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26-421: A mythical battle took place: "in 767, between King Solvathius rightful king of Scotland and a pretender Donald Bane . The victory was so nearly Donald's when a certain noble man, disdaining to see so bad a cause have good successe, struck in for the king and turned the fortunes of the day. When the king inquired about the knight who had done such valuable service, somebody exclaimed 'Sholto du glasse!'...'Behold

52-538: A hearing at the Papal Curia , on the Scottish side of the debate on Edward I of England 's claims, and at least helped prepare material dealing with the mythological history that was being adduced as relevant, on both sides. The question of the antiquity of the Scottish royal lineage, and even the details of the associated origin myth , became particularly significant from 1542 when Mary, Queen of Scots came to

78-533: A publication now in the public domain :  " Fergus I ". Dictionary of National Biography . London: Smith, Elder & Co. 1885–1900. John Elder (writer) John Elder ( fl. 1542 – 1565) was a Scottish cartographer and writer. He was the tutor of Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley in England. Elder was a native of Caithness . He passed twelve years of his life at the universities of St. Andrews , Aberdeen , and Glasgow , and appears to have entered

104-513: Is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Solvathius The Scottish Renaissance humanist George Buchanan gave a long list of Scottish Kings in his history of Scotland—published in Latin as Rerum Scoticarum Historia in 1582 —most of whom are now considered by historians to be figures of legend, or completely misrepresented. The list went back around 1900 years from his time, and began with Fergus I . James VI of Scotland , who

130-520: Is addressed to Mr. Secretary Paget, dated from Newcastle upon Tyne , 6 October 1545. This gives an account of the operations of the army under the command of the Earl of Hertford in the invasion of Scotland between 8 and 23 September 1545, minutely detailing their daily proceedings, with a list of the towns, villages and steadings burnt each day. He mentions that the Governor of Scotland, Regent Arran ,

156-405: Is very severe on David Beaton , denouncing him as the pestiferous cardinal, and his bishops as blind and ignorant; in the subscription he styles himself clerk and a 'redshank,' meaning by the latter designation, it is supposed, 'a roughfooted Scot or highlander.' Presumably for this writing, "John Elder, Redshank Scott" was given a reward of £5 on 12 August 1547. Another surviving letter by Elder

182-455: The Guelf faction of that city. This article relating to a Celtic myth or legend is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . This biography of a Scottish peer or noble is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . This Scottish history -related article is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . This article relating to a European folklore

208-617: The Kingdom of Dalriada , extending in present-day terms from western Scotland to part of Ireland. See list of Kings of Dál Riata . But the Kingdom of Scotland (i.e. Alba ) was not a historical reality until Kenneth MacAlpin created it in the year 843, and what was said about his predecessors in the list by Buchanan may have little historical foundation. The list of Kings of the Picts includes other historical figures reigning in parallel with

234-441: The Kingdom of Scotland . Much fictional material had been introduced into these lists by the humanist Hector Boece , writing half a century before Buchanan. Peter Hume Brown in his biography of Buchanan describes him as somewhat more sceptical than Boece in what he accepted as historical; but less so than John Mair , writing earlier. Buchanan has been called inconsistent in his treatment of classical sources since his rejection of

260-468: The Dalriada kings, in other areas of what is now Scotland. The critical Essay (1729) of Innes, while demolishing the king-list going back to Boece, substituted in part kings of the Picts, and is now regarded as questionable in its own way. Innes was a Jacobite and concerned therefore to lay emphasis on legitimacy of descent and primogeniture . [REDACTED]  This article incorporates text from

286-522: The Royal Line of Scotland against Lloyd, and a sequel the next year against Edward Stillingfleet , who had given a sceptical account of Boece's history in Chapter V of his Origines Britannicae . The work of Innes, which in effect terminated the scholarly debate, was published in 1729, but the tradition continued. Subsequently, John Pinkerton and William Forbes Skene contributed to the study of

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312-451: The Scot described by Nicholas Throckmorton at the coronation of Francis II of France (or was it more surely ARTHUR LALLART). Throckmorton wrote on 19 September 1559 that Elder had described the policy of Edmund Bonner Bishop of London and Cardinal Pole in the time of Mary I of England to Charles, Cardinal of Lorraine . He added that Elder was "as great a praticer, and as dangerous for

338-411: The Scottish throne. Buchanan alluded to Mary's long ancestry in his Epithalamium written for her 1559 marriage to Francis II of France . In the period before Mary's betrothal, a marriage to Prince Edward, the future Edward VI of England , was much discussed. As part of that debate, the list of legendary kings of Britain became involved, in the form of the "Brutus myth", promoted by Edward Hall over

364-498: The aspye where he listitht". Elder joined Lord Darnley and his wife Mary, Queen of Scots in August 1565, travelling from Flanders, according to a letter of the Earl of Bedford He presented to Henry VIII , or Edward VI a 'plot' or map of the realm of Scotland , being a description of all the chief towns, castles, and abbeys in each county and shire, with the situation of the principal isles. In an accompanying letter to Henry, Elder

390-622: The black man!'." In the story of Sholto Douglas, his youngest son Marius Douglas  [ it ] is a commander of forces sent by the mythical Scottish king Achaius , to the court of Charlemagne to aid him in his wars against Desiderius , King of the Lombards . Marius Douglas is said to have settled in Piacenza where his descendants the Marescotti family  [ it ] became powerful local magnates, and eventual leaders of

416-471: The chronicles of Buchanan and John Knox as "infamous invectives". The king-list of the Historia was, therefore, in that work, only incidental to Buchanan's purpose in the book, whatever later uses it may have been put to. After the later scholarly work of Thomas Innes , this list was given little credence in its initial parts. It was, however, the culmination of centuries of development of king-lists for

442-531: The doubts of Polydore Vergil . Publicists on the English side of the argument, including John Elder , James Henrisoun , and William Lamb, had cast doubt on Scottish history. When James VI entered Edinburgh in 1579 the pageantry included a public posting of the genealogy of the Scottish kings; and when his son Charles I visited in 1633, portraits of 107 kings were displayed, some of which (by George Jamesone ) survive. Another series of 110 imagined portraits of

468-698: The king-lists. Reference works continued, however, to copy Buchanan's list, and the mythological history took many years to drop out of circulation, persisting in print as factual well into the 19th century (for example the fourth edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica (1810), the Encyclopædia Perthensis (1816), the London Encyclopedia (1829), and the individual kings in reference books by George Crabb and John Platts ). See list of Scottish monarchs for

494-509: The legend of Gathelus does not extend to the early Scottish kings, who are equally unsupported by classical authors. Writers who perpetuated the Boece tradition, as put into form by Buchanan, included: The antiquity of the line was attacked by William Lloyd , who argued that Scotland was not settled before the 6th century; George Mackenzie published the 1685 Defence of the Antiquity of

520-468: The matters of England, as any that I know." Throckmorton advised Elizabeth to have Elder's English acquaintance watched. In 1561, Elder told one of the servants of the Earl of Lennox that he had shown Darnley's juvenile handwriting to Mary, Queen of Scots when she was in France. The servant, possibly Thomas Bishop, was distrustful of him and thought he had the wit to be a spy, "he haitht wytt to playe

546-516: The ministry. He went to England soon after the death of James V of Scotland in 1542. At Mary's accession Elder turned Roman Catholic, as is apparent from a letter addressed to Robert Stewart , bishop-elect of Caithness. He sent with it verses and adages written with the hand of Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley , the bishop's nephew, Elder then being with Darnley, who was not yet nine years of age, at Temple Newsam , Yorkshire. He refers to Darnley's noble parents as his patrons. This John Elder seems to be

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572-535: The monarchs from the list was painted for Charles II by Jacob de Wet II , and hung in Holyrood Palace . The de Wet portrait collection later became a noted sight for tourists, for example as written about by John Macky , A Journey through Scotland . While Rerum Scoticarum Historia was published only in the year of Buchanan's death, he had worked on it during much of his life. It was published with his De jure regni apud Scotos , first printed in 1579. Of

598-484: The two works, the Historia for Buchanan served as a source of precedents on dealing with bad kings (tyrants in the list inevitably come to a sorry end at the hands of the people, in line with Buchanan's monarchomach position), while the De jure is cast as a humanist dialogue between Buchanan himself and Thomas Maitland , and concentrates on classical exemplars. Both works were dedicated to James VI. King James came to regard

624-622: The view of contemporary historians of Scotland. The first historical figure in Buchanan's list is Caratacus . The rediscovery of the works of Tacitus prompted Boece to include this well-attested figure from the period of the Roman occupation of Britain. The last legendary figure is more complex to discuss. The kings in the list from about the 6th century (in the Fifth Book of Buchanan) onwards may have some relationship to historical figures in

650-454: Was Buchanan's pupil, adopted the story of Fergus I as his ancestor, and the antiquity of the line was emphasised by the House of Stuart . The genealogy of Scottish kings, going back to Fergus mac Ferchar (i.e. Fergus I ) and beyond, was in place by the middle of the 13th century when it was recited at the 1249 inauguration of Alexander III of Scotland . In 1301 Baldred Bisset was involved in

676-412: Was sick with 'colic & stone', physicians checked his water, and he could not ride. As a New Years gift to Lord Robert Stewart , Bishop of Caithness , Elder wrote a description of the wedding of Mary I of England and Philip II of Spain . This was printed in 1555 as, The copie of a letter sent in to Scotlande of the arivall and landynge, and most noble marryage of ... Philippe, prynce of Spaine to

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