PhD Thesis—Neither Scotland nor England: Middle Britain, c.850–1150

This is the first full-length study of Scottish royal government in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries ever to have been written. It uses untapped legal evidence to set out a new narrative of governmental development. Between 1124 and 1290, the way in which kings of Scots ruled their kingdom transformed. By 1290 accountable officials, a system of royal courts, and complex common law procedures had all been introduced, none of which could have been envisaged in 1124. The Shape of the State in Medieval Scotland, 1124-1290 argues that governmental development was a dynamic phenomenon, taking place over the long term. For the first half of the twelfth century, kings ruled primarily through personal relationships and patronage, only ruling through administrative and judicial officers in the south of their kingdom. In the second half of the twelfth century, these officers spread north but it was only in the late twelfth century that kings routinely ruled through institutions. Throughout this period of profound change, kings relied on aristocratic power as an increasingly formal part of royal government. In putting forward this narrative, Alice Taylor refines or overturns previous understandings in Scottish historiography of subjects as diverse as the development of the Scottish common law, feuding and compensation, Anglo-Norman 'feudalism', the importance of the reign of David I, recordkeeping, and the kingdom's military organisation. In addition, she argues that Scottish royal government was not a miniature version of English government; there were profound differences between the two polities arising from the different role and function aristocratic power played in each kingdom. The volume also has wider significance. The formalisation of aristocratic power within and alongside the institutions of royal government in Scotland forces us to question whether the rise of royal power necessarily means the consequent decline of aristocratic power in medieval polities. The book thus not only explains an important period in the history of Scotland, it places the experience of Scotland at the heart of the process of European state formation as a whole.

The Medieval History Journal, 2013

Northern History, 2015

The extent to which southern kings of England, from the tenth century onwards, were able to claim authority over the kingdom of Northumbria, is a question of considerable importance in any consideration of the unification of England in the Anglo-Saxon period. Scholars have previously made use of a range of historical evidence in the pursuit of answers, including the testimony of, for example, narrative texts, coins and place-names. But the royal charters and diplomas of Anglo-Saxon Northumbria have never before been harnessed in such discussions and this article examines what they reveal about structures of power within England and likewise within Northumbria itself.*

Scottish Historical Review, 1998

One of the major trends in Western European historiography in the last twenty years has been a fascination with territorial expansion and with the consolidation of the nascent national states of the late medieval and early modern period. Writers have attempted to examine the methods by which autonomous territories were progressively brought under central control and integrated with core territories, and by which conquered territories were divorced from their old allegiance and brought under the control of the conquering power. Interest in this process has grown in step with the realisation that it was far from the straightforward absorption once imagined. This has stemmed in large part from the general realisation of the 1960s and 1970s that local political society was more independent and less responsive to central direction than high-political history had previously assumed. The consequence of such work has been to emphasise that the processes of conquest, coalescence and integration were slow ones, cautiously entered upon and enacted by both central and local elites. An important example of this approach is the volume Conquest and Coalescence, edited by Mark Greengrass and published in 1991.' In his introduction, Greengrass emphasised 'how cautious and prudent Europe's statemakers often were, how dominated by the historical logic of the state tradition of the past in their own regions, even when faced with fortuitous and manifestly opportune circumstances in which to increase their authority and impose their wi11.,2Christian Desplat, for example, described how in the seventeenth century 'the [French] monarchy displayed considerable flexibility in its attitude towards the Estates of Beam and, although it reduced its power, it did so without fuss ... it would be wrong to imagine that the relationships between I M. Greengrass (ed.), Conquest and Coalescence: The Shaping of the State in Early Modern Europe (London, 1991). 2 M. Greengrass, 'Introduction: conquest and coalescence', ibid., 6.

Northern Scotland, 1994

charters, episcopal registers, university records, medieval chronicles and place names from the Gough Map, Professor Barrow argues that however obscured by the difficult geography of the country, with its mountains, fast rivers, bogs, and its many arms of the sea running far inland, it is still possible to discern a complex pattern of routes which existed throughout medieval Scotland by land and water. His essay on 'Popular Courts' follows a similar pattern: an enquiry, stimulated by a question put by Cosmo Innes in one of his Lectures on Scotch Legal Antiquities, as to whether early Scotland ever had local gatherings which could be equivalated to the English Court of the Hundred or Tithing. Using the evidence of words like Couthal and CuthilJ (Gaelic, ComhdhaiT) meaning assembly, which can be found in some sixty place names scattered throughout Scotland, he suggests a number of these look very much like meeting places where law enforcements and settlements of disputes took place. Many tributes have rightly been paid to Geoffrey Barrow's contribution to medieval Scottish history since his recent retirement as Fraser Professor of Scottish History and Palaeography at the University of Edinburgh; nor is it difficult to see why, looking at this sample of his prodigious output. Scholarship like his will inspire historians for many years to come. LESLIE J. MACFARLANE Medieval Scotland. Crown, Lordship and Community. Essays presented to G.W.S. Barrow. Edited by Alexander Grant and Keith J. Stringer. Pp.xvi, 319. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. 1993. £25.00. This magnificent tribute to Professor Barrow brings together the work of two generations of Scottish medieval historians. The first, represented by such luminaries as Grant Simpson, Archibald Duncan, Donald Watt and Bruce Webster (and epitomised by Geoffrey Barrow himself), came to prominence in the 1950s and '60s. It was responsible for establishing Scottish medieval studies as a subject in its own right, deserving of scholarly examination. The second, represented here by the editors, Alexander Grant and Keith Stringer, as well as by other contributors, has carried on that tradition, and continues to flourish in centres of higher education both in Britain and North America, thanks largely to the tutelage and influence of Professor Barrow. Geoffrey BarroWs seminal research has led him to explore virtually every region of the northern kingdom, and to turn his critical skills to a wide variety of areas of enquiry. Both facets of his efforts are well attested in the thirteen essays collected here. Traditions first created by medieval chroniclers, then perpetuated by antiquarian studies, are subjected to the scrutiny and re-evaluation which informs so much of Barrow's own writings. Thus, Alan Macquarrie's reconstruction of the genealogy of the kings of Strathclyde demonstrates that Fordun's claims for the office as a stepping stone to the throne of the king of Scots was erroneous, and his essay does much to bestow on the ancient kingdom a history of its own. Similarly, Bruce Webster's energetic review of the nature of the English occupation of Scotland in the 1330s shows that the episode was no mere 'aftermath' of the victory achieved by Robert Bruce, but rather that it was 'an integral part of the Wars of Independence'. One of the central themes of Professor Barrow's work has been the commingling of Celtic and feudal, or Anglo-Norman, influences in high medieval Scotland, nowhere more

The impact and legacy of Scottish raiding of Northern England during the First Scottish War of Independence has been the subject of significant study. English evidence in particular provides quite detailed accounts of the extent of the raids of Robert Bruce and his commanders, the amount of money and goods taken, and the impact that such raids had on the economy and society of this region. Considerably less analysis has focused, however, on the raids undertaken by Scottish commanders during the next phase of conflict, in particular in the later 1330s and 1340s. In part this is because the Neville’s Cross campaign (1346), which acts as an endpoint for this phase of raiding, casts a long shadow and affects the perception of this period of Scottish warfare. Moreover, the relatively short duration of this raiding phase has ensured that it remains a less-appreciated element in discussions of this period of Anglo-Scottish conflict. I would argue, however, that these raids deserve to be re-examined in order to better understand the nature, extent and impact of these attacks on the English countryside during a period when English focus was increasingly drawn towards France. In particular, this paper will consider the depiction of these raids in English sources and the picture that the available evidence presents of these incursions. It is the contention of this paper that: the English north returned to something like the dark days of the 1310s, and that its people quite seamlessly recommenced paying protection money to Scottish raiders to be left in peace; that local lords could not be depended upon to defend the region from Scottish depredations; and that this was a period when the English crown largely abandoned the English north to its fate and northern Englishmen to deal with the Scots as best they could.

2015

Innes Review, vol.71 (2), pp.270–302, 2020

The society of the Kingdom of the Scots in the central Middle Ages has long been viewed as experiencing a transition from `old', `Celtic' ways to `new' English norms. This process was once neatly described as `Normanisation', and if such straightforward terms have been abandoned, historians nevertheless still tend to portray political, social, legal, cultural and religious traits of that society as either `Celtic' or `Anglo-Norman'. Recent work on ethnicity in general, and on the ways medieval people often used ethnic identity for political purposes in particular, necessitates a new approach to the society of the kingdom's heartland, north of the Forth. This thesis examines the aristocracy of Scotland north of Forth through the lens of Europeanization, a conceptual framework that is less insular than previous models and more nuanced in its understanding of the role of ethnicity in the sweeping changes that took place across Europe in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. This thesis seeks to examine the Europeanizing themes of the spread of charters, the adoption of common European names and the interaction of the chivalric `aristocratic diaspora' with local landholding society through the methodology of prosopography. The role of aristocratic landholders as grantors, witnesses and recipients of charters was studied, based on an analysis of the texts of over 1500 aristocratic, royal and ecclesiastical documents relating to Scotland north of Forth, dating from circa 1100 to circa 1260. The Appendix is a list of all non-royal, non-ecclesiatical (or `private') charters, agreements, brieves and similar documents, catalogued herein for the first time. The results of this study are twofold. First, the thesis involves a degree of reappraisal, in which phenomena which were seen previously as pertaining to either `native' or `Norman' trends are instead examined as part of a single Scottish society. Second, this thesis offers several new findings based on the prosopographical analysis of the charter material, which help to hone our understanding for how Europeanization worked in Scotland. It is now clear that, while the adoption of charters should certainly be seen as a Europeanizing trend, their use by aristocratic landholders followed several stages, none of which adhered to any ethnic bias. This study reveals the prominence of networks in spreading charter use, including one focussed around Countess Ada and other related countesses, in the early stages of aristocratic charter use. Furthermore, the important component of Europeanization, whereby `peripheral' peoples took up common European personal names, can be qualified in the case of Scotland north of Forth, where the society Author's Declaration 9 Abbreviations 10 One: Ethnicity and the Study of Medieval Scotland 17 Conceptual frameworks 17 Methodology 26 Two: The Use of Charters by Scottish landholders 34 The advent of charter use in the Scottish kingdom 34 Aristocratic grantors and monastic beneficiaries 45 Aristocratic charters to other laypeople 59 Three: Personal Names and Scottish Society 64 Problems with using personal names as evidence for ethnicity 66 Prosopographical analysis of personal names 74 Other approaches to personal names as evidence 87 Four: Social Networks and the Aristocracy 115 Groups in landholding society 118 Networks and connections 136 Case studies, contexts and trends 147 Five: Social contexts 169 Patterns of landholding 170 Physical settings and social contexts 186 Six: The Nature of Scottish Europeanization 216 Appendix: A list of non-royal, non-ecclesiastical charters 222 from Scotland north of Forth, circa 1150-1260. Bibliography 247 1. Primary sources 247 2. Secondary sources 254 5 List of Tables and Graphs 1.1 Types of non-royal, non-ecclesiastical charters 1.2 Sources of non-royal, non-ecclesiastical charter texts 31 2.1 Trends in the adoption of charter use in Scotland 37 2.2 The first extant royal charters to lay tenants north of Forth, ca. 1160-ca. 1180 2.3 Beneficiaries of aristocratic charters, 1150-1200 2.4 Beneficiaries by monastery, grants, confirmations and quitclaims to circa 1210 2.5 Top twelfth-century grantors of extant charter texts 48 relating to Scotland north of Forth 2.6 Agnes and Morgrund of Mar's charters to 50 St Andrews Priory, ca. 1160-78 2.7 Earls and royal charter attestations in Scotland, 1124 to 53 1214 2.8 Earls with highest number of attestations 1124 to 1214 54 2.9 Non-royal, non-ecclesiastical charters, according to 60 charter median date 2.10 Numbers of documents from lay landholders, to laypeople 62 3.1 Occurrence of all names 74 3.2 Gender of names versus sex of individuals 75 3.3 Most frequently-attested male names 76 3.4 Personal Nameslocal and European 78 3.5 Most frequently-attested female names 80 3.6 Percentage of individuals with post-1000 English and 81 Scottish royal names 3.7 Proportion of individuals with religious names 84 5.1 Parishes and thanes in the Meares 181 5.2 Evidence for thanages and royal lordship in the Mearns 183 5.3 Sworn perambulators or `good men': 6 examples 212 5.4 `Witnesses' to the ceremony 214 6 List of Genealogical Trees Chapter Two Genealogical Trees 2.1 The countess network 52 2.2 Earl David and his connections in donors to Lindores Abbey 57 Chapter Four Genealogical Trees 4.1 Earls of Angus, earls of Caithness and lords of Ogilvie 155 4.2 Earls of Atholl 156 4.3 Scottish earls and Anglo-French baronial families 157 4.4