1.
Shetland
Shetland /ˈʃɛtlənd/, called the Shetland Islands, is a subarctic archipelago that lies northeast of the island of Great Britain and forms part of Scotland, United Kingdom. The islands lie some 80 km to the northeast of Orkney and 280 km southeast of the Faroe Islands, the total area is 1,466 km2 and the population totalled 23,210 in 2012. The largest island, known simply as Mainland, has an area of 967 km2, making it the third-largest Scottish island, there are an additional 15 inhabited islands. The archipelago has a climate, a complex geology, a rugged coastline and many low. Humans have lived in Shetland since the Mesolithic period, and the earliest written references to the date back to Roman times. The early historic period was dominated by Scandinavian influences, especially Norway, when Scotland became part of the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707, trade with northern Europe decreased. Fishing has continued to be an important aspect of the economy up to the present day, the discovery of North Sea oil in the 1970s significantly boosted Shetland economy and public sector revenues.
The local way of life reflects the Scots and Norse heritage of the isles including the Up Helly Aa fire festival, the islands have produced a variety of writers of prose and poetry, often in Shetland dialect. There are numerous areas set aside to protect the fauna and flora. The Shetland pony and Shetland Sheepdog are two well known Shetland animal breeds, other distinguished local breeds include the Shetland sheep, cow and duck. The Shetland pig, or grice, has been extinct since approximately 1930, the islands motto, which appears on the Councils coat of arms, is Með lögum skal land byggja. This Icelandic phrase is taken from the Danish 1241 Basic Law, Codex Holmiensis, and is mentioned in Njáls saga. The name of Shetland is derived from the Old Norse words, hjalt, in AD43 and 77 the Roman authors Pomponius Mela and Pliny the Elder referred to the seven islands they call Haemodae and Acmodae respectively, both of which are assumed to be Shetland. Another possible early reference to the islands is Tacitus report in AD98, after describing the discovery and conquest of Orkney.
In early Irish literature, Shetland is referred to as Inse Catt—the Isles of Cats, the Cat tribe occupied parts of the northern Scottish mainland and their name can be found in Caithness, and in the Gaelic name for Sutherland. It is possible that the Pictish cat sound forms part of this Norse name and it became Hjaltland in the 16th century. As Norn was gradually replaced by English in the form of the Shetland dialect which shares similarities with Scots English. The initial letter is the Middle Scots letter, the pronunciation of which is almost identical to the original Norn sound, /hj/
2.
Church of the Holy Sepulchre
The Church of the Holy Sepulchre is a church in the Christian Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem, a few steps away from the Muristan. The tomb is enclosed by the 18th-century shrine, called the Aedicule, within the church proper are the last four Stations of the Via Dolorosa, representing the final episodes of Jesus Passion. The main denominations sharing property over parts of the church are the Greek Orthodox, Armenian Orthodox and Roman Catholic, and to a lesser degree the Egyptian Copts and Ethiopians. According to Eusebius of Caesarea, the Roman emperor Hadrian in the 2nd century AD built a dedicated to the goddess Venus in order to bury the cave in which Jesus had been buried. The first Christian emperor, Constantine the Great, ordered in about 325/326 that the temple be replaced by a church, during the building of the Church, Constantines mother, Helena, is believed to have rediscovered the tomb. Socrates Scholasticus, in his Ecclesiastical History, gives a description of the discovery.
The remains are enveloped by a marble sheath placed some 500 years before to protect the ledge from Ottoman attacks. However, there are several thick window wells extending through the marble sheath and they appear to reveal an underlying limestone rock, which may be part of the original living rock of the tomb. The church was starting in 325/326, and was consecrated on 13 September 335. From pilgrim reports it seems that the housing the tomb of Jesus was freestanding at first. Each year, the Eastern Orthodox Church celebrates the anniversary of the consecration of the Church of the Resurrection on 13 September and this building was damaged by fire in May of 614 when the Sassanid Empire, under Khosrau II, invaded Jerusalem and captured the True Cross. In 630, the Emperor Heraclius restored it and rebuilt the church after recapturing the city, after Jerusalem came under Arab rule, it remained a Christian church, with the early Muslim rulers protecting the citys Christian sites. A story reports that the Caliph Umar ibn al-Khattab visited the church and stopped to pray on the balcony and he feared that future generations would misinterpret this gesture, taking it as a pretext to turn the church into a mosque.
Eutychius added that Umar wrote a decree prohibiting Muslims from praying at this location, the building suffered severe damage due to an earthquake in 746. Early in the century, another earthquake damaged the dome of the Anastasis. The damage was repaired in 810 by Patriarch Thomas, in the year 841, the church suffered a fire. In 935, the Orthodox Christians prevented the construction of a Muslim mosque adjacent the Church, in 938, a new fire damaged the inside of the basilica and came close to the rotunda. In 966, due to a defeat of Muslim armies in the region of Syria, the doors and roof were burnt, and the Patriarch John VII was murdered
3.
Kingdom of England
In the early 11th century the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, united by Æthelstan, became part of the North Sea Empire of Cnut the Great, a personal union between England and Norway. The completion of the conquest of Wales by Edward I in 1284 put Wales under the control of the English crown, from the accession of James I in 1603, the Stuart dynasty ruled England in personal union with Scotland and Ireland. Under the Stuarts, the kingdom plunged into war, which culminated in the execution of Charles I in 1649. The monarchy returned in 1660, but the Civil War had established the precedent that an English monarch cannot govern without the consent of Parliament and this concept became legally established as part of the Glorious Revolution of 1688. From this time the kingdom of England, as well as its state the United Kingdom. On 1 May 1707, under the terms of the Acts of Union 1707, the Anglo-Saxons referred to themselves as the Engle or the Angelcynn, originally names of the Angles. They called their land Engla land, meaning land of the English, by Æthelweard Latinized Anglia, from an original Anglia vetus, the name Engla land became England by haplology during the Middle English period.
The Latin name was Anglia or Anglorum terra, the Old French, by the 14th century, England was used in reference to the entire island of Great Britain. The standard title for all monarchs from Æthelstan until the time of King John was Rex Anglorum, Canute the Great, a Dane, was the first king to call himself King of England. In the Norman period Rex Anglorum remained standard, with use of Rex Anglie. The Empress Matilda styled herself Domina Anglorum, from the time of King John onwards all other titles were eschewed in favour of Rex or Regina Anglie. In 1604 James VI and I, who had inherited the English throne the previous year, the English and Scottish parliaments, did not recognise this title until the Acts of Union of 1707. The kingdom of England emerged from the unification of the early medieval Anglo-Saxon kingdoms known as the Heptarchy, East Anglia, Northumbria, Essex, Sussex. The Viking invasions of the 9th century upset the balance of power between the English kingdoms, and native Anglo-Saxon life in general, the English lands were unified in the 10th century in a reconquest completed by King Æthelstan in 927 CE.
During the Heptarchy, the most powerful king among the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms might become acknowledged as Bretwalda, the decline of Mercia allowed Wessex to become more powerful. It absorbed the kingdoms of Kent and Sussex in 825, the kings of Wessex became increasingly dominant over the other kingdoms of England during the 9th century. In 827, Northumbria submitted to Egbert of Wessex at Dore, in 886, Alfred the Great retook London, which he apparently regarded as a turning point in his reign. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle says that all of the English people not subject to the Danes submitted themselves to King Alfred, asser added that Alfred, king of the Anglo-Saxons, restored the city of London splendidly
4.
Edinburgh
Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 local government council areas. Located in Lothian on the Firth of Forths southern shore, it is Scotlands second most populous city and the seventh most populous in the United Kingdom. The 2014 official population estimates are 464,990 for the city of Edinburgh,492,680 for the authority area. Recognised as the capital of Scotland since at least the 15th century, Edinburgh is home to the Scottish Parliament and it is the largest financial centre in the UK after London. Historically part of Midlothian, the city has long been a centre of education, particularly in the fields of medicine, Scots law, the sciences and engineering. The University of Edinburgh, founded in 1582 and now one of four in the city, was placed 17th in the QS World University Rankings in 2013 and 2014. The city is famous for the Edinburgh International Festival and the Fringe. The citys historical and cultural attractions have made it the United Kingdoms second most popular tourist destination after London, attracting over one million overseas visitors each year.
Historic sites in Edinburgh include Edinburgh Castle, Holyrood Palace, the churches of St. Giles and the Canongate, Edinburghs Old Town and New Town together are listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, which has been managed by Edinburgh World Heritage since 1999. It appears to derive from the place name Eidyn mentioned in the Old Welsh epic poem Y Gododdin, the poem names Din Eidyn as a hill fort in the territory of the Gododdin. The Celtic element din was dropped and replaced by the Old English burh, the first documentary evidence of the medieval burgh is a royal charter, c. 1124–1127, by King David I granting a toft in burgo meo de Edenesburg to the Priory of Dunfermline. In modern Gaelic, the city is called Dùn Èideann, the earliest known human habitation in the Edinburgh area was at Cramond, where evidence was found of a Mesolithic camp site dated to c.8500 BC. Traces of Bronze Age and Iron Age settlements have found on Castle Rock, Arthurs Seat, Craiglockhart Hill. When the Romans arrived in Lothian at the end of the 1st century AD, at some point before the 7th century AD, the Gododdin, who were presumably descendants of the Votadini, built the hill fort of Din Eidyn or Etin.
Although its location has not been identified, it likely they would have chosen a commanding position like the Castle Rock, Arthurs Seat. In 638, the Gododdin stronghold was besieged by forces loyal to King Oswald of Northumbria and it thenceforth remained under their jurisdiction. The royal burgh was founded by King David I in the early 12th century on land belonging to the Crown, in 1638, King Charles Is attempt to introduce Anglican church forms in Scotland encountered stiff Presbyterian opposition culminating in the conflicts of the Wars of the Three Kingdoms. In the 17th century, Edinburghs boundaries were defined by the citys defensive town walls
5.
St Andrews Castle
St Andrews Castle is a picturesque ruin located in the coastal Royal Burgh of St Andrews in Fife, Scotland. The castle sits on a promontory overlooking a small beach called Castle Sands. There has been a castle standing at the site since the times of Bishop Roger and it housed the burgh’s wealthy and powerful bishops while St Andrews served as the ecclesiastical centre of Scotland during the years before the Protestant Reformation. In their Latin charters, the Archbishops of St Andrews wrote of the castle as their Palace, the castles grounds are now maintained by Historic Scotland, and are entered through a visitor centre with displays on its history. Some of the best surviving carved fragments from the castle are displayed in the centre, during the Wars of Scottish Independence, the castle was destroyed and rebuilt several times as it changed hands between the Scots and the English. Soon after the sack of Berwick in 1296 by Edward I of England, in 1314, after the Scottish victory at Bannockburn, the castle was retaken and repaired by Bishop William Lamberton, Guardian of Scotland, a loyal supporter of King Robert the Bruce.
The English had recaptured it again by the 1330s and reinforced its defences in 1336, sir Andrew Moray, Regent of Scotland in the absence of David II, recaptured it after a siege lasting three weeks. Shortly after this, in 1336-1337, it was destroyed by the Scots to prevent the English from once again using it as a stronghold and it remained in this ruined state until Bishop Walter Trail rebuilt it at the turn of the century. His castle forms the basis of what can be seen today and he completed work on the castle in about 1400 and died within its walls in 1401. Several notable figures spent time in the castle over the several years. James I of Scotland received part of his education from Bishop Henry Wardlaw, a resident, Bishop James Kennedy, was a trusted advisor of James II of Scotland. In 1445 the castle was the birthplace of James III of Scotland, during these years, the castle served as a notorious prison. The castles bottle dungeon is a dank and airless pit cut out of rock below the north-west tower.
During the Scottish Reformation, the became a centre of religious persecution. Referring to the dungeon the Scottish reformer, John Knox, wrote. In 1521 James Beaton, Archbishop of Glasgow, won the seat of St Andrews, Beaton altered the defences to enable the castle to withstand a heavy artillery attack, which was a threat as tensions grew between English Protestants and Scottish Catholics. In 1538 James Beaton was succeeded by his ambitious and wealthy nephew David Beaton, Cardinal David Beatons strong opposition to the marriage of Mary, Queen of Scots, with Prince Edward, the son and heir of Henry VIII of England, helped to spark renewed fighting in 1544. Scottish Protestants were increasingly viewed as dangerous turncoats who sided with the English, in 1546 David Beaton imprisoned the Protestant preacher George Wishart in the castle’s Sea Tower and had him burnt at the stake in front of the castle walls on March 1
6.
Renaissance
The Renaissance was a period in European history, from the 14th to the 17th century, regarded as the cultural bridge between the Middle Ages and modern history. It started as a movement in Italy in the Late Medieval period and spread to the rest of Europe. This new thinking became manifest in art, politics, Early examples were the development of perspective in oil painting and the recycled knowledge of how to make concrete. Although the invention of movable type sped the dissemination of ideas from the 15th century. In politics, the Renaissance contributed to the development of the customs and conventions of diplomacy, the Renaissance began in Florence, in the 14th century. Other major centres were northern Italian city-states such as Venice, Milan, the word Renaissance, literally meaning Rebirth in French, first appeared in English in the 1830s. The word occurs in Jules Michelets 1855 work, Histoire de France, the word Renaissance has been extended to other historical and cultural movements, such as the Carolingian Renaissance and the Renaissance of the 12th century.
The Renaissance was a movement that profoundly affected European intellectual life in the early modern period. Renaissance scholars employed the humanist method in study, and searched for realism, however, a subtle shift took place in the way that intellectuals approached religion that was reflected in many other areas of cultural life. In addition, many Greek Christian works, including the Greek New Testament, were back from Byzantium to Western Europe. Political philosophers, most famously Niccolò Machiavelli, sought to describe life as it really was. Others see more competition between artists and polymaths such as Brunelleschi, Ghiberti and Masaccio for artistic commissions as sparking the creativity of the Renaissance. Yet it remains much debated why the Renaissance began in Italy, several theories have been put forward to explain its origins. During the Renaissance and art went hand in hand, Artists depended entirely on patrons while the patrons needed money to foster artistic talent. Wealth was brought to Italy in the 14th, 15th, and 16th centuries by expanding trade into Asia, silver mining in Tyrol increased the flow of money.
Luxuries from the Eastern world, brought home during the Crusades, increased the prosperity of Genoa, unlike with Latin texts, which had been preserved and studied in Western Europe since late antiquity, the study of ancient Greek texts was very limited in medieval Western Europe. One of the greatest achievements of Renaissance scholars was to bring this entire class of Greek cultural works back into Western Europe for the first time since late antiquity, Arab logicians had inherited Greek ideas after they had invaded and conquered Egypt and the Levant. Their translations and commentaries on these ideas worked their way through the Arab West into Spain and Sicily and this work of translation from Islamic culture, though largely unplanned and disorganized, constituted one of the greatest transmissions of ideas in history
7.
Margaret of Denmark, Queen of Scotland
Margaret of Denmark, referred to as Margaret of Norway, was Queen of Scotland from 1469 to 1486 by marriage to King James III. She was the daughter of Christian I, King of Denmark and Sweden, Margaret was betrothed to James of Scotland in 1460. The marriage was arranged by recommendation of the king of France to end the feud between Denmark and Scotland about the taxation of the Hebrides islands, a conflict that raged between 1426 and 1460. Her father, King Christian I of Denmark and Norway, agreed to a considerable dowry and he was in need of cash, however, so the islands of Orkney and Shetland, possessions of the Norwegian crown, were pledged as security until the dowry was to be paid. In July 1469, at age 13, at Holyrood Abbey, william Sinclair, 1st Earl of Caithness, was at that time the Norse Earl of Orkney. In 1472 he was made to exchange his Orkney fief to Castle Ravenscraig, Queen Margaret was given the largest jointure Scottish law allowed in her marriage settlement. She was interested in clothes and jewelry, and known for always being dressed in the latest fashion of the time and she may have taught her son James to speak Danish.
She became a queen in Scotland and was described as beautiful, gentle. Many historians called her far better qualified to rule than her spouse, the relationship between Margaret and James III was not described as a happy one. Reportedly, Margaret was not very fond of James and had intercourse with him only for procreation, one reason for their estrangement was the fact that James favored their second son before their eldest. In 1476, John MacDonald was trialed for treason and deprived of the title Earl of Ross by James, John MacDonald was allowed to remain as Lord of Parliament upon Margarets request. Politically, she did work for the reinstatement of her spouse in his powers as monarch during this incident, after the crisis of 1482, the couple lived apart, James III lived in Edinburgh, while queen Margaret preferred to live in Stirling with her children. Margaret died at Stirling Castle on 14 July 1486, and is buried in Cambuskenneth Abbey, a story given by her son claims that Margaret was killed by poison given to her by John Ramsay, 1st Lord Bothwell, leader of one of the political factions.
However, as Ramsay was favoured by the family after the death of the queen. Reportedly, James III did mourn her death and sent a supplication to the Pope where he applied for her to be declared a saint. James IV James Stewart, Duke of Ross John Stewart, Earl of Mar. Attribution This article incorporates text from a now in the public domain, Henderson
8.
Orkney
Orkney /ˈɔːrkni/, known as the Orkney Islands, is an archipelago in the Northern Isles of Scotland, situated off the north coast of Great Britain. Orkney is 16 kilometres north of the coast of Caithness and comprises approximately 70 islands, the largest island Mainland is often referred to as the Mainland. It has an area of 523 square kilometres, making it the sixth-largest Scottish island, the largest settlement and administrative centre is Kirkwall. A form of the dates to the pre-Roman era and the islands have been inhabited for at least 8500 years, originally occupied by Mesolithic and Neolithic tribes. Orkney was invaded and forcibly annexed by Norway in 875 and settled by the Norse, the Scottish Parliament re-annexed the earldom to the Scottish Crown in 1472, following the failed payment of a dowry for James IIIs bride Margaret of Denmark. Orkney contains some of the oldest and best-preserved Neolithic sites in Europe, Orkney is one of the 32 council areas of Scotland, a constituency of the Scottish Parliament, a lieutenancy area, and a historic county.
The local council is Orkney Islands Council, one of only three Councils in Scotland with a majority of elected members who are independents. In addition to the Mainland, most of the islands are in two groups, the North and South Isles, all of which have a geological base of Old Red Sandstone. The climate is mild and the soils are fertile, most of the land being farmed. Agriculture is the most important sector of the economy, the significant wind and marine energy resources are of growing importance, and the island generates more than its total yearly electricity demand using renewables. The local people are known as Orcadians and have a distinctive Orcadian dialect of Scots, there is an abundance of marine and avian wildlife. Pytheas of Massilia visited Britain – probably sometime between 322 and 285 BC – and described it as triangular in shape, with a northern tip called Orcas and this may have referred to Dunnet Head, from which Orkney is visible. Speakers of Old Irish referred to the islands as Insi Orc island of the pigs, the archipelago is known as Ynysoedd Erch in modern Welsh and Arcaibh in modern Scottish Gaelic, the -aibh representing a fossilized prepositional case ending.
The Anglo-Saxon monk Bede refers to the islands as Orcades insulae in his seminal work Ecclesiastical History of the English People. Norwegian settlers arriving from the ninth century reinterpreted orc as the Old Norse orkn seal. The plural suffix -jar was removed in English leaving the modern name Orkney, according to the Historia Norwegiæ, Orkney was named after an earl called Orkan. The Norse knew Mainland Orkney as Megenland Mainland or as Hrossey Horse Island, the island is sometimes referred to as Pomona, a name that stems from a sixteenth-century mistranslation by George Buchanan, which has rarely been used locally. A charred hazelnut shell, recovered in 2007 during excavations in Tankerness on the Mainland has been dated to 6820–6660 BC indicating the presence of Mesolithic nomadic tribes
9.
Monarch
A monarch is the sovereign head of state in a monarchy. A monarch may exercise the highest authority and power in the state, alternatively, an individual may become monarch by conquest, acclamation or a combination of means. A monarch usually reigns for life or until abdication, if a young child is crowned the monarch, a regent is often appointed to govern until the monarch reaches the requisite adult age to rule. A monarch can reign in multiple monarchies simultaneously, for example, the monarchy of Canada and the monarchy of the United Kingdom are separate states, but they share the same monarch through personal union. Monarchs, as such, bear a variety of titles — king or queen, prince or princess, emperor or empress, duke or grand duke, Prince is sometimes used as a generic term to refer to any monarch regardless of title, especially in older texts. A king can be a husband and a queen can be a kings wife. If both people in a reign, neither person is generally considered to be a consort.
Monarchy is political or sociocultural in nature, and is associated with hereditary rule. Most monarchs, both historically and in the present day, have been born and brought up within a royal family, different systems of succession have been used, such as proximity of blood, agnatic seniority, Salic law, etc. In an elective monarchy, the monarch is elected but otherwise serves as any other monarch, historical examples of elective monarchy include the Holy Roman Emperors and the free election of kings of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. In recent centuries, many states have abolished the monarchy and become republics, advocacy of government by a republic is called republicanism, while advocacy of monarchy is called monarchism. A principal advantage of hereditary monarchy is the continuity of national leadership. In cases where the monarch serves mostly as a ceremonial figure real leadership does not depend on the monarch, a form of government may in fact be hereditary without being considered monarchy, such as a family dictatorship.
Monarchies take a variety of forms, such as the two co-princes of Andorra, positions held simultaneously by the Roman Catholic Bishop of Urgel and the elected President of France. Similarly, the Yang di-Pertuan Agong of Malaysia is considered a monarch despite only holding the position for five years at a time, hereditary succession within one patrilineal family has been most common, with preference for children over siblings, sons over daughters. Other European realms practice one form or another of primogeniture, whereunder a lord was succeeded by his eldest son or, if he had none, by his brother, the system of tanistry was semi-elective and gave weight to ability and merit. The Salic law, practiced in France and in the Italian territories of the House of Savoy, in most fiefs, in the event of the demise of all legitimate male members of the patrilineage, a female of the family could succeed. Spain today continues this model of succession law, in the form of cognatic primogeniture, in more complex medieval cases, the sometimes conflicting principles of proximity and primogeniture battled, and outcomes were often idiosyncratic
10.
James V of Scotland
James V was King of Scots from 9 September 1513 until his death, which followed the Scottish defeat at the Battle of Solway Moss. His only surviving child, succeeded him when she was just six days old. James was son of King James IV of Scotland and his wife Margaret Tudor, a daughter of Henry VII of England, and was the only legitimate child of James IV to survive infancy. He was born on 10 April 1512 at Linlithgow Palace and baptized the day, receiving the titles Duke of Rothesay and Prince. He became king at just seventeen months old when his father was killed at the Battle of Flodden Field on 9 September 1513, James was crowned in the Chapel Royal at Stirling Castle on 21 September 1513. Other regents included Robert Maxwell, 5th Lord Maxwell, a member of the Council of Regency who was bestowed as Regent of Arran. In February 1517 James came from Stirling to Holyroodhouse, Edinburgh, at Stirling, the 10-year-old James had a guard of 20 footmen dressed in his colours and yellow. When he went to the park below the Castle, by secret and in fair and soft wedder.
Poets wrote their own nursery rhymes for James and advised him on royal behavior, as a youth, his education was in the care of University of St Andrews poets such as Sir David Lyndsay. In the autumn of 1524 James dismissed his Regents and was proclaimed an adult ruler by his mother, several new court servants were appointed including a trumpeter, Henry Rudeman. Thomas Magnus, the English diplomat, gave an impression of the new Scottish court at Holyroodhouse on All Saints Day 1524, trumpets and shamulles did sounde and blewe up mooste pleasauntely. Magnus saw the young king singing, playing with a spear at Leith, and with his horses, and he was given the impression that the king preferred English manners over French fashions. In 1525 Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of Angus, the young kings stepfather, took custody of James, another attempt that year, on 4 September at the battle of Linlithgow Bridge, failed again to relieve the King from the clutches of Angus. When James and his came to Edinburgh on 20 November 1526, she stayed in the chambers at Holyroodhouse.
In February 1527 Henry Fitzroy, Duke of Richmond, gave James twenty hunting hounds, Magnus thought the Scottish servant sent to Sheriff Hutton Castle for the dogs was intended to note the form and fashion of the Dukes household, for emulation in Scotland. James finally escaped from Anguss care in 1528 and assumed the reins of government himself, the first action James took as king was to remove Angus from the scene. The Douglas family were forced into exile and James besieged their castle at Tantallon and he subdued the Border rebels and the chiefs of the Western Isles. Even his pursemaster and yeoman of the wardrobe, John Tennent of Listonschiels, was sent on an errand to England, James increased his income by tightening control over royal estates and from the profits of justice and feudal rights
11.
James Stewart, Duke of Ross
James Stewart, Duke of Ross was the son of King James III of Scotland and Margaret of Denmark. He was made Marquess of Ormond at his baptism and he was created Earl of Ross in 1481 after that title was forfeited to the crown by John, Lord of the Isles. Of his fathers three sons, James of Ross was the favourite, James III even tried to marry him to Edward IVs daughter, Catherine of York. This increasing preference shown to James of Ross was a factor in the rebellion of his brother against their father. Nonetheless, when the elder James succeeded to the crown in 1488, around May 1497, his brother the King nominated James of Ross to be Archbishop of St Andrews. King James thought that would keep James of Ross from rebelling against him, James of Ross was a minor, and so the revenues of the archbishopric would be controlled by King James. James of Ross became Lord Chancellor of Scotland in 1502 and he was one of three brothers, his two brothers being King James IV of Scotland and John Stewart, Earl of Mar.
It may seem surprising that there were two brothers both called James and it has been suggested that at the time the younger was born the older was seriously ill and seemed unlikely to survive, but it is unclear whether there is any evidence for this hypothesis. In late mediaeval Scotland it was not uncommon to have two brothers with the same Christian name, or occasionally even three
12.
James IV of Scotland
James IV was the King of Scots from 11 June 1488 to his death. He assumed the following the death of his father, James III, after the Battle of Sauchieburn. James was the son of James III and Margaret of Denmark, as heir apparent to the Scottish crown, he became Duke of Rothesay. In 1474, his father arranged his betrothal to Princess Cecily of England and his father was not a popular king and faced two major rebellions during his reign. James IIIs army rebelled against him and the English army reached Edinburgh, during the second rebellion, the rebels set up the 15-year-old James as their nominal leader. They fought James III at the Battle of Sauchieburn on 11 June 1488, the younger James took the throne and was crowned at Scone on 24 June. When he realised the role which he had played in the death of his father. From that date on, he wore an iron chain cilice around his waist, next to the skin, each Lent as penance. James IV quickly proved an effective ruler and a wise king and he defeated another rebellion in 1489, took a direct interest in the administration of justice and finally brought the Lord of the Isles under control in 1493.
For a time, he supported Perkin Warbeck, pretender to the English throne, then, in August 1497, James laid siege to Norham Castle, using his grandfathers bombard Mons Meg. First he ratified the Treaty of Ayton in February 1498, then, in 1502 James signed the Treaty of Perpetual Peace with Henry VII. He maintained his relations with France, with rumours that James would renew the Auld alliance, in April 1508 Thomas Wolsey was sent to discuss Henry VIIs concerns over this. Wolsey found there was never a man worse welcome into Scotland than I. they keep their matters so secret here that the wives in the market know every cause of my coming, James saw the importance of building a fleet that could provide Scotland with a strong maritime presence. James founded two new dockyards for this purpose and acquired a total of 38 ships for the Royal Scots Navy, including the Margaret, and the carrack Michael or Great Michael. The latter, built at great expense at Newhaven and launched in 1511, was 240 feet in length, weighed 1,000 tons and was, at that time, James IV was a true Renaissance prince with an interest in practical and scientific matters.
He built a part of Falkland Palace, and Great Halls at Stirling and Edinburgh castles, figures associated with his court include William Dunbar, Walter Kennedy and Gavin Douglas, who made the first complete translation of Virgils Aeneid in northern Europe. His reign saw the passing of the makar Robert Henryson and he patronised music at Restalrig using rental money from the Kings Wark. James was well educated and a fluent polyglot, in July 1498 the Spanish envoy Pedro de Ayala reported to Ferdinand and Isabella that The King is 25 years and some months old
