MacBeth - Scottish History - The Last Highland King

if you mention the nameless Beth most people would immediately think the Shakespeare play without realizing that Macbeth was actually a real historical figure the story that that the historical figure is actually quite fascinating and also covers one of the most neglected eras in history that of Dark Age Scotland one of the problems with telling the story of Macbeth is there are virtually no surviving historical records or histories but they're just fleeting mentions often of no more than a single sentence in the various chronicles of the time such as the annals of Ulster the annals of Tiger nach or even the writings of Marianna SCOTUS and it's only by assembling all of these fleeting mentions that we can hope to try and piece together this man's life so by tying together all of these documents I hope to give an insight into a very very little-known era of Scottish history at the dawn of the 11th century Scotland was a declining nation and one that really shouldn't have survived at all it was little over half the size of modern-day Scotland and surrounded by enemies on all sides and within it was equally divided it was divided into Highland and lowland and then again into Mon now Otto Daan's each of these Eldon's had little in common with each other except the mutual hatred and treachery towards one another to the north the Hebrides and albany islands as well as part of the mainland case ness was in the hands of the Northland these were ever building up strength to both raid and snatch more Scottish territory to the south worth England and the powerful Oldham of Northumbria the traditional phone with his greedy eyes ever on taking territory from the lowlands of Scotland to the west was the independent kingdom of Strathclyde which covered Strathclyde in Scotland but also Cumbria in northwest England Strathclyde was going through a mini renaissance and was a jagged form in scotland side but first of all King Canute was building his Scandinavian Empire and was intent in adding the Scottish crown along with those of Denmark Norway and England Scotland only Hansa life with a thread within Scotland the moor mayor in principle owed fealty to the king who could call upon them to defend Scotland from foreign invaders among these old one stood out in power the northerly province of Mauri Mauri then stretched from the west coast to the East Coast and encompassed almost the entire of the Grampian mountains the power of morai rivaled that of the king himself technically the Earl of Moray was still a vassal of the king so the Irish chronicles always refer to him as the king of Moray reflecting the fact that the earl of mine was virtually an independent monarch of the highlands throughout medieval history the kingship at Scotland was always a bloody business more a matter of plots and assassinations than rightful succession in the 11th century never was this more true so precarious was the position of Scotland at a single wing link and the nation would succumb to the warts that surrounded it just as Edward the first Empire in England collapsed when it fell apart in the hands of his son Edward the second or as Henry the fifth conquest of France were left in the hands of the infant envy the sick one weak ruler of Scotland and it would be overrun Scotland avoided this by not practicing primogeniture primogeniture has become very familiar to us in modern times we tend to assume that this is how it was always practiced that the throne would pass from father to eldest son however in the past various other systems were used one of these with dentistry which was still practiced in Scotland in the 11th century chemistry worked where a Scottish King warlord or Oh would name at renée's as he there the Tenet's was an adult selected from among the lords larger family group the Tenet's would be an adult proven in battle and capable of ruling the Tenet's would come from his extended family including brothers nephews uncle's sons spep sons cousins etc which would have the effect that the extended family of the Lord or King during the height of his reign would be in a constant state of brutal struggle with each other to be the Tenet's when the noble in question died in an ideal world the Tenet's would become the Lord and often slaughter his entire extended family to secure that position more often than not though a relative not named Tonia's would get in first murdering both the Lord and his Tenet's proving him even more ruthless and Kellee and fit to rule when a new Lord or King or L came to power he then immediately had to find an extended family himself to begin the struggle to succeed him family ties were given a very low priority and adoption or by marrying widows with sons was good to DES just as a legitimate way of getting Italians as with blood relatives so in many ways Scotland owed its continued existence to social Darwin at least practiced by the ruling class this land was the world but Beth was born into around ten hundred and five the son of thinlit Makua read the Earl of Moray little is known about eel ancestry but it's possible he was the grandson of king malcolm ii of scotland through his mother when macbeth was around fifteen his father was murdered by his cousin who became ill and began the natural slaughter of his entire extended family one of the advantages of tennis tree unlike primogeniture his children are usually spared from the slaughter this is because children on those threats because they don't have any experience in battles to qualify them as kanae's but let Beth at the age of 15 was old enough to be considered a threat and disposed off the young was Beth however seems to have had his head screwed on and managed to flee south to the sanctuary of the Court of Malcolm the second there the young macbeth resided in Malcolm's Court for at least a decade finding both favor and high office he said yes he was quite capable in 1031 he has mentioned as one of the emissaries sent by Malcolm the second to commute delivering Malcolm submission after commutes invasion of Scotland along with two other Scottish Kings a year later macbeth Scorch was so strong he was able to raise an army and march on Moray itself to avenge his father's murder and become earl arriving with a band of men he caught the current Oh his cousin Gilliam come gain his father's assassin by surprise Gilliam kong gaem took refuge in one of his strongholds which Macbeth surrounded with his men set the stronghold on fire and burned gillich on gain and 50 of his men to death Macbeth was now Earl of Moray the second most powerful man in Scotland he had served his king for over a decade and proven himself a canny and ruthless politician as well as a capable commander he probably considered himself a good candidate to be named kanae's by Malcolm however Malcolm was about to drop a bombshell on both Macbeth and Scotland in 1034 Malcolm the second dive on his deathbed he abolished chemistry and adopted primogeniture in common with many European countries as the legitimate method of succession malcolm named his young improved and grandson Duncan as he there his own son being ineligible having joined an order of monks this would have been all well and good if Duncan had been proven a good King but Duncan drained was quickly to turn into a series of disasters the first of these shortly after becoming king and probably very aware of the facts he needed to prove himself uncle made an overly bold move invading the territory of the north to the north now no details of what this boldness to the north was or any military campaign or Gungans survived at around about the same time the saga of Orkney Inger Kias telling the story of a massive Scottish attempt to regain the islands and their calamitous defeat in the final battle so catch we can assume this was the aggressive move that funkin made that ended in disaster anyway after Duncan's defeat his position was very weakened Duncan's decided to remedy this by going on the offense again and in ten thirty nine he struck a bun to the self against his main foes the northumbrian this time he led the forces personally length each to Durham however the siege quickly deteriorated into a shambles adversity held out the besieging scotch ran out of supplies and retreated in chaos the only surviving account of the event is in the historia ecclesia Dan a melon thief it reads Dunican king of the Scots advance with countless multitude of troops and laid siege to Durham and made strenuous but ineffective attempts to carry it for a large proportion of his cavalry was slain by the besieged and he was put to a disorderly flight in which he lost all of his foot soldiers whose heads were collected in the marketplace and hung up on the posts not long afterwards the same king upon his return to Scotland was murdered by his own countrymen so we can see the account not only tells us of the disaster in more Umbria but it also tells us of Duncan's murder we know that my best became king after Duncan's murder but the account also makes another suggestion that when it says he was murdered by his countrymen that perhaps was that wasn't working alone but actually had the consent of the other Earl's in fact the fact that Macbeth scoop never resulted in a civil war and followed to calamitous defeats just suggest that the other URLs were supporting with their that sentence is also the only account of the death of we have and it's from that one sentence a certain mr. Shakespeare got an entire play well there's no account of Duncan's death itself there are no announcements of his death were made around the country in several chronicles in the 1040 entry in the annals of Ulster a simple sentence says don cat son of Crenn and king of alba was killed by his own people the annals of tige notch reported duncan was killed and image your age with no us no further elaboration the chronicle of Melrose states why Macbeth the son of bin liqu he was struck down the mortally wounded King died in Elgin in Moray while the chronicler Mariana SCOTUS wrote can the King of Scotland was killed in the autumn by his Earl with bear fin likes and these few sentences perhaps give us some insight into which we can work out how Duncan died the first one is the fact that he says Duncan died in Moray not in the lowlands of Scotland suggest that Duncan maybe took the initiative against the rebel Macbeth and March to attack him the fact that he was mortally wounded suggests he died in battle also finally a local legend suggests that Duncan died a battle called off gained fame and was taken to a blacksmith's hut where he died of his wounds which means the actual events of that death killing Duncan was very different to what Shakespeare wrote with Duncan dead Macbeth was now King of Scotland however the hereditary heir of Duncan was Duncan some Malcolm Campbell who became himself King however Malcom Kenmore could raise no support and Scotland supported Macbeth on the throne another indication that the best came to the throne with the support of the other roles apparently Malcolm Canmore and his brother tried to gain support for a rebellion against my flesh for two years and failed they then went into exile in Northumbria in England the first serious challenge to my best friend came in 1045 when Duncan's father Krillin who was the abbot of Dunkeld a position that commanded substantial resources organized what could be described as a sizeable rebellion which left 180 of his men dead why Macbeth left crinoline in such a strong position when he had usurped his son is a mystery was crinoline one of the Lords that supporting was neck scoop in Scotland's darkest hour against his son wasn't that still ruling independently enough from the other girls to be allowed to dispose of him or was my best showing a fatal weakness by not brutally deposing his enemies something he notably didn't do to many of the others who would be a party to his downfall after the failure of Quinlan's rebellion the middle years of Macbeth rule seemed to have been one of relative stability and prosperity in 1052 he shows great statesmanship when Edward the Confessor sold all the Normans from England Macbeth granted and refuge and lands and many of them loyally served in to the end there is virtually no information whatsoever about the middle period of the Bexar all except yoni clear mention is in the prophecy of virgin and this gives us a rather interesting picture of it Beck it says the ruddy-faced King will possess Scotland the strong one was fair yellow hair and tall brim full of food was Scotland east and west during the reign of the ruddy brave King this account not only tells us about what's got them would like but gives us our only image of the man himself strong brave and ruddy meaning red-faced perhaps with rage if this is added to talk fair with long blonde hair a picture of a huge terrifying warrior emerges the kind of man the 4G country in a violent age the line brim full of food suggests what the facts seems that support Scotland was a stable and prosperous land during this time in fact so stable that in 1049 but there felt secure enough to leave Scotland and go on pilgrimage to Rome leaving a country was a big deal for any medieval King Prather Macbeth with the Pretender Malcolm can ma exiled in Scotland's main rival Northumbria this was a bold move of a confident man assured in his position Macbeth arrived in Rome in Easter at 10:50 where he visited the poor areas of the city and scattered so much silver in the streets it was written about by the monks in Hamburg why he went on this pilgrimage was less clear as a Norman Ally was he seeking more favor from the Pope against England was it to try and get pope to legitimize his rule over milk and canmore or maybe it was just genuinely pious however it was in towards the end of Malcolm's reign discontent began to emerge in Scotland the reasons for this are unknown but for the first time Malcolm can more found support for his cause in Scotland and he was to return to haunt Levesque else II would of Northumbria had harbored kennel for many years but not out of kindness the card to play in the prolonged struggle between the two realms and he decided to play it the anglo-saxon Chronicle reports this year when C would be Earl with a great army into Scotland both we ship forth and land force and fought against the Scots I put to fight King Macbeth and flew all were his chief men in the land and led events much booty such as no man before had obtained but his son was fun and his sister's son he would and some of his have scars and also the Kings were found slain on the day of the Seven Sleepers so he would and camera rode at the head of a large army into Scotland and defeated Macbeth however is not this straightforward amongst the northumbrian army were a lot of personal troops of Edward the Confessor we suggest it was in English not a northumbrian orchestrated invasion perhaps in response to Macbeth harboring of the Normans by the standards of the day the invading force was huge the Northumbrian Chronicle itself paints a vivid picture a large Northumbrian fleet led by Kenmore captured the city of Dundee and was joined by Scottish rebels including course they marched out of the plains of galway Eyre they marched out of the plains of go wire past the capital scone and Edinburgh probably pillaging in an attempt to force my best to face them the best presumably having to ride up and down the country to muster enough forces to fight such a huge invasion the campaign was recorded as being costly in men to both sides and in cold and culminated in one of the most massive battles seen today in Scotland the Battle of Seven Sleepers at Dunsinane the Northumbrian chronic hotels lit loved about itself but that Macbeth forces charged down from the hills at the north Umbreon and were put to fly the annals of Ulster record as many as 3,000 Scottish dead 1,500 English dead and all of Macbeth Normans wiped out the Battle of Seven Sleepers but can mark in firm control of the lowlands for the English this was enough who made a separate peace we went back and returned home with their booty leaving Kenmore with only his own forces Kenmore now without English support lack the power to venture into the Islands confronts Macbeth meanwhile what Beth still love more a the most powerful album in Scotland retreated to the security of his Highland Kingdom where he mounted a guerrilla war against kenmore raiding south for three years Macbeth carried out his walks leading ambitious Ray's deep down into the lowland and then retreating north assured the lowlands could never follow him but he was proven wrong in 10:57 Malcolm Kenmore managed a leader force across the Grampian mountains and ambushed the unsuspecting the best in the village of Phnom phen and deep in Moray had he returned home from a southern for a well Beth was slain in the battle but best died in 10:57 at the age of 52 in thinking of Scotland for 17 years it is always said with the death of Macbeth dentistry in Scotland as Malcolm Kenmore and his descendants ruled in primogeniture from then on however in a great twist of irony it was perhaps but Beth himself who ended it but Beth was succeeded by his son who lacked often known as LULAC foolish he was never crowned knee Lac survives his father by only seven months before Kenmore invaded Moray and slew him whereas kennel himself was succeeded by his brother briefly before his son Macbeth may not have been the last kanae's walnut of Scotland but he was actually the last Highlander ever to rule Scotland if you enjoyed this broadcast please click the like button and subscribe to the channel and I'll be back with some more obscure history hopefully in a week or two

Channel: The Lost Antiquarian

Views: 16,821

Rating: 4.8861208 out of 5

Keywords: History of Scotland, Scottish History, Scotland, History, MacBeth

Id: rFVVxI9a3qU

Length: 19min 21sec (1161 seconds)

Published: Wed Mar 01 2017