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THERE CAN BE little doubt
that the relationship with England has been the key factor in the birth,
development and for some the decline of the Scottish nation. England is
Scotland’s larger, richer and more powerful neighbour and all the
‘heroes’ of Scottish history have been defined by either victory over
her or defeat at her hands. Only one, of course, Robert the Bruce, truly
achieved victory. The rest – including Wallace, Mary Queen of Scots and
Bonnie Prince Charlie – were either executed or driven into exile.
Still, the history of Scotland is so steeped in mythology that this is
always overlooked. We Scots like to dress up our past in all its finery,
like Montrose on his walk to the scaffold (‘dressed more like a
bridegroom than a criminal’, according to one eye-witness report) and
our contemporary Scottish Nationalists seem steeped in medievalism ready
to refight the wars of independence all over again. They cleave to a
Braveheart vision of the past, however unhistorical it may be.
Mythology was always at the heart of Anglo-Scottish relations.
In 1136 the Welsh monk Geoffrey of Monmouth wrote his Historia Regnum
Britanniae which influenced English thought for centuries. This was
supposedly the history of the British from their first arrival in
Britain in the twelfth century BC under King Brutus, the great-grandson
of the Trojan hero Aeneas, until their overthrow in the seventh century
AD by the Angles and Saxons. Geoffrey’s book was important because it
for the first time introduced characters such as King Lear, Cymbeline
and Merlin, not to mention King Arthur and the Knights of the Round
Table. More than that, by giving future English dynasties an ancient
foundation, it became the basis of a national mythology which was
continued in Caxton’s Chronicles of England (1480), Hidgen’s
Polychronicon (1482) and a flood of books right into the Tudor period
written by authors such as Edward Hall, Richard Grafton and Raphael
Holinshed. After the Reformation, indeed, it became almost apocalyptic.
England became an ‘elect nation’ and according to Bishop Aylmer, God was
an Englishman.
Moreover, it became very dangerous, for pupils of Geoffrey added that
after the death of King Brutus the British kingdom had been divided. His
eldest son inherited Loegria (England), his second Albany (Scotland) and
the third Cambria (Wales) and under feudal law, the English king held
seniority over the other two. Worse still, by the time of King Arthur,
this monarch ruled all of England, Scotland, Wales, Ireland, Scandinavia
and Gaul, with Scotland as a tributary state, whose kings for centuries
paid homage to England’s ruler.
Over the course of centuries this mythology became a powerful
ideological weapon used to justify aggression against the Scots. Edward
I, Henry V, and Henry VI all based their right to conquer Scotland on
their descent from Brutus. Henry VIII likewise justified his claim to
Scotland on his ‘Trojan-English’ ancestry. No king, he said had ‘more
just title, more evident title, more certayn title, to any realm … than
we have to Scotland.’
One almost inevitable reaction to this English ideology was the creation
of a Scottish counter-ideology, which was used in international
diplomacy at the same time as Edward submitted his claim to Scotland to
the Pope in 1301. Then the Declaration of Arbroath of 1320, also laid
before the Pope, claimed that Scotland had had 113 kings of her own and
had never been ruled by a foreigner. The full exposition of the Scottish
counter-ideology, however, had to wait till the monk, John of Fordoun,
published his Chronica Gentis Scotorum between 1384 and 1387, later
continued until 1437 under the title Scotichronicon.
Fordoun disputed that Brutus had ever ruled the entire island, which, he
maintained had been called Albion, whereas the Roman name Britannia had
only referred to England. The Scottish nation, he explained, was
descended from a Greek prince named Gathelus (the Greeks, remember, had
conquered the Trojans) and an Egyptian princess called Scota who had
married about 1,500 BC. The Scots had subsequently wandered from the
Mediterranean through the Pillars of Hercules and reached the west of
Scotland, via Spain and Ireland. There they founded their kingdom in 330
BC under King Fergus I. After forty-five further kings and a period of
exile lasting forty-three years the Kingdom of Scotland was
re-established in 403 AD, from which date, despite English hostility, it
had been ruled by independent Scottish monarchs.
Like Geoffrey’s Historia, the Scotichronicon dominated Scottish
historical consciousness till well into the sixteenth century and had
many interpreters, the most prominent being Hector Boece, Principal of
the University of St. Andrews whose Scotorum Historiae was published in
1527. He used the tale of the forty-five fictitious kings as a
constitutional and moral warning against corruption, which would, he
feared, undermine the country’s stability. The power of this Scottish
mythology declined from the sixteenth century but was never completely
broken. When Charles II was restored he had a Dutch master, Jacob de
Witt, paint a series of one hundred and eleven portraits of the Scottish
kings, starting with Fergus I in 330 BC right up to himself and his
brother James (the future James VII and II) on the walls of Holyrood
Palace. Hence the legend was used as a source of royal legitimacy as
late as 1660.
The original purpose of the legend had been to legitimise Scottish
independence. This seemed to have been established by Robert the Bruce
at Bannockburn in 1314. And legally, of course, it had been. Yet
Scottish independence remained fragile. The country was often invaded,
defeated and humiliated by the English. As early as 1332 and 1333 two
full scale Scottish armies were cut to pieces and their leaders slain.
In 1356 Edward III again invaded Scotland devastating the South East
counties in the so-called ‘Burnt Candlemas’. Under Robert II attacks on
England (usually at the behest of the French) brought punitive
expeditions by John of Gaunt, who first ransomed Edinburgh and later
burnt it. In 1400 Henry IV also led an army to Edinburgh while in 1402
the ‘the flower of chivalry of the whole realm of Scotland’ was captured
and held to ransom at Homildon Hill. Scotland’s greatest defeat,
however, came at Flodden in 1513 where the king (James IV) died along
with his illegitimate son, the Archbishop of St. Andrews, two other
bishops, three abbots, one dean, fourteen earls, about the same number
of lords, three Highland chiefs, and a great number of lairds. Yet as a
distinguished historian remarked: there was ‘nothing novel about a heavy
defeat at the hands of the English and Flodden was neither the first nor
the last in a long series.’ One need not list them all. The final
humiliation, of course, was Scotland’s defeat, conquest and occupation
by Oliver Cromwell in the 1650s. Remarkably, there is no folk memory of
this at all among contemporary Scots, unlike the visceral memory of
Cromwell’s record in Ireland among the Irish.
The independent kingdom unfortunately suffered other woes besides
English invasions. It was cursed for example by a succession of royal
minorities. In the period 1406-1488 there was no adult ruler for
thirty-eight years. After Flodden in 1513 there were three royal
minorities, so that in the space of more than seventy years there were
no more than twenty-two years’ rule by a monarch of a mature age. Mary
Queen of Scots became queen when only a week old; James VI was crowned
at thirteen months; and David II became king at the age of five. Worst
of all were the cases of David II and James I, both kings were captured
by the English and kept as virtual prisoners by them. David II, defeated
in battle, was kept in England from 1346 till 1357 and was only released
when Scotland agreed to pay an exorbitant ransom for him (the ransom was
continually renegotiated). James I was captured by English pirates and
kept a prisoner from 1406 till 1424 and also had to pay a large sum to
secure his freedom.
Scotland was also subject to noble factionalism, the fifteenth century
being particularly lawless. Both James I and James III were murdered
while the reign of James II saw a bitter struggle between him and the
Black Douglases. Before his own murder James III had to experience the
murder of his own favourites by a dissident nobility. The independent
Scotland created by Bruce therefore remained at the mercy of the English
who invaded and devastated it and held its kings to ransom. Moreover it
was a poor and lawless place as the above-mentioned murders affirm. In
1398 the chronicler of Moray wrote that ‘there was no law in Scotland
but he who was stronger oppressed him who was weaker.’ Crimes went
unpunished and justice ‘lay in exile outwith the bounds of the country.’
Some kings, it is true—James V for example—did try to impose justice but
a prominent historian could write of Scotland as late as the 1660s as ‘a
country which could not afford and did not know how to administer any
system of regular policing.’ Independent Scotland in fact could hardly
defend or administer itself.
One great hope of salvation lay with the French. An alliance with France
would surely create security. But the effectiveness of the Auld Alliance
is just another Scottish myth.
THE AULD ALLIANCE was a treaty of mutual defence against England signed
by John Balliol and Philip IV of France in Paris in 1295. It lasted till
1560. It is still much revered and romanticised today by Scottish
Anglophobes who see the EU as its modern equivalent. And, indeed, like
the EU, it turned out to be a disaster for Scotland. It worked well
enough for France, however. After her defeat at Agincourt in 1415 when
her leaders were in a panic, an appeal was made to the Scots for help.
More than 12,000 sailed to assist the French and at the battle of Bauge
in 1421, the English were defeated. This provided a vital breathing
space for France but in 1424 at Verneuil in a ‘second Agincourt’ 4,000
Scots were completely wiped out by the English.
Over the centuries Scottish knights continued to make their way to
France but no French army ever turned up in Scotland to fight the
English. Instead, French kings made appeals quite regularly to their
Scottish counterparts to invade England to take the pressure off France
when she was at war. Both David II and James IV were leading their
armies into England at the request of the French when, first, David II
was captured at the disastrous battle of Neville’s Cross in 1346 and
then James IV and his leading nobles were annihilated at Flodden in
1513. At the Scottish court meanwhile there were always tensions between
pro-French and pro-English factions. However, the final proof of the
toxicity of the Auld Alliance came during the reign of Mary, Queen of
Scots, whose first husband, Francis II of France, was made king
matrimonial of Scotland. Not only that but Mary signed three documents
making over her kingdom of Scotland to France should there be no issue
from her marriage, this despite promises to the contrary having been
made to the Scots.
In Scotland meanwhile during her absence in France, Mary’s mother, the
French Mary of Guise, became regent and practically turned the country
into a French province. French troops garrisoned Scottish castles and
French administrators advised the Regent on policy. It was this French
preponderance which led in 1559 to a Scottish revolution which saw the
Scottish nobles seize back control. But they were lucky: things might
have been very different had not a political crisis in France prevented
the despatch of French troops to Scotland, had not Mary of Guise
suddenly died, and had not Elizabeth I of England intervened.
The Treaty of Edinburgh of 1560, which saw both French and English
troops withdraw, was, as a result a sort of peace treaty between England
and France. It did not say much for Scottish independence or for the
Auld Alliance which now came to an ignominious end. Factionalism at the
Scottish court continued with Mary Queen of Scots’ return to Scotland in
1561. Yet it was not her Catholicism that fatally undermined her (the
Pope despaired of her lack of action on behalf of Catholics) so much as
her politics and marriages. Her forced abdication in 1567 and subsequent
exile in England from 1568 till her execution in 1587, meant yet another
Scottish monarch being held prisoner by the English while her infant
son, James VI, was at the mercy of Scottish political factionalism. His
first two regents were murdered and in 1582 he himself was captured by a
faction led by the Earl of Gowrie. Only after a league with England was
established in 1586, with James becoming a pensioner of Elizabeth I, was
stability really restored. James could then accept both his mother’s
execution and exhibit neutrality towards the Spanish Armada. But this
was Scottish independence at a very high price.
The Darien Expedition was a fantastical scheme to found a Scottish
colony or empire in Panama which could trade across both the Atlantic
and Pacific oceans. The Company of Scotland provided vessels and
colonists. Yet the colony was covered in jungle and swamp and the scheme
threatened the interests of nearby Spanish adventurers. It was also
opposed by William II and III, who sabotaged the whole enterprise to
keep in with the Spanish. Yet almost anyone who had money in Scotland
had invested in it and when it failed many faced ruin at a time when
harvests were failing, foreign trade had collapsed and hunger stalked
the land. Economically Scotland needed to be saved and only England
could help her.
The other problem that sped on union was yet another crisis of the royal
succession. William’s successor, Queen Anne, had no surviving children,
forcing the English Parliament in 1701 to choose the Protestant Elector
of Hanover as her heir. Scotland, of course, could make a different
decision, as the Scottish Parliament in an Act of Sovereignty in 1704
made clear. But this only brought the Alien Act from England, which
threatened to treat all Scots as foreigners and block Scottish exports
if Scotland so decided. Also threatened was the use of force. The Scots
were so outraged that they hanged an English ship’s captain on
trumped-up charges of piracy. Inevitably, however, compromise was
reached and the Scots agreed to negotiate a Union. And once negotiations
got underway in London a Treaty was drawn up remarkably quickly: a new
kingdom of Great Britain was created; the Hanoverian succession was
secured; there was to be a single Parliament including 45 Scottish MPs
and 16 Scottish peers; Scotland received an ‘Equivalent’ of almost
£400,000 to compensate her for the higher English national debt but also
to compensate the stockholders of the Darien scheme. This Treaty was
ratified by the Scottish Parliament by 110 votes to 69.
Scotland did very well out of the negotiations. She acquired access to
English and imperial markets, enjoyed a uniform taxation system, her
sons could join British regiments, while her legal, educational and
religious institutions remained untouched.
How popular then was the Union? Its terms were debated at length in the
Scottish Parliament despite the rioting mobs outside, and although there
were petitions galore against it, these were from old opponents and were
hardly representative. Claims of bribery of the Scottish Commissioners
who negotiated in London were made and are still believed but these seem
to have been based largely on a misunderstanding of the legitimate
expenses due the people involved. According to Professor Smout: ‘In the
end one is forced to the conclusion that the Union of Parliaments did
not at the time seem of overriding importance to very many Scots.’
Control of foreign policy had been lost in 1603. Otherwise life remained
much the same as far as church, law, education and even economics were
concerned. Economic control of most things – estates, farms,
manufactures – remained in the North. And the country was now protected
from feuds over the succession as the history of Jacobitism proved. A
Jacobite plot of 1708 never got off the ground, the 1715 rebellion had
no support in the Lowlands and as for the Forty Five, Culloden was a
victory of Scots over Scots. Three Scottish regiments fought prominently
there and Scottish irregulars and volunteers numbered 13,000. More Scots
enlisted against the Rebellion than in it.
The Jacobite army was composed mainly of Highlanders. Glasgow and
Edinburgh were opposed and during his brief ascendancy there were
several outbreaks against Charles. Even in the Highlands many of the
great clans were aloof or actively hostile to the rising: Campbell,
Mackay, Munro, Macpherson, Grant and Fraser, not to mention the McLeods,
MacLeans, MacNeills and the MacDonalds of the Isles. Indeed, if Lochiel
had persisted in his initial refusal to take up arms, the other chiefs
would not have joined without him and the rebellion would have died
instantly.
The Church of Scotland was absolutely opposed to the Jacobites, as were
all Presbyterians. They saw the uprising as an attempt to return
Scotland to a state of slavery under France and Rome. Not a single
minister – and they were influential even in the Jacobite Highlands –
joined the rebellion.
Contemporary witnesses put support for the rising into perspective: the
Earl of Marchmont estimated that two-thirds of Scotland backed George
II; Brigadier-General William Douglas put that support at more than
three-quarters; while Sir Archibald Grant put it at ‘nine parts in ten
of Scotland’. It would seem that the Union was quickly accepted by the
vast majority of Scots. And support for it grew. The economy prospered
as the industrial revolution transformed the country. The Scottish
Enlightenment dazzled minds across the world and Scottish regiments
played a prominent part in building up Empire and Commonwealth and
taking a leading part in coalition warfare against European tyrants like
Napoleon, the Kaiser and Hitler. Scottish emigrants with their
democratic culture helped build up the world’s greatest democracies
within the Commonwealth. Hence the Union contributed not merely to the
growing wealth and freedom of Scots but to the defence and growth of
freedom throughout the world.
In many ways the Union was both the logical outcome of Scottish history
and its crowning glory.
Independence had allowed the Scots to build up national institutions
which the Union then preserved. But independence had always been fragile
and sometimes even nominal. The fate of Scotland was often decided by
the English or their proxies in Edinburgh. Even when this was not the
case Scotland herself was often without stable government and for long
periods was a poor and lawless land. Union with England was always the
obvious solution and when it came about it brought prosperity not
poverty and enlightenment not oppression. Scotland became part of a
world power with a record of success second to none.
Alan Sked was educated at Allan Glen's School in Glasgow, before
going on to study Modern and Medieval History at the University of
Glasgow, followed by a DPhil in Politics at Merton College, Oxford. Sked
taught at the London School of Economics where he became a leading
authority on the history of the Hapsburg Empire, also teaching US and
modern intellectual history and the history of sex, race and slavery.
Alan Sked is now Emeritus Professor of International History at the
London School of Economics. |
