THE SCOTTISH PLAY

In this day and age, we have the plague known as spin-doctors. But four centuries ago, when the ruling classes held a much tighter grip on what the plebs could and could not know, they had something even more effective - Shakespeare. The Bard of Avon is well-known for his blatantly pro-Lancastrian interpretation of the Wars of the Roses, but when his Tudor mistress (Elizabeth I) was replaced with a Stuart master (James I), he proved equally adept at 'changing' history. Stand by then for Macbeth - the truth!

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To understand the events of eleventh-century Scotland, it is first necessary to understand something of what led up to it. The Scottish monarchy had been founded in 843 by Kenneth (I) Macalpin, who from his base in the Kintyre-based kingdom of Dalriada had taken over the much larger Pictish kingdom of Alba to the north. His 'Scotland' (a term that was never used until much later) had to share the lands with Strathclyde (from about Glasgow down to Cumbria) and the Scandinavian territories of the western islands, Caithness and Sutherland. Also, south-eastern Scotland, from Stirling down to Berwick, was in English hands as a remnant of the old Northumbrian kingdom, although by 975 Lothian and Berwickshire had been gained, thanks largely to the fecklessness of King Edgar I of England. However, the title 'King of Scots reflected the bearer's real power; outlying areas like the north-east, south-west and midlands would just about tolerate acknowledging a king, and nothing more.

To make matters worse, the Scottish monarchy seemed to have inherited a strange Alban custom of switching alternately between rival lines of descent. This of course encouraged members of one line to hurry the rival dynasty members off this earth, usually with a dagger or sword. The descendants of Kenneth I's two sons thus shuffled the crown between them until that of the younger line (Aedh) was forcibly extinguished in 997 with the murder of King Constantine IV. But the tradition continued, and now it was the two lines of descent from Malcolm I (943-54) who bid for the crown. The senior line were the Morays and the junior line the Canmores (whose name meant 'bigheads!). When King Kenneth III (Moray) was murdered by his replacement Malcolm II in 1005, the former left only daughters - but with Malcolm also having only daughters, a renewal of the fight for the crown seemed imminent.

Malcolm's elder daughter, Bethoc, had married Crinan, Abbot of Dunkeld, and they had had a son, Duncan. Malcolm determined that this grandson should succeed him, and in 1034 he duly did. Indeed, Young Duncan was almost certainly amongst those barons who 'assisted' his father into the next world. But the new Duncan I proved a great disappointment. Nicknamed 'the Gracious' (probably an insult), he failed to hold the country together, and in 1039 his assault on Durham ended in humiliation. Worse, his main rival was now a rising figure. Gruoch, Kenneth III's grand-daughter, had married twice, her second marriage to Macbeth, Thane of Fife. As well as being the king's cousin, Macbeth was an important army leader. The crisis came after Durham; in an attempt to bolster his position, in 1040 Duncan made his infant son Malcolm Prince of Cumberland (like the English title Prince of Wales). Macbeth responded by forming an alliance with another cousin, Thorfinn 'Raven-Eater', and the two defeated and killed Duncan in battle that same year. Macbeth then ruled over the bulk of southern and central Scotland, with Thorfinn receiving an extension to his kingdom of the Isles well into the Highlands.

Macbeth's next 'crime' was the murder of his lifelong friend and fellow soldier Banquo. There is only one problem with this - Banquo never existed. He was introduced as both a counterpoint to Macbeth and as a legendary ancestor of James I of England, for whom the play was, after all, written. From his rule in Scotland James had also inherited a strong fear of witchcraft - he actually wrote a book on the subject - hence the witches as the personification of evil. Back to the real world however, and although Macbeth lost ground against the aggressive Siward of Northumbria in Cumberland, he apparently felt secure enough to leave the country in 1050 to visit Rome. The exiled Malcolm further alienated Scots opinion by seeking English help. Although the saintly Edward the Confessor proved of little aid, the warlike Siward was only too happy to seek the chance of extending his dominion, and in 1054 he and Malcolm invaded. It was only a partial success; they defeated Macbeth's army at Birnam Wood/Dunsinane and gained some ground in Strathclyde, but Macbeth remained king.

In 1057 Siward's successor, Tostig, aided Malcom in a second attack, and this time they were able to bring Macbeth to battle at Lumphanan, near Aberdeen. Yet Malcolm's standing with the Scots was such that they immediately set not him but Lulach, Macbeth's stepson (Gruoch's son by her first marriage), on the throne, and it took a third invasion to depose him. Malcolm later married (Saint) Margaret, Edward the Confessor's half-niece, but he left a rather messy succession after being killed raiding into England in 1093. Six of his sons followed him onto the throne; Edward (also injured at Alnwick and 'reigned' for a few days before dying), Duncan II (son from his first marriage, ruled for a few months in 1094), Edmund (co-ruler with Malcolm's brother Donald Bane 1094-7), Edgar (ruled 1097-1107), Alexander I (ruled over northern Scotland 1107-24) and David I (ruled southern Scotland 1107-24 and the whole country 1124-53). It was from David I that the line descended eventually to King James IV, who married Margaret Tudor, sister of Henry VIII of England. Thanks to this marriage, James VI of Scotland became James I of England when the Tudor dynasty expired in 1603, although it took over a century more before the two countries were united into Great Britain (1707).