfeiting the earldoms of Mar, Strathearn and Dunbar – the latter Douglas’ prime rival in the south. When he was assassinated, it was by another faction of nobles led by his uncle Walter of Atholl, who was starting to feel threatened, and which was able to take advantage of the king’s failure to take Roxburgh.
The reign of James II, who was only six at his coronation, was cut short by his accidental death, and is primarily known for his civil war with the Douglas family, the most powerful in the realm. He did not take personal control until 1449, and it took from 1451 to 1455 to overthrow them. Like his father, he had opposition to his methods, and may have also had a shortened reign if he had not been killed in 1460, but it is hard to think who might have led such an endeavour. His nine-year old son James III, whose personal rule began in 1469, was unpopular – and had three uncles as well as two younger brothers who were to cause him problems throughout his reign as sources of opposition, not least as the king was determined on peace with England, and there were a lot of the nobles who did not agree.
So, it is against this political background that we must consider the works of Fordun, Bower, and Hary. It is these writers who have coloured the reign of Robert II and III as weak, ineffective kings, James I and II as tyrannous, and James III as another weak king. David II, king for over 40 years, barely gets a mention!
It is these writers who emphasise the treacherous nature of the Scots nobility in the Bruce period, and their desire for land and profit. It is these writers who portray Bruce and Wallace as heroes – turning anyone opposed to them as traitors – and James Douglas as well.
We have to ask, who benefits here? The answer is the Stewart monarchy, who are able to emphasise their descent from Bruce and the support of the Douglases. They can point fingers at double dealing, their audience seeing the reference to the Fife family, and greed. They can emphasise a “hawkish” national position with regard to war with England that has more to do with a later era than the late 13th century. And they can emphasise a national movement that came to its peak in 1513, when James IV was able to lead a massive and united national army to Flodden, where it suffered catastrophic defeat.
War is ugly. There is no getting away from it. Medieval politics to a large extent revolved around land ownership and disputes which often escalated into war. Which makes medieval politics ugly. Medieval politics was also messy. The wars in Scotland from 1296 to 1488 were largely civil wars. It just so happened that in Edward I and Edward III there were two English kings who had the resources, determination and sheer bloody-mindedness to involve themselves as power brokers and a third – often compelling – option to this civil war. It was not until Henry VIII that another monarch elected to involve themselves to the same degree.
It is simplistic to assess any ruler as “weak”, “strong”, “good” or “bad”. It is also simplistic to attempt to rehabilitate medieval monarchs who have suffered damage to their reputation for one reason or another. However, with the Kings of Scotland from Robert Bruce to James IV, all today are largely portrayed as one-dimensional clichés. Hero-king, doomed chivalric knight, elderly fool, hermit-king, violent money-grabber, crusher of the over-mighty subject, lover of favourites, doomed hero. In this, the power of the stories woven by Fordun, Bower and Hary can clearly be seen. But they are products of their time – and as was the case with Shakespeare, whose portrayals of MacBeth, Henry V and Richard III have such power today, but wrote as an Elizabethan Englishman. Reader beware….
thecastleguy.co.uk
thecastleguy.co.uk
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