Noble Blood - Betrayal and a Tudor in Scotland

Episode Date: October 6, 2026

When she was still a child, Margaret Tudor, sister of the future King Henry VIII, was married to the King of Scotland. But it wouldn't be until her husband's death that Margaret would face the greatest challenges of her life during her regency. Support Noble Blood:—ORDER 'THE ARCANE ARTS'— Bonus episodes, stickers, and scripts on Patreon— Order Dana's book, 'Anatomy: A Love Story' and its sequel 'Immortality: A Love Story'  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed Human. Welcome to Noble Blood, a production of IHeart Radio and Grim and Mild from Aaron Manky. Listener discretion advised. It's a brisk autumn night, but late enough, or rather early enough, that it might be considered morning. Muted footsteps pad across a moonlit field. The footsteps belong to a man creeping under the convales. hover of darkness toward the house where he once lived. The house where his estranged wife and her

son are, at this moment, asleep inside. He's here to kidnap his estranged wife's son, and he brought accomplices. Together they hop the gate and are about to break in when something catches them off guard. The wife bursts through the front door with guns aimed directly at them. It's a standoff. Tense words are exchanged. The neighbors come to gawk. There is no chance in hell this man will leave without her son, and there's even less chance she'll hand her son over to him. In truth, she would like nothing more than to have this good-for-nothing lying, cheating, son of a bitch, give her a reason to light him up. She gives him one last warning, leave now or die. He won't budge. So be it. The place the men were trying to break into,

Edinburgh Castle, and the wife turned the cannons onto her estranged husband and said, fire. The would-be kidnappers all survive, but four innocent bystanders are, struck dead. The woman has won the night and held the bastard off for now, but that collateral damage marks the beginning of the end of Margaret Tudor's second reign as regent of Scotland and custodian of her son, King James V, the boy who was not thankfully kidnapped. Little is written about Margaret's talents, virtues or intelligence. She is not remembered as a great leader of her age,

but Margaret was a scrappy underdog through and through as this attempted kidnapping story shows. Hers is a story of perseverance, loss, defiant grit, and one of the messiest divorces of all time. And given that her brother was King Henry VIII, That's saying something. I'm Dana Schwartz, and this is Noble Blood.

First, a note about Margaret Tudor, eldest daughter of the first Tudor King. In her lifetime, no one seems to have liked her very much. She didn't have very many friends. No one was ever really in her corner unless they needed something from her, with the possible exception of her son. It's not clear exactly why, but historians have been quick to venture guesses. They suggest a caustic personality, a lack of charisma, and a deficit of intelligence. The true answer is certainly more nuanced and probably lost to time,

but there is one helpful bit of context that may give us a clue as to Margaret's personality. Her younger brother, the future King Henry VIII, was not a fan of hers. It's possible that her fate was sealed as early as childhood when she simply made enemies with the wrong future famously misogynistic king. As a young girl in the court of her father, Henry V. Margaret found strong role models in her mother and her paternal grandmother. Both overcame extreme hardships in their time, and through tenacity and political savvy, had come out the other end stronger for it.

This must have set an example for Margaret to follow and draw on for strength during the challenges that were to come. By age eight, Margaret was arranged to be married to King James IV of Scotland, an arrangement that would come to fruition when she was 13 and he was 30. Margaret's marriage explicitly sealed a pact between England and Scotland, at this time two separate kingdoms, a pact called the Treaty of Perpetual Peace, meant to preserve the two nations shaky and uncomfortable truce. Nobody expected the treaty or.

Margaret to really succeed. From 1503 to 1513, Margaret was Queen of Scots. She and James the 4th seem to have gotten along well enough for however much they would have interacted before she was of age, and when she was 17 and declared able to consummate her marriage, she began trying in vain to give him an air. After a grueling seven years of constant miscarriages and tragic infant mortalities, Margaret finally gave birth to the future James V, who would survive to adulthood. But the Treaty of Perpetual Peace was already faltering, and only one year after the birth of her son, Margaret's husband was killed in a battle against her brother, in England's army. The Battle of Flodden was one of the bloodiest conflicts in British history up to that point,

and the single largest battle ever fought between England and Scotland. Some accounts have put the death toll at over 14,000. King James IV's death caused a political earthquake in the Scottish capital. Not only was their head of state dead, but a baby was now sitting atop the throne. And the person who James's will appointed regent to that infant king, aka the de facto monarch of Scotland, was Margaret, aka the sister of the man who had just caused this crisis in the first place. Up until this point in her life, Margaret had lacked any meaningful amount of self-determination.

Suddenly, she found herself very much in charge. But loath to be ruled by a woman whom many saw as loyal to the enemy, England, a council of four nobles was established to, big air quotes here, help her govern. James IV's body was barely cold, and the vultures were already circling. Margaret would need to move quickly to prove her loyalty as a Scot

and to consolidate her power. Enter Archie. One member of Margaret's Regency, council was Archibald Douglas, 6th Duke of Angus. Archibald had no experience in politics until the severe casualties at Flodden thrust him into the halls of power. He belonged to one of the most powerful families in Scotland, the Douglases, an infamous and brutal clan with enormous wealth, but few friends. Although Archibald was, in the words of his uncle, a young witless fool, he was also handsome and superficially charming, his family's useful idiot. He was exactly who the

Douglases needed to take advantage of in the sudden power vacuum, and their sights were set on the newly widowed queen. Spurred on by his grandfather, Archibald walked away from his current wife and decided to pursue Margaret. After a brief courtship and less than one year after King James's death, Margaret Tudor and Archibald Douglas were wed. But there was one problem. James's Will had explicitly stated that Margaret would forfeit her regency the moment she remarried. Margaret would have been well aware of this clause in the Will when she married Archibald, and many see this as an inexplicable tactical blunder. There is no record of her exact reasoning.

Oversimplified guesses suggest she was blinded by love. That's probably too easy. It's not hard to imagine how Margaret could convince herself that a union between herself and an influential Scottish family dynasty would actually shore up her position rather than sabotage it. Legal technicalities be damned. Archibald was on the very Council of Nobles that would decide whether to honor the late Kempelieu.

King's will's stipulation. Also, she would have probably been aware of the fact that her brother down in England was already cooking up potential suitors for her to advocate his own political agenda. The window of opportunity for Margaret to set her own course was closing fast and she must have known it. Whatever the reason, the council did vote to revoke her region. and Margaret would soon lose custody of her children, James V and his baby brother, Alexander, who was born posthumously to King James IV. Margaret had been pregnant when he died. The man whom the council voted to pass the torch to was John Stewart, second Duke of Albany. Albany, though technically Scottish, was born in France,

and had never set foot in his father's home country until he rather reluctantly answered the call of duty to become regent. If it can be said that Margaret ever caught a lucky break in her life, it's that Albany's heart really wasn't ever in it. Scotland's new caretaker knew very little about the country and really just wanted to go home. but he was stuck in here until he could get the dust to settle. Unfortunately for him, Margaret was going to kick up a storm.

Albany's first objective as regent was to take possession of young James and Alexander. The regent wasn't really supposed to do much without the physical person of the king under his care. It was only a matter of time before he got his way, but Margaret made it absurdly hard. Using every tool at her disposal, she delayed and evaded until Albany was forced to confront her at Stirling Castle with an army of 7,000 men. He had her beat, but rather than quietly hand her sons over, she came to the gates in full queenly regalia and had three-year-old James V solemnly present the keys to the castle to Albany.

Margaret was a shrewd student of optics, and the image was clear. James was king, and Albany was an interloper. Margaret was taken to Edinburgh Castle as a virtual prisoner. The money troubles that had followed her since losing her regency would get even worse. She fell pregnant, escaped to England alone, and gave birth to a girl, Margaret Douglas. It was there living in relative poverty in her brother Henry's court that she received word that her baby boy Alexander had died. Even though Albany had agreed to restore some of her sources of income, Margaret hadn't actually seen any of it. She desperately wanted to get back to Scotland to reclaim her surviving son and her fortune.

In 1517, she got an opening when Albany left Scotland to return to France for an unspecified period of time. I told you, his heart wasn't quite in it. The power vacuum gave Margaret hope of reestablishing her influence in the Scottish Parliament. On her return trip, Margaret arrived at Newark Castle to discover that her husband, Archibald, whom she had not seen in person for some time, had been living lavishly with his ex-wife and current mistress, Jane Stewart, the woman whom his grandfather had convinced him to divorce for Margaret. It turned out Albany had restored Margaret's income after all, but it had been intercepted by Archie. He and his ex-slash-first-wife were living it up on Margaret's dime,

while she had spent the past year humbling herself before her self-righteous little brother. Margaret was irate, while a formal divorce would be off the table without permission from Henry the 8th, who was rather charmed by Archie and preferred to keep the ally, Margaret kept her distance. In the letters between the brother and sister discussing the matter, Henry reflected. a real 16th century, brose before ho's attitude that makes you want to take a shower. By 1523,

James V was 11 years old, and nearing the end of his minority, he would come into his full legal power at the age of 14. Margaret devised a plot to ostensibly kidnap him and bring him to Parliament to have him erected as a full king a few years early. The dramatic plan was to stage an attack on a nearby

Berg while James was out hunting and then whisk him away. Unfortunately, before she could pull the metaphorical trigger, Albany, the regent, returned from France, and Margaret lost her chance. terrified that Albany would hear of her scheme, Margaret wanted to flee back to England, but Henry wouldn't allow it. To try to win back Henry's favor, she became his spy. While writing letters of shallow and trivial matters through official channels, she simultaneously used back channels to send England intelligence about Albany's troop formations. A lot of the bad rap that Margaret gets for being air-headed and superficial derives from the subject matter in her correspondences, but that may have been by design.

During this period, she clearly wanted to fly under the radar. Had she been exposed for her double-agent behavior, it could have meant her execution. She once wrote to a confidant, for God's sake, keep her. my writing secret, for it is my destruction. Henry scarcely responded to his sister, which she took as a great insult. In reality, it's very possible that Albany knew about this betrayal all along, but outing Margaret would have rocked the boat and his primary motivation was still to leave this cold, damp country for good. The man who was once, heard to have said that he, quote, wished he had broken both of his legs before he had ever

set foot there, finally got his wish. In May of 1524, Albany departed Scotland for the final time. Legs intact. Margaret once again leapt at opportunity, and on July 26, 1524, James escaped from Stirling Castle, where he had been held by French guards put in place by Albany. United once again with his mother, he and Margaret rode into Edinburgh to cheers from the public. Albany's regency was formally ended, and James V became king in his own right with his mother at his side. This was a high point in Margaret's life. After over a decade of struggle, she had achieved everything she had fought for. The trick now was holding onto it. Around this time, Margaret took a secret lover, 29-year-old Henry Stewart. This was a risky thing to do, because even though Archibald had

literally never been faithful to her, and they spent nearly all of their marriage apart. There was, unsurprisingly, a huge double standard between men and women when it came to infidelity. Margaret's reputation was at stake, and possibly more, given that adultery still carried the death penalty in Scotland at the time, though enforcement was rare. When Margaret had cut off her husband Archie's passive income, he had run away down to Henry's court in England, and Margaret soon got word that Archie was coming back over the border, sent by Henry with a pledge to advance English interests and oppose France, and Archie was amassing men to his cause as he went. The threat of Archibald's next move loomed until the

the early morning of November 23rd, when Archie had his men scale the walls of Edinburgh and open the gates to him. Archie demanded to be let inside the castle. He wanted proximity to the young impressionable king. He claimed to come in peace. It was his wife's mistreatment that had driven him to such theatrics, an attempt to kidnap her son. Margaret, of course, was furious and ordered that the cannons be fired. Archibald and his men fled and were unharmed, but four innocent bystanders were killed, and Margaret lost face on the world stage. Henry, her brother, was especially irate. More unpopular and isolated than ever, Margaret had to turn to the absolute last person she wanted for an ally.

the guy who would have made the mouse from if you give a mouse a cookie blush. Good old Archie. As Margaret's grip on power waned, she decided her estranged husband, Archibald, was of more used to her as a defanged member of court than an outside influence, and so she brought him back into the fold with a reduced role. Maybe if she could frequently stand next to him,

someone even less popular than her in Parliament, it would remind everyone how much worse things could get. Archibald lobbied Henry VIII down in England with personal attacks against her, accusing Margaret of money-grubbing, infidelity, mood swings, and temper tantrums. His misogynistic campaign worked, and Henry wrote to Margaret, chastising her for her unwaifely behavior. Supposedly this reproach rocked Margaret so deeply that she ran to Sterling Castle to recover, or maybe to plot her next move. Either way, it was a blunder, because when Margaret missed the next session of Parliament,

Archibald seized on her absence to remove her as regent. He installed himself and three other nethered. nobles to rotate as James's guardian. Archie got first dibs, and, listener, you may be shocked to learn that when it came time for Archibald Douglas, 6th Duke of Angus, to hand King James V over to the next guardian in line, he straight up refused, and everyone just sort of let it happen. Archibald installed his family to every position of power that he could and used his stepson as a literal human shield

while traveling through unfriendly territory. Nobody was thrilled about it, but they couldn't risk harming the king, so all they could do was play nice while grumbling about how much they hated him. Margaret played nice with Archie at Parliament just for the opportunity to lay eyes, eyes on her son, even though, in her perspective, he had kidnapped him. The young king was also

none too happy. He wrote to his mother in secret, pleading for help. By 1526 at 14, James V had officially come of age, but Archibald and the rest of the Douglases were worried about the boy, who had come to loathe them, ascending to full power. They had the wolf by the ears, so to speak, and so they did everything they could to distract James from his duties while clinging to the levers of control. Hunting, drinking, and women were among the primary distractions. It must have worked for a time because King James refused to let his mother, Margaret's lover, Henry Stewart, join her household at court, and she was forced to return to Sterling Castle so they could live openly. Cold comfort eventually came, though, when Margaret was finally granted the annulment

that she had lobbied the Vatican for for so long. She married Henry Stewart immediately. The annulment and remarriage was a big blow to the Douglases, furious to be stripped of his dual positions, as brother-in-law to King Henry V and stepfather to King James V, Archibald demanded Margaret's daughter be returned to him, though at 12 years old she hardly knew her father. He brought James with him to lay siege to Margaret's castle with her inside.

Archibald's Achilles' heel seems to have been that the more time you spent with the guy, the more you saw him for the craven, power-hungry narcissist that he was. So it was only a matter of time before the newly empowered King James decided that he'd had enough. In 1528, he escaped Douglas custody while on a hunting trip. In echo of the scheme, his mother had devised years earlier. He rode to Stirling Castle and was warmly welcome, by Margaret. At his mother's suggestion, James declared Archie a traitor to the crown and seized all the Douglas' assets before laying siege to their last stronghold. He banned Archibald and every

other Douglas from coming within seven miles of him. Archibald would finally wither on the vine. Without physical possession of the king, he lost all influence. and legitimacy. In May of 1529, he fled with his and Margaret's daughter to England, where he would remain for 13 years, only returning after James V's death in 1542. Margaret lived in Scotland in relative peace for the rest of her life, which is not to say she was happy. Her marriage to Henry Stewart soured eventually, and her son kept her out of most of his decisions. Margaret's life was defined by a constant struggle for power and position that always seemed to slip away from her the moment she grasped it. In the brief windows where she held power,

little of lasting consequence was accomplished because she was always so preoccupied with the struggle to keep it. On the 18th of October, 1541, at the age of 51, Margaret Tudor died from complications resulting from a stroke. On her deathbed, she asked that her son come visit her, but he didn't arrive in time. She instructed that her belongings should go to her daughter, Margaret Douglas, but James ignored her wishes and her belongings reverted to the crown. Two, final bitter reminders of the respect she never actually commanded. Historians have been quick to paint Margaret Tudor as a superficial and inconsequential member of the Tudor family who created more problems for the Tudors than she solved.

She's usually reduced to her predisposition to complain and her obsession with keeping up appearances. But what if you have a lot to complain about, and nobody takes you seriously if you don't look rich? If my snobby younger brother got to be king of England, and then even after becoming a queen, I still had to fight for every tiny scrap of self-determination I got, I would probably be complaining a lot, too. All I'm saying is maybe there are no real heroes in this story, but if this was an Andy Cohen joint, I think I'd know who I'd want to sit with at the rap party. That's the story of Margaret Tudor, Queen of Scots, beleaguered sister of Henry the Eighth, but stick around after a brief sponsor break to hear how Margaret posthumously won the

last laugh over her brother. Henry the Eighth spent his reign obsessed with a couple of things. including propagating his royal bloodline and taming Scotland. Anything that stood in the way of those goals was a nuisance, and in his eyes Margaret was an unwelcome distraction from both of those aims. In the end, he was never able to bring his neighbor to the north to heal, and as you probably know, none of his three children would sire any offspring that could inherit the throne. The Tudor line would peter out within a generation, when Elizabeth I, accomplished as she was,

died without an heir. But both of those goals would be accomplished by Margaret's heirs. In 1603, Margaret's great-grandson, King James I of Scotland, also became James I, King of England and Ireland. He ruled Scotland for 57 years, and England and Ireland for an overlapping 22, controlling all three until his death. His descendants, Margaret's descendants, still sit on the throne at Buckingham Palace to this day. Whether you think the modern royals are worth caring about or not, I can probably say with a fair amount of certainty that Margaret Tudor's brother probably would have cared.

Noble Blood is a production of I-Heart Radio and Grimm and Mild from Aaron Manke. Noble Blood is hosted by me, Dana Schwartz. Writers for Noble Blood are Hannah Johnston, Hannah Zwick, Paul Jaffy, Natasha Lasky, and me, Dana Schwartz. The show is edited and produced by Jesse Funk and Nome's Gripen, with supervising producer Rima Il Kali, and executive producers Aaron Manky, Trevor Young, and Matt Frederick. For more podcasts from IHeartRadio, visit the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. This is an I-heart podcast, guaranteed human.