Scottish History Articles

Cheat Sheet / Updated 07-21-2023

Scottish history is full of wonderful characters — some good, some not so good — and exciting events, from the bloodthirsty to scientific discovery. This Cheat Sheet gives you the lay of the land, and identifies the leaders and the turning points that made Scotland what it is today.

Article / Updated 04-11-2017

Throughout the first half of 20th century, the Conservative Party was the only political party in Scotland to gain more than 50 per cent in a general election, but in the latter half of the 20th century, the Conservatives’ vote was on the slide. In 1997, they failed to get a single Conservative elected. Some commentators have attributed this decline to the impact of Margaret Thatcher, a British Prime Minister, and her free-market philosophy, which was at odds with the Scots’ emphasis on community and helping each other. Although Thatcher was a factor, you have to go back a little further to find the roots of the Conservatives’ decline north of the border. The best way of understanding this issue is to ask what the appeal of Conservatism to Scottish voters was prior to their slide after 1955. The appeal of Conservatism was based on three pillars – empire, patriotism, and Protestantism – which allowed them to appeal to a cross-section of Scottish society. The problem: These pillars collapsed in the decades after the end of the Second World War. People stopped going to church in the 1960s, and that started a downward trend that has continued unabated. The Conservatives themselves dismembered the British Empire in the 1960s and moved to reposition the UK in Europe. Finally, patriotism was last tested in the Falklands War, and Scotland was the least responsive part of the UK. There were no victory parades north of the border. So, what the Conservatives traditionally stood for was failing to engage post-war generations of Scots. On top of this, Labour and, more important, the Scottish National Party were eating into the traditional heartlands of Conservative support. Thatcher didn’t start the slide, but she made things much worse. When she came to office about one-third of Scots voted for her. By the time she was removed, one-quarter did. What was it about Thatcher that the Scots found so objectionable? For a start, the Scots didn’t like her manner and the finger-pointing rhetoric she used to tell them how ungrateful they were. Her pledge to ‘roll back the frontiers of the state’ threatened the livelihoods of many Scots who worked in the public services and nationalised industries. Then there was the deeply unpopular Poll Tax, which was introduced a year earlier in Scotland than in England. This suggested the Scots were being used as guinea pigs for Tory policies – a feeling that was intensified because there were so few Scottish Conservative members of parliament (MPs) that English ones had to be drafted into the Scottish Office. To many Scots, it was as if they were an occupied territory under the dictatorship of an alien government. The Conservatives belatedly responded by rediscovering their Scottish roots. During the government of John Major, the Stone of Destiny was returned to Scotland and major investment took place in Scottish culture and history. But these gestures failed to turn the tide; the party was wiped out in the 1997 general election and has failed to recover. Recent experience does not bode well for it in the coming years. The Conservatives do have a presence in the Scottish Parliament, but ironically, it’s the result of proportional representation – a system the Conservatives are opposed to! For more information about Scottish history, see Scottish History For Dummies Cheat Sheet.

Article / Updated 03-26-2016

Why the Scots voluntarily gave up their independence in 1707 to join an incorporating union with the English is one of the most hotly contested questions in Scottish history. The one thing historians can say with certainty was that the treaty was never popular and its passing was the cause of riots and protests the length and breadth of the country. This was to be expected, as petition after petition opposing union with England flooded the Scottish Parliament. In spite of the extent of the opposition, the treaty was signed and the documents were rushed south with a large military escort. Historians trying to explain this phenomenon fall into three categories: Those who emphasise bribery and corruption Those who emphasise TINA (there is no alternative), which rests on the desperate economic condition of Scotland Those who see it as an act of great statesmanship – a visionary solution to longstanding problems concerning the backwardness of the country. There is no common ground between these entrenched positions, but one thing they all forget is that, in many ways, there was no choice as soon as the English opted for union. In the past, the English wanted nothing to do with Scotland – in their eyes, Scotland was barbaric, lawless, and an economic basket case. But in the first decade of the 18th century, an awkward problem emerged: Queen Anne had produced no heir in spite of 17 pregnancies! Who was to succeed her? One possible and legitimate candidate was a Stewart, but that raised the possibility of a Catholic on the throne; the other possibility was Sophie and her husband the Elector of Hanover, who were Protestant to the core. A no-brainer! But because the Scots were not consulted on the succession, they began acting bloody-mindedly and this exasperated the English. The only solution was union; failing that, invasion. However, the Scots were able to use the desperation of the English to find a solution to the succession crisis to their advantage. In the negotiations that took place, the independence of the Church of Scotland was guaranteed; the legal system was to be left untouched; and equally important, those Scots who had lost large sums of money in the failed Darien Scheme were to get their money back plus 5 per cent interest (so it was a kind of bribe). In the long run, union proved to be a good deal for Scotland, but try telling that to the rioters on the streets of Edinburgh after the news of the signing of the treaty became public!

Article / Updated 03-26-2016

Every child in a Scottish school was brought up to recognise the ‘Black Douglas’ as one of the true, almost mythical heroes of Scottish history. That attitude was underpinned by the part the Douglas family played during the Scottish Wars of Independence. Good Sir James Douglas – ‘the Black Douglas’ – fought alongside Robert the Bruce and was the one lord to be selected to take his heart to the Crusades. To the Scots, he was a hero. To the English, he was a bogeyman. In fact, an English lullaby sung to children included the words: ‘Hush yea, Hush yea, Dinae fret yea, the Black Douglas will nae get yea’. Try falling asleep after hearing that. Another reason the Douglases entered Scottish folklore was William Douglas’s capture from the English of the heavily defended Edinburgh Castle in 1341. Douglas and his lieutenants dressed as merchants, with his men hidden in covered wagons, and gained entry into the castle. With the help of the townspeople, they slaughtered the English defenders, throwing many off the castle rock. The Douglases place in history as good guys and patriots was established. However, when the English threat disappeared, the Douglas family began to harbour ambitions to seize the throne of Scotland from the Stewarts. When James II acceded to the throne, the Black Douglases controlled three earldoms and were claiming a fourth. Their rule stretched over Galloway, Douglasdale, Annandale, Clydesdale, Lothian, Stirlingshire, and Moray. The desire to curb the power of the Black Douglases became an obsession with the king, and as such, relations between James and William, Eighth Earl of Douglas, deteriorated to a fatal degree. At the age of 23, James led a murderous attack on William by stabbing him in the neck in Stirling Castle in 1542. William had no fewer than 26 stab wounds. Horrific as it was, the Eighth Earl’s murder did not mark the end of the Douglas family; instead, it created a civil war of sorts between them and the crown during the years 1452 to 1455. From heroes of the struggle against English rule, the Douglases had become pariahs, but pariahs with power. To effectively kill off the threat from the Douglases, James bribed their allies with gifts of land. These defections proved decisive in the Battle of Arkinholm, Dumfrieshire, in 1552, in which the brothers of James, the Ninth Earl of Douglas, all lost their lives. In the following months, the Scottish parliament declared the Douglas lands and possessions forfeit and permanently annexed them to the crown. The destruction of the Black Douglases marked the consolidation of royal power in Scotland. Future Stewart kings of Scotland never again had to face such a powerful challenge from a rival family to their authority. But while we hear of the beginnings of the story of the Black Douglases – the swashbuckling, the daring do, and the love of country – their unpatriotic demise as enemies of the monarch is a story Scottish children are not often told. Better the myth than the reality.

Article / Updated 03-26-2016

Are there any real turning points in history, or is it just one continuous story with a series of little diversions on the way? Historians debate these issues endlessly and never reach agreement. But here are ten points in time that genuinely contributed to making Scotland what it is today: The end of the Ice Age (c. 7500 BC): Until the ice caps melted, there was no possibility of human settlement – there could be no Scotland. When the ice caps did melt, it was a very different place. Bits that were previously joined had become disjointed as sea levels increased. The Orkneys and Shetlands had become islands. The Roman invasion (80 AD): Unlike the English, the Scots north of the River Forth withheld the Roman onslaughts, despite being slaughtered at the Battle of Mons Graupius in 84 AD. So, the Romans didn’t have the impact they had in England, but they did leave a couple walls and some handy roads. The Roman invasion encouraged the peoples of Scotland to band together, and that laid the foundation for the creation of petty kingdoms fixed on warrior rulers, which later grew in size. The coming of Christianity (c. 390–450): The Romans introduced Christianity to the peoples of England and Ireland, but it was the Irish who introduced Christianity to the Scots through St. Patrick (God bless him), and, later, Columba and Ninian. But it was a Celtic Church with Celtic saints until after the Synod of Whitby in 664, when it became a Roman church. The Battle of Dun Nechtain (Nechtansmere; 685): Some historians see this battle as one of the most decisive battles in Scottish history. King Bridei of the Picts halted the northward expansion of the Northumbrians, although they continued to dominate much of southern Scotland. Failure would have meant the end of any possibility of a Scottish nation because it would have been part of a greater Northumbria. The kingship of Kenneth MacAlpin (c. 843–858): If you’re looking for the origins of the Scottish nation, you’ll probably find it here, where in 843, MacAlpin became king of most, but not all, of Scotland. His successors established a dynasty that would last to the 13th century, with a few interruptions along the way. The Battle of Bannockburn (1314): The Battle of Bannockburn was the decisive battle in the struggle against English domination and secured the independence of the kingdom of Scotland. It didn’t mean the end of hostility between the two countries, but it put an end to the likelihood of Scotland being incorporated as a province in a greater England. The Reformation: Scotland began the 16th century as a Catholic country and ended as a Protestant one. This amounted to a revolution in faith, but it took over a hundred years of fighting and bloodshed to establish Presbyterianism as the official religion of Scotland. When they spoke of ‘Blood of Christ’, they meant it literally! The Treaty of Union (1707): This was one of the great defining moments in Scottish history, when the nation voluntarily gave up its independence to join in an incorporating union with the English. Sovereignty was lost, but the union allowed the Scottish economy to prosper and grow as it became part of the largest free-trade area in the world. The steam engine (1765): James Watt’s invention of the steam engine was fundamental to industrialisation. His application of steam power to machinery transformed society in Scotland and the rest of the world and allowed for the early growth of the cotton industry and the emergence of the factory. The formation of the Scottish Labour Party (1888): Keir Hardie, a miner and journalist, along with others fought a by-election at Mid-Lanark as an independent Labour candidate. He lost, but it led to the formation of the Scottish Labour Party, which became the forerunner of the modern Labour Party. In time, Hardie’s actions completely transformed the political landscape of Scotland and the rest of Britain.

Article / Updated 03-26-2016

The word suffrage comes from the Latin word for ‘vote’, something that until 1918, women in Scotland and the rest of the UK didn’t have. Voters were male, and they argued that they were entitled to the vote because they fought for queen/king and country. This argument didn’t go down well with a lot of women, and the injustice of it made some of them very angry. The demand for the vote had been around since the 1860s. Back then, the movement was dominated by the Suffragists, women who used peaceful tactics to try to win support for the ‘great cause’ as it was known. In spite of their best efforts, the Suffragists got nowhere. So, at the turn of the century, more militant voices began to be heard. They were known as Suffragettes, and they were prepared to break the law and go to prison for their beliefs. The campaign for women’s suffrage became split between moderates and militants. You could understand the frustration that women felt at the lack of progress made toward the vote over 40-odd years, but did militancy help or hinder the cause? Scottish Suffragettes fire-bombed Leuchars Railway Station in Fife and Ayr Racecourse, as well as the historic Whitekirk in East Lothian. On top of this, they poured acid into pillar boxes, attacked the prime minister, and slashed portraits of the king. When arrested and imprisoned, they refused to eat, which led to force-feeding, which in turn led to public outcry. Militancy climaxed when the Scottish Suffragette Emily Davidson threw herself in front of the king’s horse at the Epsom Derby in June 1913. These tactics raised the issue and generated a massive amount of publicity for the cause, but in the end, the public became sickened by these excesses. Militancy got women nowhere. Indeed, in Scotland, the strategy never claimed widespread support, even from women. Most people took the attitude that if you wanted to be a lawmaker, you couldn’t be a lawbreaker. Most of those women who went to prison were middle or upper class, which raises the question of whether it was simply a campaign for votes for rich women – privileging the already privileged. Some historians have argued that the working-class woman was conspicuous by her absence. But that view seems to ignore that the women’s suffrage movement broadened its appeal as the decades went by, and it got backing from female jute workers in Dundee, as well as from female weavers in Lancashire. It even drew closer to the emerging Labour Party. Some historians point out, however, that, although working women were accepted into the various suffrage societies, it was on the basis that they were the foot soldiers – the officers or leaders like Elsie Inglis and Lady Francis Balfour were from the upper ranks of society. In 1914, Britain and Germany went to war, and many suffrage groups decided to suspend campaigning until the war was over. Women made a vital contribution to Britain’s war effort. Some people believe that as a result of their war work, women were given the vote in 1918 – but remember it was women over the age of 30. So, it was mainly married women who were enfranchised, and they could theoretically be relied on to vote as their husbands did. The younger women who had borne the burden of the war work were still without the vote. It took another ten years before women had the vote on the same basis as men. But democracy finally triumphed: The suffrage campaigners finally won the argument.

Article / Updated 03-26-2016

When you think of Vikings, you probably picture longhaired warriors who raped and pillaged everywhere they went. Most Vikings, contrary to appearance, were farmers not warriors. Raiding was a seasonal thing, but the farm was a year-round concern. The farm was the property of the extended family, and it was the basis of Viking society. Children, parents, and grandparents all lived together. If the farmer kept workers, servants, or slaves, they usually lived in the family house. The Viking diet was dictated by what was available locally from their farms, the sea, and the forests; meat and fish were the staples. The Vikings liked a drink, and their favourite tipple was ale or beer, although the better-off Vikings drank wine, which they picked up on their raiding expeditions. Where you stood in terms of the social hierarchy was dictated by family membership. It was virtually impossible to transcend this. Basically, there were three classes in the Viking world: At the top were the Jarls, or noblemen, from whom the king was chosen; below them came the Karls, or freemen, whose ranks included farmers, craftsmen, landowners, and other freeborn people; and, finally, at the bottom, were the Thralls, or slaves, who were easily recognised because they wore slave collars around their necks and had short-cropped hair. As you can imagine, the Thralls did all the back-breaking jobs and ate the worst food. In spite of being a hierarchical society, the Viking culture was also progressive in a number of ways: Viking women had more rights than most women in the rest of Europe during this period. Wives had a right to share the wealth their husbands gained. Viking women could own land or other property. Viking law permitted married women to have a divorce anytime they wanted. Viking society was more democratic than most other societies. Although the Thralls had no say, laws were made by the ‘Thing’, an assembly that met weekly at which all freemen could have a say in the governance of the land. The powers of the Thing allowed it to set taxes, decide who was king, and deal with arguments over marital affairs and property. Today we think of the Vikings’ appearance as rather scruffy and hairy, but one of the attractions for native Scots women may have been the Vikings’ close attention to personal hygiene. An English chronicler of the 13th century complained that the Vikings were always combing their hair, taking baths, and changing their undergarments, which apparently gave them an unfair advantage when competing with the native male population for the affection of local maidens! They also bleached their beards to saffron-like yellow and maybe their hair, too. Indeed, grooming kits that included tweezers, ear scoops, and nail scrapers have been found in the graves of men and women in Viking sites.