Satan Calls the Scots to Slaughter

The substantial quote below is from Robert Pitscottie's History and it relates how, a short time before the slaughter of the Battle of Flodden, a mysterious speaker turned up at the ancient Market (Mercat) Cross in Edinburgh and read out a muster call of those Scots due to die in that carnage. The speaker, identified us Plutock, equates with Pluto and is most commonly thought to be Satan. However,in my book The Afterlife of King James IV, I wonder whether he is perhaps the king of the fairies. Either way, the announcement is still unexplained five centuries later. Reading it still brings a chill to the spine:

there was a Cry heard at the Market-Cross of Edinburgh, at the Hour of Midnight, proclaiming as it had been a Summons, which was named and called by the Proclaimer thereof, The Summons of Plotock; which desired all Men, To compear, both Earl and Lord, and Baron and Gentleman, and all honest Gentlemen within the Town (every Man specified by his own Name) to compear, within the Space of forty Days, before his Master, where it should happen him to appoint, and be for the Time, under the Pain of Disobedience. But whether this Summons was proclaimed by vain Persons, Night-Walkers, or drunk Men, for their Pastime, or if it was but a Spirit, I cannot tell truly: But it was shewn to me, That an Indweller of the Town, Mr. Richard Lawson, being evil-disposed, ganging in his Galley-Stair foreanent the Cross, hearing this Voice, proclaiming this Summons, thought Marvel what it should be, cried on his Servant to bring him his Purse; and when he had brought him it, he took out a Crown, and cast over the Stair, saying, I appeal from that Summons, Judgement and Sentence thereof, and takes me all whole in the Mercy of God, and Christ Jesus his Son. Verily the Author of this, that caused me write the Manner of the Summons, was a landed Gentleman, who was, at that Time, twenty Years of Age, and was in the Town the Time of the said Summons; and thereafter, when the Field was stricken, he swore to me, there was no Man that escaped that was called in this Summons, but that one Man alone, which made his Protection, and appealed from the said Summons; but all the Lave were perished in the Field with the King.

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When the Saints are Against You... The King Arthur-James IV Link?

It was a bare few weeks before the Battle of Flodden between England and Scotland in the autumn of 1513. King James IV was determined to enter England, partly to aid his ally France, which was currently at war with England. The Scots kings implicitly believed in himself as a warrior and could not have known that he would, in a very short time, have the dubious honour of being the last monarch in the British Isles to be slain on a battlefield.

In the evening he went to hear the service in the kirk of St Michael's at Linlithgow, immediately adjacent to his royal palace. Surrounded by the usual crowd of courtiers and servants, the king was a little apart from them all and possibly in a pensive mood when he was approached by a man in a blue gown who began to warn him not to go to war. The figure came out of nowhere and, more remarkably, once his lecture was over, he vanished into thin air. Nobody knows who he was. There was speculation that he was an actor hired by the king's wife Margaret, sister of Henry VIII, who was against the upcoming war. Or the culprit could have been Sir David Lindsay, a man of the court who became a notes playwright and poet.

The historian Lindsay of Pitscottie, writing a few decades after the event, imbues it with mystery and foreboding. It is generally assumed that the messenger was heavenly in origin, though later writers are divided about his exact identity. Some say St James, others St John, and yet others St Andrew the patron of Scotland, of course. The mystery, of course, will ultimately never be solved. I even allow the possibility in my book The Afterlife of King James IV that the event might not have actually happened.

That aside, I gave the variants on all the heavenly contenders for the saintly messenger and thought I had covered all the possibilities. But, lo and behold, I read in a book that the mysterious figure was none other than King Arthur! News to me. It came to late to be included in my book. Would I have included it if I had found it earlier? Er, nah. Some things are just too far fetched, even when relating visions and the miraculous.

Stories on the Birth of King James VI

In a previous post I alluded to the stories surrounding the birth of King James VI in June 1566.  It's well known that the king's unfortunate father, Lord Darnley, cast doubt on his son being his.  Equally clear is the knowledge that this is almost certainly more a mark of Darnley than of Mary, Queen of Scots.  The alleged real father was the queen's murdered secretary, the Italian, David Rizzio.  But Rizzio was well advanced in middle aged and not the kind of man who might have caught the queen's eye.

   And yet the tales persisted.  It was said that, in later years, a baby's body was found interred within the walls of Edinburgh Castle and some malicious people stated that this was the queen's true son and the boy she raised as king was an impostor, a son of Lady Reres or the Earl of Mar.

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   It was true that Lady Reres was pregnant at the time and one of the few ladies attending the queen before she gave birth.  Five years later, Lady Rere's cousin Andrew Lundy had dinner with John Knox and relayed to the reformed a stranger superstitious belief which Margaret Bethune, Lady Reres, had; namely that the childbirth pains of the queen had been supernaturally transferred to her through the intercession of the Countess of Atholl, who was accounted a witch.  The revelation to Knox was recorded by his secretary, Richard Bannatyne:

On Tuysday, the 3 of Julij, 1571, Andro Lundie beand at dener with my maister, in a place of the lard of Abbotshalls, called Falsyde, openlie affirmet for treuth, that when the quene was lying in ieasing of the king, the Ladie Athole, lying [lodging] thair lykwayis, baith within the Castell of Edinburgh, that he come thair for sum business, and called for the Ladie Reirres, whom he fand in her chalmer, lying bedfast, and he asking hir of hir disease, scho answrit that scho was never so trubled with no barne that ever scho bair, ffor the Ladie Athole had cassin all the pyne of hir (the Queen's) child-birth vpon hir.

   But what of the child in the walls?  In 1835 there was a fire in Edinburgh Castle which necessitated rebuilding work to part of the structure.  A small coffin was found in the walls of the royal apartments, containing an infant wrapped in a shroud of silk and gold cloth, with a letter J upon it.  The finding was reported in magazine literature at the time but, curiously, the coffin and its contents have vanished.  One story says that they were re-interred within the castle walls.

   The story received wider attention in the early 20th century when Alice, Lady Forbes, wrote about them in The Scottish Historical Review (Vol. 15, No. 58, Jan., 1918). In an answering article in the same journal, R. K. Hannay cast doubt on the conclusions that the infant was the true king; not least the information that Lady Reres was in fact rather old to be bearing a child at that time and her  words about pain and childbirth were hopelessly muddled both by her cousin and John Knox's secretary.
   
   We will never know the truth about the matter for sure, unless and until the remains of the possible prince are discovered again.

Commercial Break - New Book Out Now!

While I take a short (and possibly well-deserved) break from my blogging schedule, can I bring your attention to my recently published book, The Afterlife of King James IV, published by Chronos Books.

   This work is very much an alternative history of one of the best beloved Scottish monarchs, King James IV, who died at the Battle of Flodden in 1513.  Or did he?  There were persistent rumours that the monarch survived the battle, being either captured by the English, rogue nobles in the Scottish army, or taking himself away on a spiritual, one way journey from the Holy Land. So, a raft of conspiracies theories which were born out of the bloody mire and confusion of battle?  That's true, but there was certainly more, uncommon intrigue afoot.  The tantalising image and reputation of the king - plus the possibility of his murder or survival - were tangible elements in the tempestuous politics of the post-Flodden period. The king's own wife, Margaret Tudor (sister of King Henry VIII) fully indulged in the intrigue, for her own purposes, claiming that James IV survived for several years after the fateful battle.

   More than this, the king was also linked to the Otherworld, with several strands of tradition aligning him with the theme of the Undying King, whose interest in the recondite traditions of his realm prompted his removed from the physical world, a captive in Fairy Land.  The persistent legends of his links with this realm are evident in witch trials and resurface in subsequent centuries, a fascinating ingredient in the postmortem reputation of this most alluring Stewart monarch.

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Robert Bruce: Saints and Superstition

To estimate the religious impulses of a long dead ruler is just one aspect of trying to determine their character and the more public facing and orthodox in form their devotions are, the more difficult it is to determine their underlying beliefs.  As a ruler Robert Bruce is judged by military exploits, both in those rather few set piece full scale battles which he won and as a guerrilla ruler before his ascent to power.  His political achievements and statesmanship were also great, but his devotion to his nation's saints also needs examined, not least because it throws light on his interaction with the complex native culture in Scotland.

   Bruce's family in background were little different from the other dynastic players active in the period, such as the Comyn and Balliol families.  All were descendants (in sometimes disputed degrees) from the native Celtic kings of Scotland, and all saw their chance at the prize of the throne when that direct line died out in the later 13th century.  Norman and English blood of course mingled with Scottish ancestry and they had extensive land holdings and associated loyalties south of the border.  Bruce himself was probably born in south-west Scotland, where the region of Galloway (larger then than the area is understood to be now) was a bastion of Gaelic language and culture.  Did the king himself speak Gaelic and participate in the the native culture of the area, including the veneration of native saints?

   Raised at Turnberry Castle in Carrick, the area would still have been within the Gaelic speaking milieu.  Obviously there would be a family inheritance of Norman French, as well as some knowledge of Scots dialect and Latin.  Having a scant understanding of the tongue of the peasantry is one thing, but understanding their culture is quite another.  John Barbour's epic account The Brus tells how the king, in the wilderness before his final triumph, encouraged the flagging spirits of his guerrilla band with tales of heroes who overcame great adversity.  The tale of Hannibal attacking Rome is mentioned, but Bruce also told tales of other ancient heroes, among them Caesar, but could he also have drawn on native legend and folklore to encourage his men with great deeds closer to home? 

Thus gat thaim comfort the king/And to comfort thaim gan inbryng/ Auld storys off men that wer/Set intyll hard assayis ser/And that fortoun contraryit fast,/And come to purpos at the last.

Bruce and the 'Celts' - The Wider Picture

The audacious Bruce incursion into Ireland fell victim to that country's factionalism(a pattern which echoes through every subsequent century) and should not be viewed as an attempt to create a kind of pan-Celtic vision for the Bruce dynasty.  They did, for certain, recognise the shared culture of Gaelic Scotland and Ireland, but the sense of kinship between other 'Celtic' countries was probably absent.  

A Superstitious King? Prophecies and Marvels

   Bruce was a king of many cultures.  His family, before the necessary duality of the Wars of Independence, held lands in England and Scotland.  Languages he would have been familiar with in south-west Scotland would have included Gaelic, Scots, Latin, Norman French.  How credulous was he as a man.  We know, as will be seen below, that he used popular legendary characters to further his agenda, but that is some distance from viewing him as an expert in the traditional lore of his native land.  John Barbour in The Brus (book four) has Robert Bruce being assured of his ultimate success by a seeress in his home region, and yet Bruce does not give her supernatural endorsement unqualified welcome.  He listened to her whole prognostication and thanked her fully, being somewhat heartened by it.  And yet he did not wholly believe, for he wondered how she or anyone could entirely have knowledge of things to come:

The king that herd all hyr carpingThankit hyr in mekill thing,For scho confort him sumdeill,The-quhethir he trowyt nocht full weill hyr spek, for he had gret ferlyHow scho suld wyt it sekyrly...

   Bruce certainly deployed ancient but nevertheless effective cultural weapons against his enemies.  The prime prophet of the island of Britain, recent regenerated by Geoffrey of Monmouth, was of course Merlin.  On May 15 1307, several days after the engagement between Scots and English at Loudon Hill, a pro-English Scot reported that the allies of Bruce were being strengthened by the continual efforts of false preachers in his army.  These propagandists were disseminated the forthcoming death of Le Roy Coveytous - the English monarch - after which happy event the people of Wales and Scotland would band together and recover full lordship  and live in peace together until the end of the world.  According to Barbour again, the people of Scotland had knowledge of the predictions of that more recent seer, True Thomas, or Thomas of Erceldoune, who had apparently foreseen his ascent.  Bishop Wishart of Glasgow is made to ponder, after hearing of Bruce's decisive slaying of Comyn: 'I hop thomas prophecy off ercildoune shall werefyd be'.  Such was the magnitude of the struggle that supernatural support had to be gathered from whatever source it could be found, be that sacrilegious or not.

A Religious King? The Record of His Religion

   In speaking to his troops before the Battle of Bannockburn, Robert Bruce mentioned - among others - the national saint Andrew, whose cult had become preeminent in the nation perhaps a century before. After his death, Archbishop Bernard Linton  likened the Bruce to that apostle. As a king, and before that date as a leading noble Bruce had participated in the recognition and veneration of St Thomas Becket also, which was also evident in the reign of his son David II.  Did Robert Bruce see significance in the date of 7 July 1307, the Translation feast of Becket, when Edward I died at Burgh-on-Sands, near Carlisle, an event which prevented another English invasion of Scotland?

   As the historian Michael Penman puts it, Bruce was not slow in copying the English example of covering a wide veneration base of saints: 'As a bachelor in Edward I’s household before 1296, and often in attendance on the English king in England and Scotland up to 1305, Robert surely came to understand the political value of... public devotions.' ('“Sacred Food for the Soul”: In Search of the Devotions to Saints of Robert Bruce, King of Scotland, 1306–1329,' Speculum 84, 2013.)

   So there is no suggestion that Bruce somehow showed a preference for 'native' saints of either Scotland or Ireland as an effort to differentiate his fragile regime and foster a sense of cultural difference from England. It does show, however, that the saints of these two nations were powerful components - allies - in his spiritual armoury which helped him defeat an overwhelming foe. The 15th century Scotichronicon details a supernatural event which carried the righteous cause of Bruce into the heartland of the enemy. On the eve of the Battle of Bannockburn, the sacrist of Glastonbury Abbey was surprised in the evening by the appearance of two knights on white steeds. He offered them hospitality, but they refused and informed him that they had case to fight that very day at sunrise in a battle between Scots and English at a place named Bannockburn, on the side of the Scots, to provide revenge for the death of Simon de Montfort, killed by the royal army of England at the Battle of Evesham fifty years before. They then 'glided from the sight of the listener and were seen there no longer' much tom the man's astonishment.

   At Bannockburn, Bruce commanded that the relic of Colum Cille, the Brecbennach, be paraded before his native horde, and this was doubtless a divine inspiration which reinforced the army's identity and demonstrated to the community of the realm of Scotland that the kingdom of heaven, as represented by local saints, was firmly on their side.  It is obvious that the deployment of saints was a political act which emphasised allegiance to a broad spectrum of beliefs and those who ascribed to them in the kingdom. Conventional piety had its limits and Bruce was able to function - for periods at least - on the dark side of the line, within the territory of damnation as defined by the Church. So when he was excommunicated for his claiming the Scottish crown, he continued regardless to press this claim. And, when he sacrilegiously killed his rival Comyn in a church in Dumfries, in February 1306, the repercussions were grave, but he was prepared to live with them.

   On a personal basis, the king's own health shows that he believed in the possible power of saints' intercessions as much as the next man or woman in his day and age. His leprosy was cured, or at least ameliorated by, a holy well in Ayr. He afterwards erected houses around the well for eight lepers and paid for sustenance for them. The place became known as 'King's Ease'. After he was on the throne he paid for the prayers of Dominicans to assist his ill health; they prayed for the well-being of his soul after he died. When he was suffering his final illness in 1329, Bruce made the arduous pilgrimage to seek the benediction of St Ninian at Whithorn on the coast of Galloway.

Two Particular Saints Particular - Malachy and Fillan

   The Bruce family in the west of Scotland had a long and interesting relationship with the Irish saint Máel Máedóc (Malachy).  According to the Chronicle of Lanercost, the second Lord of Annandale, Robert Bruce, was visited the saint in the 1140s, who interceded with him to spare the life of a condemned thief. But, when Bruce hanged the man, Malachy laid a curse on the Bruces and on the town of Annan (which was subsequently flooded). The effect of the malediction is mostly unrecorded, but we know that a later Bruce prayed at the saint's tombs later in the century and asked for the malison to be annulled. Robert Bruce the King paid for a candle and lamp for St Malachy before the saint's altar at Coupar Angus Abbey in 1326.

   Behind the legend there is of course some truth.  The Cumbrian monks who composed the Chronicle of Lanercost were notably dismissive and hostile to their northern neighbours and the tale of the Bruce family's negative interaction with a hero of the western church was written at a time when the latter day Bruces were vying for the vacant Scottish crown with the Balliols and others. So the promulgation of the legend was, in part, a carefully weighted put down of this Anglo-Scottish kindred and their regal aspirations. The saint's own contemporary vita details his departure from Ireland (some time between 1134 and 1143), bound for Rome. Arriving from Scotland he met King David I (1124-1154), who begged the saint to assist his seriously ill son. Malachy blessed the boy with holy water and assured him: 'Have confidence son; this time thou shalt not die.' The boy recovered the next day, of course, to the jubilation of the whole court. (Prince Henry survived until 1152.) The Bruce family's interaction with this cleric who had such impeccable royal connections was likely to have been more straight forward than Lanercost suggests and shows they were in tune with the prevalent channels of power in their age. Linkage with a superstar of the Irish church could only have been a good thing for their prestige.

The 'Fillan miracle' connected with Bannockburn only appears in a somewhat later source, the history written by the unreliable Hector Boece, which was published in 1527. According to this, the king prayed to the saint on the night before the battle and was rewarded by a vision of the silver reliquary of the saint which contained Fillan's arm bone, opening and closing by itself. When a priest examined the case he was surprised to find that the bone was indeed inside, which surprised him as he had removed the artefact and secreted it in Stirling castle before he brought the reliquary to safeguard against its loss on the battlefield.

Detail of the crozier of St Fillan

  

The king enlarged the chapel dedicated to Fillan in Strathearn in 1318, placing in the care of the canons of Inchaffray Abbey. Later, in 1329, his natural son Sir Robert Bruce of Liddesdale gave £20 to that church. Fillan was well established in Strathearn and was reputedly an 8th century Irish saint who settled in the area. His crozier was kept in the strath and was reputed for its magical ability to locate lost goods and cattle. A document from 1487 states that the current keeper of the crozier was Malice Dore, whose forebears had 'ane relik of Sanct Fulane callit the Quargich in keping,' even since the time of Robert Bruce. The important resonance of Fillan as a truly national saint lasted at least into the late 15th century at the highest levels. At the coronation of James IV in 1488 there was a procession led by a man holding St Fillan's Bell, renowned for its power in curing mental problems. A decade later the king confirmed his personal devotion to the saint when he confirmed the Dewars’ privileges as relic keepers. The king's allegiance to the saint is supposed to have arisen in situ. In 1306 Bruce fought the pro-English Macdougalls of Lorne in an encounter later termed Dalrigh, 'the king's field'. Bruce prayed to the great saint of the district, St Fillan, whose shrine was nearby at Kilry, and assured himself of victory. It was at this battle that Bruce is supposed to have lost the famous silver jewel which later became the property of the Campbells and then the Macdougalls, known as the Brooch of Lorne.

The Afterlife of King James IV - More Reviews

More reviews for The Afterlife of King James IV published by Chronos Books, April 2019. Mar 15, 2019: Rebecca Hill | NetGalley  The Afterlife of King James IV is one of the best books this spring! Chock-full of information, and amazing detail. I initially thought I was going to be reading more of a ghost story, but the history in this book had me captured by page two. From Flodden Field to England, France and beyond - the legacy of King James was a hard one to live down. The idea that he lived beyond Flodden was something that was passed around and whispered. If this was true, then why would he have not returned home? There were so many questions surrounding this, but the author delved into each one with confidence and was able to satisfactorily lay the "ghost" of James IV to rest.
Mar 25, 2019: Jennifer Young | NetGalley  I have to say at the outset that this was a fascinating book. You don’t have to know a lot about Scottish history to know that the handsome, accomplished and heroic King James IV was killed at the battle of Flodden Field. The absence of a clearly-identifiable body led to the growth of a plethora of stories about what had become of the king…and this book looks in detail at some of them. James was much-loved and so his subjects were perhaps reluctant to see him go which, along with the widespread beliefs of the time in the supernatural, goes some way to explaining the growth of these tales. I enjoyed it, although I found that it lost a little focus towards the end, wandering off into the highways and byways of Scottish (and other) folklore in its attempt to explain exactly how and why the stories took root when, it appears, there’s a perfectly reasonable case for the body having been taken to London. Nevertheless this is an engaging and impressively-researched book, as the vast quantities of reference indicate.
Mar 26, 2019: Jennifer Young | NetGalley  I have to say at the outset that this was a fascinating book. You don’t have to know a lot about Scottish history to know that the handsome, accomplished and heroic King James IV was killed at the battle of Flodden Field. The absence of a clearly-identifiable body led to the growth of a plethora of stories about what had become of the king…and this book looks in detail at some of them. James was much-loved and so his subjects were perhaps reluctant to see him go which, along with the widespread beliefs of the time in the supernatural, goes some way to explaining the growth of these tales. I enjoyed it, although I found that it lost a little focus towards the end, wandering off into the highways and byways of Scottish (and other) folklore in its attempt to explain exactly how and why the stories took root when, it appears, there’s a perfectly reasonable case for the body having been taken to London. Nevertheless this is an engaging and impressively-researched book, as the vast quantities of reference indicate.
Mar 26, 2019: Amy Campbell | NetGalley edit | delete The Afterlife of King James IV: Otherworld Legends of the Scottish King was a fascinating read for me. I give it five stars. Loved it!

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The Afterlife of King James IV - Reviews from Goodreads

The Afterlife of Kings James IV is being published by Chronos Books in April 2019...

Janet rated it really liked it

Shelves: 2019ng, book-club-picks, kindle

I received a DIGITAL Advance Reader Copy of this book from #NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

From the publisher, as I do not regurgitate the contents or story of books in reviews, I let them do it.


The Afterlife of King James IV explores the survival stories following the Scottish king's defeat at the battle of Flodden in 1513, and how his image and legacy were used in the years that followed when he remained a shadow player in the politics of a shattered kingdom. Keith John Coleman ha ...more

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Feb 17, 2019Alyson Stone rated it really liked it

Shelves: arc, nonfiction, history, renaissance

Book: The Afterlife of King James IV: Otherworld Legends of the Scottish King
Author: Keith John Coleman
Rating: 4 Out of 5 Stars

I would like to thank the publisher, Chronos Books, for sending me this ARC.

I will admit that at first, I wasn’t sure that I was going to like this one. Keith’s writing starting out was a bit slow. It read more like a scholarly piece than the easy writing that I have come to expect from Chronos Books. I kept on going and it did get better. I really do think that this is one of those books that you are gong to have to give time to. It is a very well written and researched book, but this may not be the one to start on if you are looking into Stuart Scotland.

This book kind of straddles between history and folklore. We do actually get the best of both worlds in this one. On the one hand, Keith is looking at the historical background and figure of King James IV, then he turns around and adds in some folklore about the king’s death. Again, this is why I don’t recommend you start out reading this book if you are new to Stuart Scotland. What Keith does he cleverly weavers in both of these elements with support to make us get the whole picture of what could have happened to James IV after his death. We also get some of the lead up to his death; again, this is why I don’t recommend this to newbies because if you don’t have an understanding of what was going on in this time period, then you are going to be lost.

What I really liked was the different layers of the story. It’s kind of a ghost story, but it’s not. I mean, this is nonfiction with just a little bit of a twist. I like how complex the book was, even though it’s really not that long. I really have never read a nonfiction book like this; I’ve read nonfiction books with layers before, but this one is different. I don’t know, but I just really like mixing the known with the unknown and having the information to support his theories.

Okay, that is the main thing here. I have read a number of articles and books that are supposed to be arguing something, but end up losing that point throughout the book. This one doesn’t. Keith uses information to form his point and explores all angles. Keith’s voice is there, but it’s not too much-like some other books that I have read. It’s just enough to see what Keith is trying to prove, but, yet, sticking to the story.

Overall, not a bad read. It did take me a little bit to get into it, but it was worth it. This book comes out on April 26, 2019. If you want to check it out for yourself, then hop onto Netgalley and make a request…At least, I think it’s on Netgalley…Don’t hold me to that…. (less)

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Feb 08, 2019Ionia rated it really liked it

What impressed me about this book, was that it didn't start out with simple ghost stories of how the Scottish King, James IV, was seen after his death. Instead, it delved into history head first and gave the reader a good look at Scotland at the time and a feel for who the king and his predecessors were. Once the author introduced the important players in the life and death of the king, only then did he embark on the supernatural aspects of the book.