Dan Snow's History Hit - Robert the Bruce, King of Scots

Episode Date: October 6, 2024

Robert the Bruce is best remembered as a rebel king, and for good reason. He was an unrelenting thorn in the side of any English monarch with ambitions to subdue Scotland. His heroics at the decisive Battle of Bannockburn helped to finally free his country from English occupation. But under the surface, this legendary rebel was also an opportunist, quite willing to switch allegiances and kill rival Scots to achieve his own goals.For the latest instalment of Dan's Kings & Queens series, we're joined by Michael Penman, author of 'Robert the Bruce: King of the Scots'. He takes us through the life of this intriguing and complex character, from his early life to the legendary Battle of Bannockburn, and explains why Robert's rule marked a turning point in Scottish history.Produced by James Hickmann and edited by Dougal Patmore.Enjoy unlimited access to award-winning original documentaries that are released weekly and AD-FREE podcasts. Sign up HERE for 50% off for 3 months using code ‘DANSNOW’.We'd love to hear from you - what do you want to hear an episode on? You can email the podcast at [e-mail] can take part in our listener survey here.

Welcome to Dan Snow's History Hit. If you're lucky enough to be exploring the west coast of the Isle of Arran on the west coast of Scotland, you will come across a cave known locally as Bruce's Cave. And it's said that it was in there that one of the great heroes of Scottish and British history, Robert the Bruce, hid out. He was dejected, broken, after a catastrophic first year, claiming to be King of Scots. It was in the winter of 1306. And it was there, the story goes, that he watched a spider on the wall of the cave try again and again to spin a web. And every time that spider fell, it rose and began again.

And Robert took inspiration. No matter how hopeless, no matter how hard life seemed to be, he could be a bit more spider. He could continue trying to weave that web. Now we have absolutely no evidence whatsoever that Robert the Bruce was ever in that cave. All we know is that in his first year, he did indeed end up on the run. He probably did have to hide in some caves at some point, and he hid up through western and northwest Scotland.

But it's very unlikely that that story is true. It's written down hundreds of years later. However, it's a story that was taught to me as a young child at primary school, and I've always loved the history of the man at centre, Robert the Bruce. What is true, whether he looked at spiders or not, he came roaring back. He took on the English as they sought to conquer Scotland and eventually he won one of the greatest victories ever achieved in Britain at the Battle of Bannockburn in 1314. He led from the front in that battle and one of the most famous stories from that terrible day was when King Robert was out in front of his men, I think he was

doing some reconnaissance. He placed his soldiers very carefully in that battle. He knew the type of weapons, the kind of way the English would fight and he deployed his men to meet them in the most perfect way imaginable and use the landscape in particular. But anyway, during that reconnaissance, he was riding a small horse. He didn't really have much armour on and he only had his axe slung on his shoulder. And the Earl of Hereford's nephew, Henry de Bohun,

spotted an aristocratic pup from England, hungry for fortune and fame. He spotted the king and he galloped towards him. He was wearing full combat gear, the whole works. Plate armour, lance, everything. And Bruce sort of accepted that challenge in a way. He told any men who wanted to come help him to fall back, and they fought the most, I think it's probably the most celebrated instance

of single combat in British history, if not European. Bohun charged at Bruce and missed with his lance, and then as they passed side by side, almost touching knees, Bruce stood up in his stirrups and brought his axe down on Bohun's head. And it was such a blow that it passed through the helmet and the skull and split the head in two. It was an encouraging start for the Scots, and indeed, the battle would go much as this opening encounter portended. and indeed the battle would go much as this opening encounter portended.

It was a day of catastrophe for England, for the Plantagenet family, for Edward II. This podcast is all about Robert the Bruce. And it's on the 750th anniversary of his death. He was born in 1274. It's part of my special Kings and Queens series. I've looked at Boudicca recently, I've looked at Robert the Bruce, and we're going to be looking at some more of these monarchs. There's plenty to choose from on this fun little island of ours. I've got a very brilliant guest to talk me through it, Michael Penman.

He's a senior lecturer in history at the University of Stirling, and he's the author of Robert the Bruce, King of the Scots. Seems like the right guy to ask. Enjoy. T-minus 10. The atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima. God save the king. No black-white unity till there is first and black unity. Never to go to war with one another again.

And liftoff. And the shuttle has cleared the tower. Michael, thank you very much for coming on the podcast. Thank you very much. Thanks for having me. Great to be here. Right, let's just defuse the hand grenade that someone occasionally throws into the bunker. Was Robert the Bruce born in England? Oh, you're starting with a hard one. I think he possibly was.

I'm prepared to stick my neck out on that one, but also to say it doesn't matter. It's something that concerns, I think, and is important to modern audiences, particularly Scots, because of his political resonance even today. But the fact that he was born on his family's possessions, perhaps in Essex, Ryttle, the lordship, is only a reflection of the fact that he's an aristocrat, his family has holdings in England, Scotland, Ireland. That's his worldview, and he would then be brought up in all parts of those holdings. He would not think of himself as English or Scottish or Irish per se, but rather as an aristocratic lord who crosses all these borders. It's when the tough question is posed, come about 1304, 1306,

about which side he's going to back, that the issue of a stronger identity comes into play. So I would be prepared to say on the balance of the evidence, mainly because his father, who's got a great amount of control over him, is more interested in the lands in Essex than those in Scotland. On balance, that's probably where he was born. So Michael, let's just peel back a little bit of that remarkable world that you're describing. Before the very early 14th century when he's forced to choose, why aren't you forced to choose as a British or even a British-Norish aristocrat living in the Isles in the late 13th century? What kind of world are we thinking about there? Because there was a place called Scotland, wasn't there? There was a kingdom of England. Yes, and there's a king of Scots,

there's a king of England. I think it's important to recognise that if you're simply talking about the kingdom of the Scots or Scotland, it was only in the early part of the 13th century that the kings of Scots felt ready and able to start addressing their subjects in their charters, their important legal and written documents, as subjects of the kings of Scots, rather than as Flemings, Frenchmans, Scots, Gaels, all the different kind of tribal and ethnic mix. So even that's just coming to a head in the early part of the 13th century. And for many of the aristocratic families, even for many of the ecclesiastical families, this idea of being cross-border, as we would now call it, is the dominant force and influence in their life cycle, I would say. So Bruce, as I said, has got lands, his family's titles come from Scotland, Annandale

and Carrick, but they have lands in Yorkshire, lands in London, lands in Huntingdon, lands in Ulster. They would perhaps still have connections back to their original family lands in Huntingdon, lands in Ulster. They would perhaps still have connections back to the original family lands in France, coming in with the Norman wave in the 11th century. And safeguarding all of these, potentially expanding these through marriages in all realms, would have been perfectly acceptable for them. It's quite remarkable as well that even the kings of Scots, right up until the mid-13th century held lands of the kings of england in england and did homage just for them not for their own kingdom of scotland in their view it didn't make them vassals of the kings of england for scotland but for smaller holdings in

the middle of england some of which the bruceys in turn inherit around about the middle of the 13th century so they're very much at the heart of that cross-border landholding world. And it's a world in which we should note as well, many leading English noblemen that you would more readily label as being English lords also have estates in Scotland. And why is that? Is that because your grandfather, you might serve alongside a Scottish king on a crusade or in a battle, or there'd be a grant of land by a king of Scots or by a king of England to people from elsewhere? You enjoy their patronage as any other knight or any other noble?

Yeah, that's undoubtedly part of it. So there's a really good example from the Bruce family history where 1270-72, Bruce's grandfather is actually part of the aristocratic group of knights cross-border holding knights who join the then prince edward future king edward the first on his trip to the holy land and a number of other scottish families what we label as scots cross-border land holding but also purely gallic families like the elder earl of carrick go with them so service is part of it the other part of it I think is sort of natural expansion by aristocratic families if you've got a junior a younger son a cadet branch cousins and so on who are looking for landed titles moving north into

northern England Scotland is a natural pattern in the 11th and 12th centuries one of the forebear kings of Scots David I whom Robert whom Robert Bruce, when he's king, very much looks to as a kind of model and often cites in his own charters and documents. He's held as being responsible for bringing in large numbers of Norman families into Scotland, granting them lands in Scotland in return for service. Actually, many of these families, we now suspect, were already there. So it's part of the nature of the beast to expand in this way. And then you're talking about marriage alliances, purchase of land, exchange of lands and so on, making sure your hold patterns are neater, tidier, whereas in England lands can often be quite disconnected. A title can hold lands in various places, leading to more tension, but certainly a fascinating part of how he's grown up. He's probably fostered out to

Ireland. He's maybe raised in the English royal and aristocratic households, as well as in Scottish aristocratic households. He's seeing all of this. So he is an enormously cosmopolitan figure for this time, isn't he? So he's visiting his lands in southwest Scotland and speaking Gaelic. He's presumably speaking English, the English court, or Latin or French. He's able to move between these different worlds. Yes, I mean, he's by no means unique. But I think in the context of the Scottish Wars, late 13th century, particularly the Gaelic aspect to his

kinship, so it's his mother's side, the Earl of Carrick, and the allies that brings him in western Scotland, and into Ulster, I think that maybe makes him uniquely positioned to seek support from various quarters when the conflict begins and when he pushes his own ambitions. It marks him out as being somewhat different from his rivals within Scotland. So say a family, an Anglo-Norman family like the Commons, who are earls of Buchan and lords of Badenoch, they perhaps don't quite have that similar Gallic dimension. have that similar Gaelic dimension, although it can be pursued through marriage. And I think it's quite interesting that the Bruce family, Robert's first wife, seeks to reinforce that. They marry the family of Marr, so one of the older native lines of Scotland. But yeah, I mean, I think you're talking about almost a tripartite childhood. He would have served important time in all these realms, learning the customs, learning the ways, clearly spoke all the languages.

And it's hard to pin him down as favouring one or other. I think he's comfortable in all. But in 1286, that's the start of a series of events that will force him to choose. And indeed will force many other people on this island to sort of choose, I suppose. And that's the death of King Alexander III. What does that mean? For the Scots, it's obviously very difficult because they've now got to guide their kingdom towards a safe succession. Alexander leaves only his granddaughter. And as much as Alexander, just before he dies in an accident, gets his parliament and all of his

nobles, including the Bruces, to pledge support to this child Margaret, made of Norway, as the heir to the throne, it's fairly clear that as soon as he dies, questions are being asked about whether it's right that a female should succeed or whether they should already be thinking about who will marry her. It's quite striking that even though the Bruce's, and it's Bruce's grandfather who's the leader of the family at this point, attempts to rebel at this point, attempts to force the issue militarily, he's beaten down by people like the Commons and others, but not forfeited, not wiped out, but rather allowed to continue pressing his cause as part of the negotiations for the maid's marriage and it's quite possible that at that juncture so this is about 1286 to 90

Robert Bruce future king of Scots is put forward as a potential marriage partner for that young girl and that would have tied up the Bruce claim to the throne quite neatly a number of other families could have done that too I think it's quite clear though that Bruce's grandfather, Lord of Annandale, and his father are prepared to push their claim to the Scottish kingship, but only so far. They will safeguard their lands, and if that means going down on Bendy Dean and doing homage to Edward I, accepting the kingship through his offices,

accepting terms of subservience to him, they would do that. And I think as he approaches roughly, what, 20 in the early 1290s, I think Bruce increasingly finds that difficult to accept. So there's maybe tension between him and his earlier generation, his grandfather and his father. Do we know anything else about him? Is he a warrior? Is he a thinker? Is he a charismatic? Does he attract people through his charisma or is it still his case is mostly the blood in his veins and the lines of his genealogy? I think it is that and it really will wait until his grandfather dies 1295 and then his father 1304 before he can really take on the convincing role of family head and define how the claim to

the kingship can be pursued it's quite striking that as well as probably being fostered out to ulster irish parentage for a while he seems to serve a time in edward the first household possibly as a knight banner in waiting so his uncle richard bruce had filled that office this is part of the legacy of going on crusade with Edward in the 1270s for the family. So he's got a very strong perspective on both sides. It's interesting though, that when he does attempt to rebel, this is 1297, once Edward I has overrun Scotland for the first time, we're told at least by one English source that he attempts to raise his father's followers from Annandale and they refuse. They're not convinced by this, not that young figure,

but I suspect mainly because the father is still in control and the father is content to be loyal to Edward and see what comes to the Bruce family that way. So it's something of a difficult, almost tortured upbringing, I think, right up until 1304 for Bruce. He's not fully in command of his family's destiny. Let's talk about Edward I and why he chooses to overrun Scotland. Presumably there's an opportunity there. There's this succession crisis. Margaret, this granddaughter, dies before setting foot in Scotland. That's right. She's on her way. And Edward has managed to, quite skillfully, I would have to admit, force through a likely marriage between Margaret and his own son.

So he's pushed through a royal match to Edward of Carnarvon, future Edward II. They are roughly the same age. So the prospect was that he was going to gain control of Scotland without the need for war, without need for great political pressure, simply through Prince Edward becoming consort and thus king of Scotland. And when she dies, suddenly that falls away. And I suspect it's a desire to assert his rights, assert what he sees as not just an opportunity, but actually his legal rights to overlordship over Scotland, and a strong sense of the weakness and the division of the Scots

that encourages him to keep pressing his case. That's made it a wee bit easier and the division of the Scots that encourages him to keep pressing his case. That's made a wee bit easier by the fact that the Scots, many of them in an attempt to avoid civil war amongst themselves, and I think a strong measure of suspicion of just what the Bruces are up to there is part of this. Many of the Scots actually invite Edward in. They're hoping he'll play the part of the statesman that because he's been their overlord for other lands he will adjudicate neutrally. If that's the case they're somewhat naive and perhaps quite predictably he makes one of the conditions of his arbitration that all the claimants recognize him as overlord of Scotland. So no matter what

happens whoever's chosen, whoever emerges as part of the legal process is going to have to acknowledge Edward as superior of Scotland. This is 1291. You mentioned that Edward actually feels that he is legally in the right there. Just briefly, what claims could the kings of England have to be overlords of the king of Scots? Some of it is mythical. What you might almost take right back to Brutus and Trojan legends, this idea that the three sons of Brutus, the eldest is given England, the younger brothers are given Scotland and Wales, and therefore the older brother, as feudal law and primogeniture develops, has the right to control, if not determine the destiny of the other two.

Some of it's natural law, you could almost say. Scotland is a much weaker, poorer kingdom. England is by far superior in terms of men, wealth, and so on. And he's probably very much conscious that many more Scottish lords do homage to him for lands they hold in England than vice versa, than English lords to kings of Scots. And the kings of Scots themselves have been doing homage for a considerable amount of time for these lands in Huntingdon to kings of England. So there's always a natural assumption of power on the part of the kings of England. Edward, of course, is the great asserter of royal rights. Think of what he does to Wales, what he does in consolidating royal control over Ireland. He's tried to intervene

on the continent. So I think Scotland represents a kind of opportunity he can't pass up. It's always a bit funny to think the Plantagenets tried to do to Scotland what they'd get so furious when the Kings of France tried to do to them for the Nazehold in France. And of course, it's going on almost at the same time in the background that Philip of France is asking for homage for Aquitaine and other things. This is a huge stumbling block between Anglo-French relations. It's unavoidable that key Scottish leaders, particularly the churchmen, are aware of this and some of the propaganda that goes on once the wars get started clearly riffs on this, that the Scots bishops and others are not above making that point,

lobbying Philip, lobbying for French support. Even William Wallace apparently goes to Philip of France to seek support and then takes it on to the papacy. The other side of that coin, of course, is that there's a big dispute going on between Philip and the papacy about who has predominant power. Everybody's trying to establish overlordship. Right, so Edward does come in. He extorts this oath that he will be Lord Paramount, is it? And then who does he choose initially? Well, and should we call them a puppet?

Certainly what most historians, most commentators have come to call John Balliol. So of Galloway and Barnard Castle, it's another cross-border lord, southern Scotland, northern England, so very similar to the Bruce's in some senses. He's chosen by the end of 1292, even though there's maybe some evidence

that French legal opinion would have backed a possible claim by Bruce, and others clearly do back Bruce. The Bruce's, however, have read the writing on the wall, even before Edward makes his or declares his decision, they've tried to do a backroom deal to divide up their holdings in Scotland and maybe preserve their claim. So this is, again, Brucey's grandfather, who's kind of the arch Machiavellian figure of the family. Balliol is known to Edward. The Balliols have been loyal servants through the 1260s, 70s, 80s, through the civil wars for Henry III and Prince Edward, loyal to Edward I. I think even if in law, primogeniture law, the Balliols had not indeed had the best claim as they do, and most people

recognize that, you could make the case that Edward would have chosen him as the more acceptable figure to work with and browbeat when required. And quite quickly, Edward is doing just that, more or less up summoning him down to London every chance he gets to answer legal appeals, to pay taxation, to think about contributing to the war against France, even though Balliol is being, as it were, treated as a puppet almost just as much as by Scottish figures like the Commons, who view him as a way of preserving their dominant position in Scotland, albeit under Edwardian rule, it's quite clear, I think, that anyone would have struggled

to resist Edward's demands at this point, Bailliel or Bruce. Edward has sort of largely got the situation that he wants in Scotland in this period. What about the Bruce's? How do they come to terms with this new settlement? In classic fashion, they try and cut their losses and protect their right, their legal claim. They do this odd thing whereby Bruce's father resigns to him the Scottish title of Earl of Carrick. The grandfather, whilst he's still alive, retains Annandale, but resigns his claim to the kingship to the middle Bruce, so Bruce's father, which means that the man within the family who has the claim to the kingship, should it be revived, should it be brought back into question, has no lands in

Scotland and therefore doesn't have to do homage to King John. It's our Robert, Robert Bruce, who, because he's now Earl of Carrick, has to quite reluctantly, it seems, in 1293, turn up at a Scottish Parliament controlled by King John and the Commons and others, and do homage to this new King John. That's worth bearing in mind. So he's the only Bruce that does homage to King John, it is Robert the Bruce, which adds an extra layer of frisson when he does usurp and steal the throne. It's often said of William Wallace, that Wallace never did homage to Edward I. That was kind of his ultimate principle and his layer of protection. But here's Bruce, not only having done homage to Edward I throughout his career, now doing homage to King John. So in

many ways, Bruce starts out his adult career in possession of his main Scottish title. You could argue quite heavily compromised and bound in by these kind of political niceties. But this would be an era of oath-breaking, wouldn't it? Because what happens as we go through the 1290s? Well, to give him his due, John Balliol, as King of Scots, again, probably led very much by the Commons, do start to resist Edwardian demands. And you've mentioned the Commons a few times. The Commons are just one of the most powerful families in Scotland. They are. They're very much the dominant force of the second half of the 13th century. So the late part of Alexander III's reign and into the early years of the crisis, they managed to control much of the political process after

Alexander III's death, the pursuit of marriage negotiations for the maid and so on. And you would have to think that if King John remained on the throne, it would really be the commons running the show for him. So the Bruces would be very much excluded in that case. for him. So the Bruces would be very much excluded in that case. They do resist Edward and they make an alliance with France, an alliance which Philip of France probably calculates as a way to deflect English aggression. This treaty is revealed to Edward who now, instead of invading France, invades Scotland, moves to punish Scotland, a kind of police action as he sees it against rebellious vassals. He overruns Scotland quite quickly, late 1296 into early 1297. And it's important to know that Robert Bruce and his father, just as Edward sets

foot with his force in Scotland, they do homage. So they are there with the English army suppressing the common Balliol resistance in 1296-97. Now, that might seem to indicate, well, Bruce has chosen which side he's going to be on. But by early 1297, as Edward starts to install an occupation regime, Bruce actually joins a rebellion, ostensibly in King John's name, but that means he's fighting alongside people like William Wallace, Andrew Murray, Bishop Wishart, and others. So he's out in rebellion, you could argue, quite early, and possibly against the wishes of his own father, who remains loyal. I always think it's quite interesting that Edwardian invasion of Scotland, because invasions of Scotland from the south, from the Romans

onwards, have tended to be catastrophic affairs and actually that one goes relatively smoothly it's quite effective isn't it I mean Edward ends mid 1297 or early 1297 King Edward of England is ruling Scotland oh yeah very much and he's puts in his own lieutenant general he's raising taxation he's got firm control of the seven or eight southern Scottish counties and the massive castles like the one near where you're talking to me from now, Stirling and things like that. Yeah and Truthy's had control of some of these off and on since 1290 as part of the process of negotiation over the maid and then deciding who would be the vassal king of Scots. He'd held some of these Scottish castles and of course he can use both Scottish and English lords who know these places, who know these lands. So it's something he's relatively familiar with. He had visited Scotland as a younger man in the 1260s to see his sister, who was married to Alexander III. So it's not somewhere he doesn't know.

the Battle of Dunbar, and then Edward quickly overruns the major sites. And of course, just as with Wales, he strips it of its symbols of nationhood, removes the Stone of Scone, removes the royal records, the royal muniments. When Balliol surrenders, he's stripped of his coronet and scepter. Some of these end up in places like Westminster and Canterbury as war trophies. It's a pretty emphatic display. I do wonder, however, because our Bruce, young Robert, is there, I wonder if that quite cruel treatment of Scotland actually has an impact on him. Some of the places Edward really quite badly manhandles, the royal centres like Stirling, Dunfermline,

particularly the churches, Bruce shows a sympathy for and attention to when he himself is king. And I don't think that's just tactics and politics. So I think there's maybe a bit of a misstep for Edward treating Scotland so cruelly. As with Wales, I suppose, he looks like he's going for sort of English annexation

rather than taking it back to ruling through people like Balliol, I suppose. And is that what you think sparks this uprising in 1297? What happens there? Yes, I think it is. I think for the first time, the Scots are confronted with limitations on their movements, fairly hefty taxation, which hasn't been a feature of Scottish royal governance. The loss of office, traditional office like sheriffs, coroners, balliolists, Bruce in particular, his family lose out on several offices that they would normally have held throughout the 13th century. So there's no real attempt by Edward to win hearts and minds. He'll move to do that, Edward, once he reconquers

Scotland for a second time, 1304. I think there's a realisation that he pushed it too far. but he pushed it too far. And for example, in 1297, his regime includes 30 or so English sheriffs, many men who wouldn't speak the local language, wouldn't speak Gaelic, wouldn't be able to handle the local population. Come 1304, he's got partnerships between English and Scottish figures, and he's much more reliant on the Scottish figures to do a local job for him. So he learns his lesson, but it'll take him six years to get there. Yes, let's talk about the road there, this first revolt that's broken out. People may have heard of one William Wallace, who's a particularly well-known leader in that revolt, but the Bruce was part of that almost from the

beginning. It looks that way, yeah. There's local rebellions by people like Wallace in the South, Andrew Murray in the North. So a mixture of lesser gentry and high noble figures. Bruce fits within that category. And it does look like by the summer of 1297, possibly encouraged by people like Bishop Wishart of Glasgow, Sir William Douglas, and others in southwestern central Scotland. He's out resisting the English occupation regime. He doesn't seem to take part in any pitched battles, any particular recorded campaigns. Rather, the assumption on the part of later Scottish chronicles is that he and the bishop are kind of stalling, holding up the English figures, holding negotiations with them, whilst in fact what's happening is all of their men are being drained off to go and find William Wallace and support him. And part of the negotiations requires that Bruce surrender himself and his

daughter as a hostage. And it's worth bearing in mind he doesn't. He refuses. He stays out. Even though other figures like Douglas and Wishart do seem to submit, Bruce stays out and is pretty much frozen out for the next couple of years. We should say the rebellion, there's a very striking military victory in autumn 1297, is it, Stirling Bridge? That's right. English forces annihilated William Wallace's great moment. So at that point, what, Bruce is slightly secondary? Yeah, he's obviously uncertain as to just who this resistance movement is fighting for. Are they pushing for the restoration of King John, who at this point is a prisoner in England,

along with his son, heir Edward Balliol? Or are they pushing simply for the recovery of the Scottish kingdom, perhaps for the reopening of the legal hearings about who should be king? Has Balliol done enough to be removed in some legitimate way as ruler, as a puppet of Edward I? I think it's quite hard for Bruce to navigate in that environment. The victory at Stirling Bridge in September 1297 could only encourage him, even though he's not there. I think it's quite striking that even when Edward I, furiously angry at what's happened, storms north in the next year and defeats Wallace

at Falkirk in July of 1298, again Bruce is not there, Bruce doesn't submit. He waits and it's quite clear that Edward is struggling to consolidate that victory and again conquer Scotland. that Edward is struggling to consolidate that victory and again conquer Scotland and within a matter of months quite remarkably Bruce emerges as a joint guardian of Scotland so the very office Wallace has now resigned Bruce holds it jointly with John Coleman of Badenoch another young 20 something Scottish knight but obviously from that rival family and And again, at least on paper, this is in the name of King John, but is this Bruce's attempt to push his own claim to the front, to show people that on the ground,

on the day, he's doing a good job. He could be a possible leader as King of Scots. You listen to Dan Snow's history at There's More coming up. from the greatest millennium in human history. We're talking Vikings, Normans, Kings and Popes, who were rarely the best of friends, murder, rebellions, and crusades.

Find out who we really were by subscribing to Gone Medieval from History Hit, wherever you get your podcasts. and so the revolts continue unlike edward's invasion of 1296 this time more characteristically it's rather more attritional scene and edward what marching north in the campaigning season pacifying some parts of Scotland but not others? Yes, yeah, it looks like he gains fairly firm control of the southern counties and quite a few of the local communities are willing to accept the presence of English garrisons, English justice figures and so on, benefit maybe perhaps even from English trade and the demands of the English markets. But really north of the Forth Clyde line,

north of Edinburgh Stirling, no, it's a very uncertain English presence. The Scots begin to wheel it back. Bruce and Colman as guardians are even pressing into southwest Scotland. So former Balliol Bruce lands. They're also, of course, lobbying in France, lobbying the papacy. They're making it awkward, not only on the ground militarily, but diplomatically for Edward. it awkward not only on the ground militarily but diplomatically for Edward at a time when at home Edward's having his own political problems and raising money and ensuring parliamentary support all of that means he's just not got a sustained campaign in Scotland to reconsolidate after

Falkirk on a couple of occasions he cancels military campaigns he can't raise the money and the men and The Scots look increasingly hopeful of getting papal and French help to get John Balliol fully released, and perhaps the great cause that the hearings about who should be the rightful king re-heard, this time maybe under a papal court rather than Edward's own court. But you mentioned that Edward does, there is a second conquest of sorts in the beginning of the 14th century talk me through that bit yeah this is really quite remarkable and it shows you and underlines the extent to which the Scots are really dependent on events elsewhere

the French are defeated as allies of Scotland not by the English but by the Flemish that could try in May 1302 and have to come to peace and terms with Edward. That leaves the Scots exposed because they're left out of the treaty at this stage, even though there are promises from the French that they will eventually be included, they're left out. And Edward now has clear water and time to regroup, mount a substantial campaign through 1303-4 and really do an impressive logistical and military job in again overwhelming Scotland. The interesting thing for us is that by this stage Bruce is submitted. Bruce has easily read the writing on the wall, seen that if the Scottish campaign does progress it's going to be

in favour of Balliol, not him, so he's covering himself and late 1301, early 1302 he's resubmitted to Edward I that means he probably takes part just as he did in 1296 in a decisive reconquest of Scotland in 1304 1305 the interesting thing is that by the end of that campaign whether because of doubts about previous changes of loyalty it really looks as if Edward doesn't trust him. Well, I'm not wholly surprised about that. Yeah. I mean, Edward would rather deal with the Commons and get a clear, clean surrender from them and a promise that they'll run Scotland in his interests than deal with Bruce. So he's being frozen out by both sides by 1304, 1305. in out by both sides by 1304 1305 there's one really striking moment through 1303-4 where Edward repeatedly winters and takes up residence in Scotland at Dunfermline Abbey and his son and

others are in Perth just north these are the two main English bases and when they begin to negotiate with the commons for the Scots surrender the commons are invited to dinner at Perth and at Dunfermline. They're feasted. They're quite well treated. They're promised the restoration of their lands if they pay a fine and spend a short period in exile. No sign that Robert the Bruce is invited to any of these sessions, these discussions. He struggles, it seems, even to get hold of local regional offices that his family had formerly held, things like Sheriff of Ayr. So it looks increasingly like both sides are freezing him out and his track record from 1297 is doing him lasting damage.

So is that why in 1306 he decides to really, really throw his hand all in? I suspect it's a large part of it. I mean, the only thing we've got to figure in is as much as he's got to assume responsibility now because his father dies in 1304 for family holdings that still touch three kingdoms in theory if all of it's restored he's in his 30s if he's ever going to be king of scots and it's hard to get a sense of just how much he felt that was his genuine birthright, that he should be king, how much he's been raised to think that way, rather than just as an aristocrat. But time is

passing. Part of his resubmission had seen him get a good marriage to one of Edward I's allies, Elizabeth, the daughter of Richard de Burgh, Earl of Ulster, although it's possible that that's something the Bruces themselves had pushed for, given their Ulster connections, and it's possible that that's something the Bruces themselves had pushed for given their ulcer connections and it's presented to Edward as something he can't really quibble with but she's very young and he does not have any children of his own yet any sons of his own to pass on the title he only has a daughter by his first marriage so he must be worried about his aristocratic succession but if he has any lingering ambition to be a king time is very definitely passing and he has the weaker record as a leader of a scottish resistance movement or a scottish recovery of the crown john common of badnock arguably has the far better record and the far

cleaner record in terms of association with wallace john Balliol, and others. I think a lot of that explains their meeting on the 10th of February 1306. They choose to meet on what might be sort of neutral holy ground, Dumfries Church in southwest Scotland. And we've got conflicting chronicle reports, both contemporary English and later Scottish, about just what happens, just why they were meeting. And given the outcome, you can understand why both sides furiously get spinning as to what actually happened. But we do know the outcome. And what was that? Just to add to his fairly patchy record

so far, either it's premeditated, if you believe the English Chronicle accounts, or it is an act of hot blood, of bad temper, because Bruce hears that Common has betrayed Bruce's ambition to revive the Scottish resistance, to revive the Scottish kingdom. He's betrayed it to Edward I. Regardless of which one of those is the real reason, Bruce kills Common in the church. So a sacrilegious crime to add to his political vacillation up to this point. that really complicates things. I think the big thing for me is if it was premeditated, it's a really stupid plan because he doesn't have his other pieces in place and he has to improvise over the next few weeks, even just to get a few people together and go to school and have himself inaugurated, installed as king. and have himself inaugurated, installed as king. He clearly hadn't laid that out yet. He may be lobbying for support. He's maybe trying to reassure himself of common's neutrality. There's even the suggestion from later sources that it's actually common suggestion that one of them should take the kingship with the other support. And as a reward, the other would get the other person's

noble lands. Common does have a decent claim. He is the nephew as a result of marriage of King John. So if the Balliols are out, by primogeniture, you can make the case that John Common should be the next king. It's quite striking that when he does seize the throne and eventually has two children, he has two sons, twin boys, it seems, it's possible the eldest is called John. And if that boy had lived, you have to wonder, would it have been John I or John II of Scotland? Would Bruce have

obliterated the Balliol memory by installing his own son as King John? Interesting. So he kills John Common. As you say, he rushes off to Scone and has himself crowned king within weeks. I mean, mean you're in you're all in at that stage right you've rebelled against king edward you've then collaborated with him you're then now an open rebellion this is he's crossed all sorts of red lines here he has and i think some historians have suggested that even in the wake of the murder bruce may have sought to submit to edward i to explain it away as hot blood argument between two noblemen and it wasn't really about the kingship. Edward's not going to tolerate that. Edward, by all accounts

and by the records that survive, is clearly furious and sets both his English occupation regime and Scots who have submitted, so including the commons and their supporters, basically to hunt Bruce and his supporters down and they will be summarily executed and forfeited. There's a wonderful list of the Bruce family lands and the lands of his few supporters are present at his inauguration as king. And the list of the English and Scottish lords who lay claim to them, because they know right that said, the Bruce's are done as far as Edward I is concerned. I think for me, one of the two of the ways I've begun to rethink it is that, yeah, having committed the murder, having really committed a serious misstep, Bruce maybe pushes it

even further. There's nothing else to lose in some senses. Yeah, I'm all in now. I've really gone and done it. I might as well go for broke. That's it. And even with the support, figures like Bishop Wishart, who apparently absolves them of the murder, even though that's up to the Pope, and pulls out from under his bed, by all accounts, Scottish royal robes for the ceremony. I wonder if what they do is they even go so far

as to effectively improvise an attempt at coronation. So a full royal and kingman ceremony, something the Scots kings have long lobbied for, but which the English crown and the papacy have denied them for centuries. Bruce has got nothing to lose. I think he pushes it. So he pushes the symbolism, the sacral nature of kingship. He begins pushing this idea that common was the traitor, so deserved to die. That's quite interesting because one of the spiritual figures that I think Bruce has a lot of time for and association with is Thomas Beckett. So a sacrilegious victim of English royal power in a church.

And here's Bruce himself committed something not too dissimilar, murdered his rival in a church, sacrilegious act, at the altar, by all accounts. So he's got some real PR work to do, if nothing else. And I think he realizes, yeah, nothing left to lose. Let's just throw it all accounts. So he's got some real PR work to do, if nothing else. And I think he realises, yeah, nothing left to lose. Let's just throw it all down. So speaking of PR work, the rebellion doesn't start very well, does it? The Bruce brothers pay a high price for their brother's ambition, don't they? I mean, at least three of them executed by Edward and his men. This is the bit though, where Robert goes into hiding, turns it into a more guerrilla war,

taking refuge in inaccessible highlands, perhaps the islands as well off the west coast, and hit and run attacks on Edward and his followers. That's right. This is where the Carrick, the Gaelic part of his heritage proves so vital, important. I mean, it's often said that really Gaelic Scotland saves him, and with it the Scottish Kingdom. He probably goes first of all to Macdonald territory, west coast Scotland, then perhaps on to Rathen Island off Ulster, possibly in contact with his sister who's now married Eric King of Norway. So certainly out west, but very dependent only on western Scottish families like the Macdonalds, the Stuarts and others, but also those Gallic allies he has in Ireland. When he finally sneaks back into Scotland in 1307, he does so, he and his surviving

brother Edward Bruce were told with the support of Irish lords, unnamed, but you would think from families like the O'Neills and others who are keen to resist English rule in Ireland. This, of course, is the period to which the later tale of Bruce and the Spider belongs, that his fortunes are such a low ebb that he has to find the reserves to try, try, try again. That's probably a later corruption of an associative story with a saint rather than a spider. That's a post-Reformation version, I would think. But yeah, the cost is terrible, not just his three of his younger brothers captured and killed, one or two of his supporters, including the Earl of Athol,

his new young wife, the daughter of the Earl of Ulster, and his two sisters, who are set to marry important allies, including the Campbells from the West, are captured and treated quite harshly by Edward, even though you could certainly argue they're innocent and all of this. So he really does have nothing to lose by the winter of 1306, early 1307. I've always struck out some of the similarities between the mythology of the Bruce in this period and the mythology of Alfred taking on the Vikings

and trapped on his little island, his marshy island in the West Country. And he comes back to win great victories. In the case of the Bruce, he's helped enormously by the death of one of England's most effective kings, Edward I, and his utterly useless son succeeding him. Is that immediately important in Scotland, or is Robert too busy focusing on these more local struggles against Scottish adversaries? Well, he does have to sort of balance both, you're right.

I think it's even a factor before Edward I dies, the anticipation that Edward II is going to become king, a king less focused on Scotland, on military endeavour and so on. This is probably what Bruce is doing through 1304 or 1305 and the meeting with Common in 1306 is because they're anticipating Edward's death. He's clearly ill. He's in his late 60s. If that's the case, they're a wee bit early. He does linger on. But I think once he dies, there are several things that Bruce can make use of. He knows Edward II is not going to have that same interest.

He's going to have to deal with political issues back home. And of course, he adds to that, he complicates that tenfold by 1310-11 there's going to be a three-year gap between 1307 1310 when there's no English royal presence no reinforcement or expansion of the English royal forces it's really left up to former common supporters to hunt down or try to take on Bruce this is what's going to let him have his foothold. But even the symbolism of the death of Edward I, so here's that the hammer of the Scots dies not having succeeded in completely reconquering Scotland.

Bruce can at least say, I'm resisting him. And there's even a bit of symbolism the day of his death. I'm quite struck by the fact that Edward dies on the 7th of July, 1307, translation feast of Beckett. Now, as much as that's become a saint that the English royals venerate and worship through Canterbury and elsewhere, Bruce also looks to Beckett as a kind of anti-English royal tyranny symbol and makes very effective use of it.

By 1309, Bruce will have established his royal chancery, his main government writing office at the Abbey of Arbroath in central eastern Scotland. This is only one of two major Scottish churches dedicated to Beckett. So he's, I think, associating quite strongly with that cult as he tries to revive his fortunes. He makes good use of churchmen and saints and other ways to revive his fortunes, as well as slowly beginning to peg back Scottish enemies and the English regime in Scotland militarily. This is Dan Snow's History. There's more on this topic coming up. I'm Matt Lewis. And I'm Dr. Alan Orjanaga.

And in Gone Medieval, we get into the greatest mysteries. The gobsmacking details and latest groundbreaking research. From the greatest millennium in human history. We're talking Vikings. Normans. Kings and popes. Who were rarely the best of friends. Murder.

Rebellions. And crusades. Find out who we really were. By subscribing to Gone Medieval from History Hit, wherever you get your podcasts. And he captures castle after castle, taking advantage, as you say, of Edward II's lack of interest or lack of ability to do anything about it. But that all changes dramatically in 1314 when Edward does indeed march north. Tell me about that campaign.

I kind of take the view that a number of other historians have come to in more recent scholarship that there's a bit more deliberate planning from the Bruce's. They kind of invite the confrontation by 1314. There is a myth in later chronicles and Scottish poetic sources that there's a year's respite given to the castle and that's what brings Edward. In fact, it's only a few weeks in May of 1314, Edward Bruce gives the English garrison in Stirling Castle until midsummer that year to be relieved by an English force. But otherwise, all of the Bruce military actions in the months before that, taking first Roxburgh Castle on the border, then Edinburgh, widening that English supply chain from Berwick and other places on the Anglo-Scottish border right up to

Stirling, which means that when Edward does appear with his army to try and relieve that garrison, he's got to come 100 miles plus and be supplied by sea or cart rather than from garrisons he holds. And they're exposing him. They could have taken him on in a similar way in 1310, 1311, when he comes partly to escape from his problems in England with Piers Gaveston, they come to Scotland. But Bruce at that juncture avoids him he declines battle and only nips at his heels as he leaves and otherwise as you say restricts himself to guerrilla warfare taking castles and raising them to the ground not risking a pitch battle but summer 13 14 is different there's a sense in which if they're going to consolidate what they've taken,

if they're going to win over the French and the Papacy, if they're going to have any chance of recovering Bruce's Queen from English captivity and other Scottish prisoners, they have to have a reckoning and either defeat, capture, capture would be ideal, or kill the English king. In that sense, you could say in the end, it's a missed opportunity. They come so close to actually capturing Edward. They chase him all the way to Dunbar Castle on the second day of the battle. He flees with his army defeated behind him. But it means that in the end, the most high status prisoner the Scots have is probably the Earl of Hereford. It is in the end enough to trade for Elizabeth de Boer so Bruce gets his

Queen back and now has the chance to produce an heir, a male heir but of course he's not really got the leverage to force Edward II to surrender, come to terms and recognise Scottish independence. That's going to rumble on. It is and yet Bannockburn14, it's a catastrophic defeat for the English. It is, and the death toll on their side is very, very substantial. It will take them a long time to recover from that. It gives Bruce really what a lot of military historians now call military hegemony. For the next decade or more, the scotch really dominate the military initiative in the british isles whenever there is the possibility of a full-scale pitch battle again it's the scots

who are dictating the terrain the timing on two more occasions they'll come close to capturing edward particularly in 1322 when they invade into yorkshire and threaten them again it's a large part of why edward ii is removed come 1326. He's just not capable of dealing with this. Even Edward III, his fledgling regime in 1327, struggles to deal with the Scots in the Anglo-Scottish border skirmishes of 1327. And his mother, Isabella and Mortimer, have to come to terms with Bruce. And it's Bruce dictating these terms really because he's got the military initiative. And at the Battle of Bannockburn, for example, he is credited with hugely effective leadership and how he deploys his men, but also charismatic leadership. He fights

one-on-one. He fights an English nobleman who foolishly charges forward and Robert cleaves his skull in half with his battle axe. Are we seeing Robert emerge as a genuinely effective military commander? I think so. He's aged 40. He's got plenty of experience now. He's prime of life. He is prime of life. He doesn't have to be 33, the perfect nightly age. He's learned the hard way. He's made mistakes. He's had defeats, albeit fairly low scale skirmishes he's had some important testing grounds there's now the feeling that the battle at loudon hill slightly more larger scale than we maybe previously thought and he's testing the kind of tactics dismounted foot

soldiers with landscape traps to limit the movement of english horse and archery to using the terrain using the environment to really take them on. That really quite striking mixture of, yes, Norman chivalric practice, but also what you might call Gallic, Catalan-style warfare. And in many ways, Bannockburn is kind of a microcosm of his kingship, you could argue. So there he is with his great host assembled. We think three great divisions, at least one of which is probably made up predominantly of Gaels, the McDonalds, McRurys and others, but also the great chivalry of the realm under people like Randolph and Douglas. A small number of great mounted knighted men, but also foot soldiers, well-blooded and raiding into Northern England. And they're going to fight predominantly on foot with spears other weapons not the kind of

archery and heavy cavalry predominance that you see from the English and yes both English and Scottish accounts albeit later Scottish accounts record this moment on day one when one English knight sees his chance this is de Bohun and charges what he identifies as Robert on a small horse a palfrey not yet ready for battle, it seems, not yet ready to deploy his troops, seeing the light of the land. And Bruce rises up in his stirrups and cleaves the chap's skull with one blow. If that's true, the effect in rousing his troops, and you would think he would be well exercised in how to make the best advantage of that, particularly in turning it almost to a kind of spiritual blessing. God's on our side. He's there with a number of relics and churchmen as well to

bless his troops. There's strong records of, on the morning of the 24th, his troops being blessed by key churchmen and relics. And I think he knows this is his moment. As much as he's prepared the ground to allow him to retreat to the West, I think realizes this is it he has to roll the dice it's an english source that reports he's confirmed in thinking that by defection from the english side by a scottish knight sir alexander seaton who tells him what's going on in the english camp that there there's not good relations between edward and his nobles quite a few are also haven't showed up there's not good relations between Edward and his nobles. Quite a few earls haven't showed up. There's not great leadership. It's an opportunity. And it's interesting that Seton is heavily rewarded thereafter. Having established military hegemony, one of the great counterfactuals of British and Irish history is Robert sending his brother Edward

to invade Ireland to help the Irish lords repel the English. He, in the end, is unsuccessful, but it's remarkable to think of how history might have been different if that had worked. But he does, his greatest legacy surely is establishing that Scotland will be distinct, a separate country from England further south. And that is an achievement that endures for centuries. Yes. Yeah. Although you have to, I think, recognize that, at least on paper, if you look at the negotiations that finally come to pass in 1327-28, when the new regime of Edward III, really controlled by Isabella and Mortimer, they're bankrupt, they're besieged on all sides, they have to come to terms with Robert.

It's quite clear that at least at that stage, he's prepared to contemplate the restoration of cross-border landholding. So the kind of muddying of loyalties, particularly amongst aristocratic families. The Bruce family themselves might have looked to recover territories that they formerly held in England. But I think it becomes quite clear to him that after so much has happened, and in particular after the kind of profile of the Scottish nobility has changed so dramatically since 1286, mainly through his own patronage, he's rewarded different families.

So it's now the Stuarts, the Douglases, the Randolphs, the Rosses, the Dunbars and other have come up. And these are families whose power rests on their Scottish holdings. They've lost or are not drawing any real power from England and English holdings. The pressure is on Robert to recognise, no, it's changed. And I think he may make verbal and written promises about perhaps restoring some English lords to their Scottish lands, but in reality, he's not going to do that. And that's certainly what comes to pass after he dies and the wars resume. The Scots fight for a distinct separate Scottish kingdom. They've got no interest in

recovering lands in England. So yes, that's very much part of Bruce's legacy. The Irish question, however, wow, that's the one that so often gets overlooked even by Scottish historians. And yes, you're right. It would have been such a different story. looked even by Scottish historians and yes you're right it would have been such a different story. A fascinating moment. He dies in June 1329 just having agreed the Treaty of Edinburgh, Northampton in which the English crowned as you say Edward III's mum and boyfriend recognised Scotland as independent and the border there agreed endures to this day I believe? Yes it resets the border, admittedly where it had been set up 1237, an earlier treaty,

but with no cross-border landholding unless it is followed up by separate charter grants and decisions. And that's just where it will rest to the present day. So therefore, what does he mean today? That legacy endures. Oh, absolutely. I mean, it's never an easy legacy and he still rests in Wallace's shadow I think an awareness of his aristocratic waverings in his early career

and the kind of ruthlessness he displays and even some awareness of what he attempts in Ireland does reduce him somewhat. The Scots are far more likely to favour a lad of parts, a more ordinary figure, at least as he can be portrayed, like William Wallace, who, of course, is a martyr to that cause, dies trying. Whereas Bruce succeeds, it's quite difficult perhaps for the Scots to cope with someone who succeeds and is an aristocrat, is an elite figure. I think even without Bannockburn, the record would have been remarkable if he still achieved independence at the end, albeit one that has to be fought for again within just a few years. He's laid the toolkit, if you like. He's given them the template. This is how you do it. This is what you need to do to resist Plantagenet claims. Little wonder that throughout

the 19th and 20th centuries, when it comes to modern Scottish politics and questions of Scotland's position in the union, he and Wallace are both the the touchstones Bannockburn is a common reference point political rallies very often held at Bannockburn right up until the late 20th century it's quite fascinating to see how he gets reused and recast and then how he gets treated in things like Hollywood movies Braveheart Outlaw King the sort of man who needs to be shown the correct path by the ordinary everyman Wallace. Yeah, the tough who eventually does the right thing. Eventually, yeah.

Michael, thank you so much for coming on the podcast. Your book is called? Robert the Bruce King of the Scots by Yale University Press. Well, thank you so much for coming and giving us such a thorough, thorough biography of the great man. Thank you. Thank you very much. Very enjoyable.

Cheers. Well, thank you very much for listening to that podcast. I do think Robert the Bruce is one of the most important figures in Scottish, British, and indeed in English history. Really, I think without him, it could have been very different. He made sure that England and Scotland would not be fused together through conquest. England failed to conquer Scotland as it had conquered France. Instead, Scotland would remain independent and free until they were joined by act of union. They joined together as equals

in the union in the 18th century. I think that's hugely important both for all of subsequent history, but today as well. Well, everyone, I can imagine after listening to this episode, if you're like me, you're going to want to know about how this Union of Scotland and England came into being,

given we've spent the whole time talking about Scotland's independence and also connected with that, Scotland's ambitions outside Scotland. We had a little bit about the Bruce family in Ireland well what about Scotland as a colonial power on its own well the good news for you folks you need look no further because the rest this week we've got episodes that can answer all your questions on Wednesday we're looking at Scotland's attempt this is an extraordinary story to establish New Caledonia, a colony in the Darien Gap, right on the isthmus of Panama.

It was in the late 1690s. It went catastrophically wrong and it had really enormous consequences. And some of those consequences you will hear about on Friday because we're going to be talking about the two countries, Scotland and England, joined together eventually in 1707 to form Great Britain. Make sure you hit follow wherever you get your podcasts. you