After Dark: Myths, Misdeeds & the Paranormal - The Murder that Shook Mary Queen of Scots

Episode Date: April 16, 2026

On the night of Saturday the 9th of March, 1566, a pregnant Mary Queen of Scots was having a dinner party.It was a night that ended in the brutal murder of one of her closest friends, David Rizzio, led by her husband, Lord Darnley.How did this happen? How did Mary handle this traumatic moment? And did Mary have a Scottish or French accent?!Joining Anthony once more as special guest co-host is author and historian Gareth Russell, to take us back to this disturbing night.You can now watch After Dark on Youtube: www.youtube.com/@afterdarkhistoryhitEdited by Tim Arstall and Anna Brant. Produced by Stuart Beckwith.For tickets to see Anthony and Maddy talking about her new book, Hoax, click here: https://www.conwayhall.org.uk/whats-on/event/hoax/Sign up to History Hit for hundreds of hours of original documentaries, with a new release every week and ad-free podcasts. Sign up at https://www.historyhit.com/subscribe.  You can take part in our listener survey here.All music from Epidemic Sounds.After Dark: Myths, Misdeeds & the Paranormal is a History Hit podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hello everyone, it's me, Maddie. I am back. Well, not quite. I will be back on the pod very soon. But in the meantime, if you've missed your fix of Anthony and me together, you can now catch us live on stage at Conway Hall in London on the 7th of May. There we'll be discussing my brand new book, Hoax, Truth and Lies in the Age of Enlightenment out that very same day. We'll be discovering how fake news is nothing new, chatting about what it's like to spend time in the darker side of the Georgian world, and meeting the three extraordinary, bizarre and often frightening characters at the heart of the book. Cobbies of hoax will be available on the night, which I'll be signing after the show, and hopefully chatting to as many of you as possible. So get your tickets now. The link is in the show notes. You can go to the Conway Hall website or follow the link in my Instagram bio.

So I'm so excited about this book, and I just can't wait to share it with you all. Do come along. It is going to be the most fantastic evening. See you there. It's 8 o'clock on the night of March the 9th, 1566. In Mary Queen of Scott's private chambers of Holyrood Palace, Edinburgh, daggers are raised aloft and plunged into the flesh of a court favourite over and over and over again. dark pupils of blood soon ooze across the wooden floor the palace is all a frenzy then it was said that the men at the heart of this chaos

lift the body of the murdered man and drag him towards the staircase where they unceremoniously proceed to fling his still warm body down the steps but did that happen mary distraught can hear the commotion of course She can hear the final thud as her one-time favorite musician's body finally hits the ground. Who are we talking about? None other than her rumored lover, David Ritzio. And so, as Mary surrenders herself to her husband, Lord Darnley, and his men,

she will no doubt have wondered, how has it all come to this? Hello and welcome to After Dark. I'm Gareth. And I'm Anthony. I am a feeble substitute for Mali. Not feeble. It's celebrated. No, I think we have to give Mady her place. I am a current substitute for Mally, who is away.

And over the next two episodes, I will be talking with Anthony about various deranged and delightful episodes from history. This falls into the deranged category. Today we're going to be talking about the murder of David Ritzio in Scotland. When I saw this on the thing, I was like, I'm going to need to do some. back research on this because it's a while since I've had to do, and I think probably undergrad since I had to look at this. And it was one of those things where there's an ensemble line-up that makes me go, wait, where does he come in that? And it's him first, and we have a Darnley and a Bothwell and Oritio and who's, how are we all related? And so when I was researching for

this before we have our chat today, Gareth, actually what I remember thinking, and I remember this from the time as well, is going, how good, terrible, but good a story this is. It has all the elements that bring people to history. We're in chambers, there's blood on the floor, there's 60 potentially, stab wounds. There's so much going on not to give away the actual story. Let's do it. I'm going to give you a very, very, very quick context about what's going on in Scotland at this time. And then I'm going to hand back over to Gareth to explain what's happening specifically on the 9th of March 1566. Prior to, I'm going to. to that, we have Queen Mary of Scots. That's somebody that will be pivotal to this story, of course.

Her father is James the 5th of Scotland. Her mother is Marie de Guise. Mary Queen of Scots becomes Queen at only one week old. She grows up in France and she marries the French Dauphin, Francis II, and she returns to Scotland after his death. But she is there from 1819, right? She returns to Scotland sometime around then. So we have a queen that's in some ways not O'Fay with Scottish courtly life. She has been instructed in the French quarterly tradition and she carries that with her. Is it true to say that she speaks with the French accent? No. Ah, okay. So that's a great one. This is my like fun. Yeah, yeah, go, go, go. So speak on it, Garrett. Yeah, absolutely. And listen, it's one of our own compatriots who makes it off. He said no, no, shit, it's a Scottish accent. So

there is a long supposition that Mary would have spoken with a French accent because she was brought up in France. So she did speak French with a fluent French accent because that's where she learnt it. And her mother was French. But she had many Scottish attendance around her. Of course she would have had, yeah. And no one in France spoke Scots. So she continued to speak Scots with native Scots speakers the whole way through her childhood. And in 1569, an Irish lawyer met her in England, and he specifically commented on her accent

because he was so surprised that it was a southern or lowland Scottish accent. So when the 2018 movie with Sir Sharunan, as Mary Queen of Scots came out, a lot of people were saying, why is she speaking with a Scottish accent? And in fact, she was bang on the money. And you answered, because it is in the material there, please. It's a 1569 source from an Irish lawyer who worked for the English government, but he'd spent a lot of time. in the southern part of Scotland in the lowlands. And that was the accent he said

that she spoke to him with. I'm always really impressed by Mary Queen of Scots. There's something about her. Even, I will, I'll admit this, even over Elizabeth I'm a little bit like, I don't know, there's something scrappy about her that I really appreciate. She doesn't get to be queen in the same,

even in Scotland, in the same way that Elizabeth gets to be queen in England. Well, as we're about to see, she's very much having to constantly try and manage, and in the end, very unsuccessfully, what's going on around her even a court. And bear this in mind as we go through this, the culture of kingship and queenship in Scotland is different in England and how they are looking and we see this even after, you know, the revolution in 1641 and the glorious revolution 1688.

Scotland's settlement with the crown is always very different than it is in England. But let's go straight to Scotland. And let's go to Saturday the 9th of March 1566. It is approximately 8pm. Set the scene for his Garth. Where are we? What's happening? We are in the Palace of Hollywood House in Edinburgh,

which still is the largest of the royal residences in Scotland. It had existed there for centuries. But really, it was Mary's lit father, James V, who had turned it into a very... a swish, Scottish version of a chateau. It's one of Mary's favourite homes in Scotland, possibly because it does have a certain amount of French flair to it. But she is in her private apartments in her dining room and she's having a dinner party. Among the guests are her half-sister, the Countess of Argyle, their mutual father, James V, suffered from a terrible fear of sleeping alone

and had sired numerous illegitimate children of which Lady Argyle was one. So while Lady Argyll is the highest-ranking guest, the one that people are most interested, interested in is Mary's Italian secretary and confidant, a chap called David Ritzio. And Rizzo, by general agreement, was everyone comments that he was quite ugly, which seems mean, although not the meanest thing that will happen to him. That's when we'll get there. But he first came to Mary's notice, great example of sort of how in the court everything's personal and political. He first came to Mary's notice because he was a brilliant singer. And he was appointed to her staff through that. And it was only later that she discovered he was a very gifted linguist, and that he had

pretty good knowledge of French and Italian politics and diplomacy. So he becomes secretary to her majesty in the French tongue, is how he describes his own job. And some people are concerned that he says, you know, I had her majesty's ear. And some people are concerned that the tongue has been elsewhere. And there are all kinds of rumors percolating at court that Mary and her secretary are having an affair. And someone who seems to believe it is Mary's very good-looking and equally unlikable English husband, Lord Darnley. So unlikable. It's so, I tried. When I had to condense Mary and Darnley into a chapter and a half and I did a biography of their son. And I was like, you have to, you know, when you look at people in the past and they have a uniformly

negative reputation and you think, I'll find something. Yeah. No. It's giving Manusphere. Right. Like, It's giving kind of fintech bros that are trying to take money. So one thing I will say in his defense is... That was defense, by the way. For some reason, the word couldn't even come out. I actually choked slightly. Medically, that was quite difficult for me. One thing in his pseudo-defense is that he's the same age as Catherine Hard.

He's 1920. Sure, sure, sure. I was like, she's dead, Garris. What are you talking about? Okay, yes. Yes, yes, yes, yes. Yes. For a moment, I was like, what have I said?

So, yes. there is an element, but then again, the flip side of that is most people in their generation are doing important things at that age. So I'm, that's the best I could come up with. Yeah, yeah. No, I mean, I think it's, it's important to remember. But at the same time, yeah, it's just, it's, there's something really, bear with me when I say this, sad and by that, I mean, pathetic. Gross, yeah. Like, it's like, oh, God, must we? I mean, one of the things that really strikes me about this is, you know, we're in the palace, right? Like, as you've explained, and we're in Mary's private chambers.

But even within that, we're in a very small room. Have you been in the space? I presume we have, yeah. It's tiny. To the point that I think, it has to have been slightly bigger at the time to have that many people in. Because it's so small, you can get like four people in. It's really, if they were all in there, they're sitting way closer than we are.

They must have been knee to knee nearly. They would have to have been. It's very, very small. even if my hunch is wrong and that the room wasn't bigger at the time, I would imagine she and Rizio or someone are in that room and then the little door that leads out into her bedroom, they must have spilled some of the guests out into the, because it's, maybe Argyles back something.

Anyway, whatever dimensions there are, it's a tiny little space. Yeah. I think that's just to set up for people who may not have been there. So this spills, as Gareth has just said, spills into a bedroom that's much bigger. But realistically, you're talking about what? Even then it's not that much bigger. No. It's not a huge bedroom.

What is it? Four or five feet max? Max. Like that little turret room? Yeah, yeah. And this is where she's supposedly eating with Eritio and some of the others that Gareth has described. Suddenly, though, you're in the middle of a meal.

Yep. You're in this cocooned space, even if it is a little bit bigger. You're supposed to be relatively protected, relatively safe. This is your private, as much as they could be private in the palace quarters. And now there is a commotion. Well, yes. Well, firstly, the Duke of Manusphere arrives. So she's dining. On the very close to where you come into the dining room, behind a wall in her bedroom, there is a staircase that leads down to her husband, Lord Darnie's apartments. He emerges from the door. It's not that surprising because they know the staircase exists. But relations between husband and wife are strained largely because of Darnie's personality, which is really the fatal weakness. And Mary is pregnant with his child, but they have been quarreling quite a lot. So when Darnie walks into the dining room, she is a bit perplexed, but he gets wrong to her, sits next to her and allegedly affectionately, puts his arm around

her waist. Now, it will later turn out that he's decided to do that to hold her in position for what's coming next, because Darnley has not ascended the staircase on his own. He has led some of the most prominent nobles in Scotland up through his apartments, up the staircase and into his wife's private rooms. And it transpires that Darnley has been recruited by an aristocratic cabal that fiercely resent David Ritzio

and they have been making it quite clear at court for some time. They shove him out of the way when they come in to see Mary. They sort of kick him a bit when he walks past them in the corridors. they see him as a foreign interloper, a commoner who is contemptuous of the nobility. And to give these men a little bit of credit, another of Mary's advisor is a diplomat called Sir James Melville, who's one of the best sources for what's about to happen. Melville tries to warn him and says, look, you have to give the nobility in Scotland their place. This isn't like Italy. Or France,

where even if you rise in royal favour, you're sort of considered like on par with them. The clan system is different. When the chiefs come to see her, out and Ritsio doesn't listen to him fiddily. So they hadn't really been fans of Darnley either, again, referencing his personality being the main reason. But they didn't like Darnley, but they really hated Ritzio. They were becoming increasingly dissatisfied with how Mary was ruling. And they recruit Darnley as their useful idiot to the plot. And Darnley has an enormous yet fragile ego. He has been absolutely adored, spoiled beyond any possibility. of being a useful person by his parents.

And as a result, he can't handle not being the centre of attention. He can't handle not being the apple of his wife's eye. And he wants to be king. He has really agreed that Mary allows him to be referred to as King of Scott sometimes, but she doesn't give him any practical authority. I refer you again to that's because of his personality. And because of that, he is very easily recruited into this plot. Now, whether they are the ones who plan,

in his head, the idea that Queen Mary and Ritzio are lovers, we don't know. But certainly he seems to maybe believe it. Either way, he is the one who opens the door to Hollywood House, lets the key plotters in, leads them up the staircase, and wraps his arm around his wife in preparation for this attack. And the principal figure after Darnley is Lord Riven, spelled RU-T-H-V-E-N, it's one of the anti-phanetic bear traps. But Riven is a former rebel. He's a Protestant. He's middle-aged.

And he turns up wearing armor as to a lot of his allies. And it's when Riven comes into the room or the plotters move in. And it's dozens. It's a hefty enough bunch. Mary starts to panic and so does Ritsia. As you would. Absolutely. This is, I mean, even if you're just thinking audibly, the clang of that armor coming up those stairs,

the male voices that are suddenly filling. As you say, yeah, okay, it spills out into a bigger bedroom, but it's not, the bedroom's not that big. You know, we are going to be hearing these voices. And actually, I love that because I'd always seen the arm around Mary when Darnie puts his arm around Mary as, and I think, you know, there's a certain element of this, that it's a signal to the others now here, we're off. But also this really insidious thing of going, I will hold her in place. I hadn't really made that connection. And she's also in the second, she's in the, she's about to enter the third trimester. of her pregnancy. She's visibly pregnant.

Yes. And the issue of her unborn child, that will become a major point in what happens next. So you have to imagine here is a visibly pregnant woman, and her husband's arm goes round her to hold her in place. So it is terrifying to go a little bit back to the architecture briefly. If you've been to that room or have you seen photographs and for those who haven't, the dining room is at the back of the complex of a apartments. They come up through a door. Her bedroom then leads out to outer chambers and public rooms. She is, there's one door leading out to her bedchamber and then into the dining room. Once they file up, they have blocked any form of exit for the people in that room. So it has to have been terrifying. And Mary turns to Darnley and says, what do you know about this? So it is instinctive. She she knows her husband has done something

and Riven asks for or orders Ritzio, yonder man Davy is how he refers to him. He's to come with them. And Mary and David Ritzio again very quickly know that you don't turn up wearing armor with pistols and swords

if you just want to talk. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. We've just come to share some supper. Listen, no. You are reading so much into this. Okay, yes, you can smell gumpowder. and we've recently resharpened our swords. Grow up. You sound paranoid. So Ritzio then, Mary stands up.

And this is where we're not quite sure of the order of events because it happens in seconds. The plotters move forward. And the table overturns. And the Countess of Argyle, Mary's half-sister, all historians should be grateful to Lydia Argyle and her quick reflexes because she reaches out to grab the cantalabra.

and she catches one of them. So that's how they're still light in the room. And funny, when I was telling this story to a Scottish friend of mine, he said, that's the most Scottish mammy thing. What you put them on to me doing in the dark. Oh my gosh, my God. Jesus. A good silver.

She just had it polished. I don't know about him, but I'll take this. You know what? This is, I brought this. And shirts, you don't want to knock on it. And so anyway, Lady Orgyle catches the candelabra, quick thinking. And Ritzio, as the table is overturned, we're told that all the plates go, the meats over fall onto the floor. And Ritzio jumps and goes behind Mary.

It's such an image, isn't it? It is. It's heartbreaking. It's also so fear-filled. It's so instinctive. It's so instinctive. And also, just this idea of, you know, you might say, oh, this man jumping behind a woman, how pathetic or whatever. But actually, he's jumping behind a queen.

That's it. That's exactly it. So I have a little bit of, again with my just having looked at some of the sources in the room, I have a little bit of doubt, unless Darnley moved. I wonder, did he actually go behind her? Or did he grab, now, the phrase that's used by some of the other testimonies is he grabbed under her skirt. So actually, he might have leapt forward and grabbed the front of the dress. Either way, it's a difference of centimeters.

But he does grab onto her. And she is trying her level best to protect her friend and advisor. And he's screaming for her to help. And she doesn't want to let him go because she knows what's about to happen. Her mother, who you mentioned at the start, Anthony Marri De Guise, had had an advisor, Cardinal Beacon who was assassinated. They know that this is an institutional and occupational risk. And then it gets to, then something happens that Mary will return to time and time again for perfectly justified reasons. So Rivens' nephew, a man called Andrew Cara Fodenside, comes forward, cocks his pistol and points it at her pregnant womb.

And at that point, she has to make a very, very difficult decision or emotional decision, I suppose you could say. I suppose obviously she knew she had to protect her unborn child. But she steps back and the pistol is held. And Mary will return for months, quite rightly, to what would be? have happened if his finger had slipped. I mean, there's two things happening here, right? There's the human element of a mother and a child and that protection. And then there is the sacred political, monarchical element of going, this is the line to which

you should adhere. And you are threatening it in such a direct way. And actually, Gareth, I think this is a good point at which to remind listeners that, you know, we're talking about this and we're, spoiler, heading to a murder. but what we're witnessing here is a coup. Correct. That's a great way to put it. It is a coup. Darny thinks it's his. He's the king and the coup and actually he's the pawn. But it is a coup. And it's been brewing for a while. Listen, you talked about the difference in monarchy between England and Scotland. One of the big differences is that England faces rebellions and Scotland faces coups.

That's very reductive, but it's not reductive by too much. And Mary, to give her credit, she's had four. five years of dodging them and dodging them very successfully. She is fatally weakened by her marriage to Downley because of who she had married. He has knocked a hole in the side of that ship of state for her. But also, aside from anything else, it feels faintly, you know, mafia-esque, or it feels like a hit job, which is both coup and a hit job. It really is. And she talks, she writes later about, at that point, once the pistolist pointed at her womb, she has to stop protecting Rizio. And she says they most cruelly took him forth.

So they drag him out. There's pretty good evidence that the stabbing starts in the bedroom. Yes. If it doesn't start there, it starts almost the second they cross into the next room over, which is the outer chamber, one of her sort of audience rooms. And that's where he dies. And she and the Countess of Argyle and the other guests,

they can hear Ritzio screaming for help and the stabs. It's somewhere between, you know, it's between four and five dozen stab wounds are found in the corpse and then eventually the stabbing and the shrieks and the gurgling on the blood stops. It is as horrific as it can be. I mean, really, you think of the auditory element of that. The role that sound plays in terror is so, so central

and I think often overlooked, and they come back. And he's dead. And Riven, they're sort of, as there often is in traumatising moments, there's a moment of dark comedy. So Riven,

who has led the plot, has had Mary's advisor dragged from her, has had a pistol pointed in her womb, then suddenly remembers etiquette and he's overheated in his armour. So he turns to Mary

and asks, does he have Her Majesty's permission to drink in her presence? And Mary's like, What the fuck you're doing? Really? Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Like, it's sort of past the point for a round for the table at this stage, Riven. So Riven Downs the Goblet of Wine is psychotic, actually, in a way. It's really dark. It's sort of, it's with the lifeboats be seated according to class kind of stuff. It's really, it's just, it's

this odd moment where he kind of snaps back and then, but after she's done that, he launches into a lecture on why this is her fault. And he was a foreigner and we told you and you should have had a Scottish advisor and he wasn't an aristocrat and we told you that.

And you really have preferred his company over your husbands. These are the three reasons. This is on you. And Mary manages to find her voice and says, if anything happens to me or my child, you shall have the blame thereof. So Ritzio's body is found in the outer chamber and there's a sort of one of the stories that does the rounds that you can still see the blood on the floor. Yes. And there is a stay in there. There is, but it's not his blood. Sorry to Hollywood Palace. No, actually, well, listen, I always tell people if you're going on your own or with a couple of people and you don't have an in-person tour guide. Get, you know,

the, I love, I love an audio guide. So do I. Everywhere. Have you listened to Hollywood House's one? Probably. Right. So my favorite flex of theirs, or of any house, is either way some, you'll have the usual bit on the little sort of recorder thing device. We're not

technicians. Or nor mathematicians. And so he, you go in and you press the button and they play the sound. But usually there can be, in some rooms, there's like an extra a special guest to come on to speak, you can press for an extra one. And you know, the, you know, other houses, they'll be like, here's a, you know, well-known historian. Hollywood house got Princess Anne and Prince Edward to do. Oh my God. I was like, wow, you didn't even

try. I mean, I suppose it's a royal house still, right? But still, like, to get, and then also, if you listen to it, neither of them make, you know, that there's that kind of lingering suspicion that with the Royal Scotland's the favourite child, 100% correct. It just is. They find so many ways to say that Edinburgh is better. They're like, Edinburgh, gorgeous, wonderful, perfect Edinburgh. They basically use it as an excuse to be like, we hate Buckingham Palace. Please don't make it go back there. Please, we just want to, we have by St. Hollywood all the time.

But I mean, in terms of that blood stain, it's so non-blood-like. But I mean, now it just adds. So there's this idea, just to let you know, if you have ever seen the bloodstain, there's this idea that I think it was later 19th century. It's always the 19th century. It's always the 19th century. Oh, my God. That should be a book.

It's always the 19th century. I'm not going to write it. I don't have time. But somebody should do it. But it's clearly like a dyed thing. Like if that was real blood, it wouldn't look like that on the... And also,

I thought Mary at some point would have been like, can one of you clean it up? What are you doing it? I know. Listen, guys... Sworn twice in this episode. Too much.

I'm very heated. I shouldn't, I shouldn't because all I wait is for one person just swear and then I know I can. Yeah, because we're Irish. Yeah, yeah. It's bad. It's really...

And also, people here, don't swear as much as Irish people do. And we do it in such a more casual way. Yeah. Well, listen, I was, my mommy's Presbyterian, so she does not swear at all. No. So I have the chip in me to know when to stop. I used as a teenager, I was like, oh, I have to be so careful. Now I'm so grateful because it does click the switch to be like, okay, you don't, you don't do it. When I go on, other people still like, if I'm like, if, like here, it's like, well, this is my podcast. I can say, yeah. Other people's podcasts. I'm like, don't swear, Anthony, don't do it. Anyway, sorry, let's get back to darling. So we, what we have is a body. Yeah. In an outer chamber. It's really. It's really. It is, there's blood on the floor. There is blood on the floor in that moment. He's been turning to a human pincush.

Yes. Yeah, it's bad. Then is this a myth, Gareth? I have read, the body is then further defiled. How much does that stop? Well, we don't know, to be honest. The evidence that they were just there to kill him, it is pretty strong. There's an interesting thing that one of them does, though.

Actually, it's Darnie's uncle, which is quite savage. But we don't think Darnie actually did the stabbing. But one of his uncles takes... the Darnie's dagger from his scabbard and plants it in the corpse. And it's the one knife left so that Darnie won't be able to wheeze a lot of complicity. And that is showing to be quite a prescient move. I'm not convinced they do defile the body beyond what they've done to it because they all disappear quite quickly. It's really at one point only Riven left. And Liddy our gal still clutching her, Candelabra. Don't worry. Don't worry. Lizing herself. She's like, I look good.

You know what? I know this isn't the point, but I look amazing. Poor Ritzio, I mean, obviously. Listen, all right, he would want us to move on. Thoughts and prayers, but also really well-led. I look so, I look useful. Mary, have you seen this? You're not the only one with a glow. Anyway, there was this idea, and I agree with you, I really, I think there was this idea

that the body was stripped naked and then thrown down another set of stairs. that conveniently no longer exists. Sure. Because it doesn't make sense architecturally. Yeah. And then, sure, that's possible, but I've seen it just kind of anecdotally. And it just adds to the distress that the body endured. Yeah, I think it's one of those things where you don't need to make it worse, but people always want to.

Yes, exactly. So I suppose the, listen, every hit job, I suppose is different. I speak as a former hitman. But, uh... Now, in the context of you, be very careful about what you might be admitting to. You think he excels just at history. That's a film. That's a film.

Yeah, yeah. Some child. That's dark. Anyway, so right. But I think, obviously every hit job or every coup is a bit different. But I would say within the context of Scottish aristocratic history and the coups against previous shirts, they don't tend to do stuff to the Bali. They kind of, like, they'll kill you and they'll move on. They're all about tomorrow, really.

They don't want to live in yesterdays. Tomorrow. We're singing. I'll stop you tomorrow. Yeah. Can I intervene here a little bit? Because I think where this comes from, this rumor, and I agree with you. I think it is a room.

There is also this rumor that, as you've said, Mary and Rizio were potentially having some kind of a love affair, whatever. But there's also a rumor that he was having some kind of an affair with Darnley as well. Right. Now, I think that, you know, the people talk about sharing beds and all this. In the context of the 16th century, that's not proof of very much at all. But I think this idea of the stripping naked of the body and throwing down the stairs feeds into that rumor because of implications of sodomy. I'd just be interested to know where the sources are on that, Garret, I suppose like, we don't really even have proof that he had an affair with Mary.

No. And I can't imagine there's much for Darnie. There's not with Darnie. Darnie, I mean, I in the past have described Darnie as bisexual. This was years ago when I was talking about him. And it's fairly accepted. and actually the evidence is not, at least with Ritzio, it's not there. I think Robert Steddle in his biography does think that Darnley was.

But I actually think that, you know, when you're talking about same-sex love affairs in history, there are some that Richard Lianhart's another one, where it's often based on the bed sharing. And it leads to this really pernicious and completely untrue idea that every time a same-sex love affair is identified, it's resting on such flimsy evidence, which in many cases is not the case. This Darnley and Ritio is a rare, example in which while Darnie was traveling, he and Ritzio shared a bed. Now look, who knows what

happened that night? It is what it is. But that is all the evidence that there is for him and Rizio. And if that's it, I can't buy it. Not at all. We can't. I think sometimes that that is evidence. Now, here's the caveat, right? Yeah. And we've, you know, we've both written LGBTQ plus histories. it doesn't mean there isn't same-sex attraction, but it's definitely not proof. Men's sharing beds is definitely not proof. That's such a good way to put it. Look, I mean, if you're talking about

what people could admit to, what two men who fall around together, sleep together once or however many times can admit to in the 16th and 17th century, by very basic statistics, there are millions of stories that we will know nothing about. I think they probably had to be fairly emotional.

rather than sexual before they would leave at paper trail in the way, say that the people you've rid of about in Queer Georgians or I've written about in Queen James, there is hefty evidence. You don't get, like, Lord Harvey and Stephen Fox or James and the Duke of Buckingham. You have more evidence for that. But when it's just them sharing a bed, you cannot take that as evidence at all. everyone's doing it. Everyone is. Especially on the road or in a military circumstance. Well, how expensive are beds? Yeah. Yeah, exactly. So I think you just have to step away from that as evidence altogether.

And I think that, I mean, some people have said if you look at Darnley, the jealousy, the theory that he actually had a bit of a thing for Rizio is that he can then express that through. The only way he can express that is to say that he's jealous of Ritzio with Mary, not Mary with Ritzio. that to me is great for a novel. Yeah, great for novel. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And somebody make that, but in fact, have they? Was there, there was the implication in Mary Queen of School? In both, actually, in both, the 19701, one with Vanessa Redgrave, where Darnley's played

by Timothy Dalton, of James Bond fame, and I think Ritzel's Ian Holm, actually. And then in the more recent Sirshire Runner one, both of those, they have implied. I actually think in quite a few of them, they have implied it, because it's a great story. Yeah, yeah. work away with it. And it's not something you can definitively disprove. But from a historian's perspective, I just, psychologically it makes sense, but from a, from a source-based perspective, there's, there's nothing there to support it. Doesn't mean he wasn't, but we just can't support it. Sure. And so, but I do think Darnley, I actually also don't think it's

necessary to explain why Darnley sort of takes the head staggers a bit with it and gets so. Well, especially in the context of what you have explained really well here, which is going, yes, Darnley was pushed to the front of this coup, but actually, it's not him that's orchestrating this. And so therefore, the reasons for this happening are entirely different. Okay, so we have Rizio's body, we have this brutal murder, we have potentially up to 80 men

having infiltrated these private quarters in the Palace of Holy Root. Mary is held in place, then what? This is where, when I was researching for the biography of her son, I actually, like you, ended up having a lot more respect for Mary because what she pulls off next, given what she's just gone through,

is an absolute blinder. It's so impressive. So she spots her advisor the next morning walking across the courtyard at Hollywood House and it's Sir James Melville who I mentioned earlier. She flings the window open and says come here, you'll not believe what happened to me last night. Go and tell the provost of Edinburgh

that I am in distress and I need help and to bring the men at arms from the city to relieve me. Melville goes to the gate. The plotters have put their own guards there but Melville, like the guardsman, is a Protestant and he says it's Sunday morning, I want to go to a church service at St. Giles Kirk, one of the big churches in Edinburgh. And so they let him go. And he goes to the province of Edinburgh. And this is where Darnley's

complicity becomes firmer and more proactive. The provost says, no, no, we were told last night on Lord Darnley's orders that no matter what we heard from the palace, we weren't to come. So Darnley has shut out any way for Mary to get help. So Melville has to go back and tell her, listen, this is on you. No help. is coming to you, you're going to have to do this yourself. And she does. So she, darnly comes to see her because one of the agreements with the plotters is that Mary will be in his custody. And she has, Riven comes to see her as well. And she has to deliver some sort of blindingly good performance. She convinces the plotters that she is too traumatized and weakened to pursue

any form of vengeance. And then when they leave, she somehow manages to convince Darnie that she's overawed by how much he loves her and that the only reason she's unhappy is that she's worried about him. It's in a bizarre. The lengths that these women, even when they are queens, have to go to, like, they can't just sit there and go, actually, I'm involved in Stegcraft right now. I need to make some political decisions that are going to inform or change or influence society and culture across Scotland right now. No. Now I have to deal with this stupid child man. Yeah. And try and before I can even get to the throne, which, you know, is essentially not going to happen really from here on.

I have to babysit him for the next few hours. She has to manipulate him through flattering his ego. And it's, it has, I mean, this is where I just have endless time for her, because I cannot imagine how convincing she must have been. And she says, now, the one thing I will tell you about these men is and the reason I'm worried for you, because we love each other. Yeah, yeah. He wouldn't love you. Your mother was right.

You're a prince amongst men. They will kill you next. And darnly, she said, look at what they did. I mean, I'm sure you didn't want it to get as violent as I did last night. He's like, no, of course I didn't. And she says, they will come for you next because you're in the way. If I'm a widow, it's much easier for them to control me. And darnly believes her.

So she has persuaded the plotters to trust her that she's sort of broken and that Darnley can be trusted to be her jailer. Darnley then leads her out under cover of darkness because they're going to go escape and join Mary's supporters because she's convinced him he's next. And this is the moment where talk about babysitting the man child, where I have to imagine every bit of Mary was fighting the urge not to kick him in the face. They walk out. So Hollywood had been an abbey and it still has an attached church. and it had an attached working graveyard. And they end up having to walk past undercover of darkness,

David Ritzio's recently dug grave. Now, bearing in mind that Darnley is essentially the one who, like, tossed in the first shovelful, he bursts into tears as they walk past it and launches into this monologue of how sorry he is that Davy's dead. And you're like, I am going. Yeah. You have two choices, sweetheart.

Walk with me or you go in with him. Like at this, but Mary, yes, of course, lovely. Have you considered blogging about it? And some of her ladies in Willing have helped a raids. Always. If you need something done, ask a lady in Wheeling. Yeah. Always.

To this day, probably. Always. I mean, at this, listen, the Countess of Raghala managed to safeguard the silver amid assassination. The ladies in Witting have the horses and they escape to Dunbar Castle. And that is where Mary rallies her supporters. Not before Darnley has one more incident on the road. So because Mary is again pregnant and has had a bit of a weekend. She has. God love her, yeah.

Yeah, she's like, do you know what, this isn't this. Yeah, it's a lot, guys. It's not a great start to spring, but anyway, she's riding quite slowly. And Darnley is getting anxious that the longer they're on the road, the more time there is for people to realize they've left Hollywood. Darnley turns round and says, in God's name, come on. Points out that, you know, the men that they have left behind are capable of killing them. to move faster.

And Mary sort of like, again, the pregnancy of it all. And he says, well, if this one dies, God will give us more. Yeah, I don't have time from it. And Mary was like, you know, and Mary then says, Mary cracks at this stage. She was like, do you know what, if you're so worried, you go on.

Darnley takes that to be an actual possible instruction and rides on. Yeah, no, of course it does. She's like, okay, Granzo, so this is. Elizabeth's going to love this. I'm exhausted by that little shit. Yeah, yeah. As I'm sure she was.

I have to imagine at this point, she was like, do you know what? You ride on while you can, sweetheart. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because I've booked you a lovely Airbnb weekend. There ain't much more time for you. Party for one. Well, that's a whole other episode. We could do that at another time.

But, you know. So he rides on, she catches up with them at Dunbar. In one of those moments where all of a sudden some things with socialites are eternal. She arrives, sweeps off her horse and says she'd love some eggs for breakfast. And then. and then gets to the business of corraling the loyalists and various nobles have ridden to help her, including the Earl of Bothwell.

And by the middle of March, 18th of March, she has retaken the capital with 8,000 loyalist soldiers. And Darnley realizes that he was just the key to the lock at Hollywood House and has come to the conclusion that Mary and Bothwell are now sleeping together. Whether he's any more right than he was about Ritzio, that's for another time.

but she returns. But before she leaves Dunbar, she does, she pulls another blinder. And she says, listen, I understand that there was some dissatisfaction. I think you were completely wrong. But I don't want too many heads to roll. So if you supported the recent coup in Edinburgh,

but you did not wield the knife or point the pistol, all is forgiven as long as you come to me and say sorry. And what she does by doing that is that she snaps the conspiracy in half. they would have been a united front had she insisted on revenge for all of them and there is one of the great quotes of Scottish history which is that she allegedly said no more tears, it is now time for revenge

and it does come from a primary source and I just hope it's true. I will say that once it was asked in a pub quiz who said it and I said Betty Davis and I was completely convinced I was correct. I was like it's Betty Davis

and a real stretch joke. All of your cross-references just coming together. It was too much. I imploded in and myself. Oh my God. But whether she said it or not, and it is actually reported by someone who knew her very well, so I'm inclined to believe it. That's the policy she embarks upon, but it's not a blinkered policy.

She knows if she goes after all of the conspirators, they are going to bunker down and form a united bloc of opposition against her. If she offers clemency to those who will abandon the plot and separate the plotters from the murderers, then she opened. up the road back to Edinburgh for herself. And the plot collapses very quickly. They've lost Darnley, their hemorrhaging allies, and most of them flee to England, including armor-wearing ribbon who dies there. So Mary is able to get back to Edinburgh in time for her son, the future James 6th, to be born. Interestingly, and probably unsurprisingly, she doesn't go back to Hollywood,

which is where everyone expected the birth to happen. She goes to Edinburgh Castle, and it's gorgeous, but it's less comfortable. than Hollywood, but at this point less troubling for her. And she, you know, she's an observant Catholic, but you do see some signs in her that she is holding it together by a thread. So she sends for one of the relics in Edinburgh, the Catholic relics that have survived the Reformation. And it's the skull of her ancestor, St. Margaret of Wessex, and the wife of King Malcolm III of Scots. And she has the skull, the silver gilt skull of St. Margaret, in the room with her while she's giving birth. And she does. The the labour is difficult, but the child is born.

And it's right after James's birth that Mary buries the final bits of the coup. So she is very aware that for Darnie to have insinuated to anyone that she's had an affair will cast legitimacy on the child. So she holds baby James when Darnie comes to see her. And she swears on damnation of her soul that this is your man's son and no other man's son. Darnley blushes because he's embarrassed, leans over and kisses him, which is a sign of acknowledging him as his own. And by that point, Darnie has fulfilled his purpose.

She has a son. The legitimacy is acknowledged. And now it is time for her to get her own back. So, and interestingly, this is a moment where Elizabeth has Mary's back. So they go to Sterling for James's baptism. And Elizabeth tells the Earl of Bedford, who's the English ambassador, do you know what, actually, after the whole thing with Ritzie, don't send any congratulations to Darnley.

Let them stew on it. And Darnie's so upset by this that he throws a temper tantrum and won't go to the christening service. Oh, for God, I'm like, Darnie, you are on Ozzympic thin ice at this stage. You are, you should not be doing this.

But it's really, she's already starting to consider ways to get out of the marriage before the baptism at Sterling. She holds it together, and then I think, once she has retaken Edinburgh, she's dealt with the rioters, she's dealt with the risk to her pregnancy. then she can take full stock of what happens.

And darnly, to give an idea of just how stupid he is, sometimes she'll say something like, you know, imagine what would have happened, had the pistol got, why didn't you take the pistol away from your unborn child? Sweet madam, is this the promise you made to forget all and forgive all? She's like, oh, that was a lie? Yeah, and it doesn't apply to you. Ever. Just to be very clear, it will never apply to you.

So she retakes the heart of government. She gives birth to her son. But the psychological and physical impact of Ritsio's death lingers. And like many things when you're on adrenaline, you have a task to do, it doesn't catch up with you until later. And she suffers not long after James's birth, the first of what will be a series of quite close together physical and nervous breakdowns. There are stories of her vomiting blood and bile. And she is in a great amount of mental distress because of what she has gone through, understandably. And I would say, though it wasn't the way the plotters intended it to be,

the murder of David Ritsio is the first domino that will lead to her falling because she never, do you know what I would say? The tragedy of writing about her and looking at that window was the rest of your life was damned by two years. You were so frightened and struggling against huge odds that you made some very questionable decisions. because some terrible things have been done. And you, for the last 20 years, if your life paid the price for that. But Rizio, I think, is the point where the collapse of her queenship really begins.

Absolutely. I think it is that key moment. And often it's seen as this kind of monstrous, like, dramatic thing. But when you look at it in terms of those political dominoes, that we all, you know, we often talk about it. It's very easy for us to be like, yes, it's, this happens and this happens and this happens. But with that high insight, you can really see that it is an effect that's going to not. on. This is going to be my parting point, and it's going to upset a lot of people, and I'll just

let them be upset, and they can sound off in the comments. I don't think, we don't need to answer this, Gareth. I'll just leave them to have the conversation amongst themselves. I don't think if Elizabeth had been Queen of Scotland that she could have survived for as long as Mary did. Discuss. Oh. Now, thank you very much for walking us through the murder of David Ritzio, Gareth. That is, it is one of those things where there's so many players involved and so many things that happen and we get darnly and then we finally get to Bothwell and then it's like who's the worst of all the husbands and all the men. At the center of it all is this woman who we all, again, I keep saying it, but I think it's really important to remember we so easily overlook her ability had she not been so pushed down certain routes towards madness essentially, but her ability at Stakecraft. She did understand what was required. of her. There came a point where she could no longer exercise that and, you know, but she kept trying. She kept trying. It didn't always make great choices thereafter. But she did have an instinct for politics. And what you've just described there after the Ritzio Murder shows that in really desperate but real terms. There's more we can discuss about Mary. And we have other episodes about Mary Queen of Scots, of course, in the back catalogs. Go and listen to those. If you've enjoyed this episode, you can leave us a five-star review wherever you get your podcast. I am at Anthony Delaney History. Garith, they can find you where? and underscore Gareth Russell. So do join us for conversations about Mary Queen of Scots

and other historical dark points in the coming episodes. Garth will be back to talk about Titanic and... France Ferdinand. France Ferdinand in the next couple of weeks. Until then, happy listening.