Warfare in Medieval Scotland

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The earliest known depiction of the Battle of Bannockburn in 1314 from a 1440s manuscript of Walter Bower's Scotichronicon

Warfare in Medieval Scotland includes all military activity in the modern borders of Scotland, or by forces originating in the region, between the departure of the Romans in the fifth century and the adoption of the innovations of the Renaissance in the early sixteenth century. In this period conflict developed from minor raids to major conflicts, incorporating many of the innovations of continental warfare.

In the

motte-and-bailey constructions, but these were replaced in the thirteenth century with more formidable stone "enceinte
" castles, with high encircling walls. In the thirteenth century the threat of Scandinavian naval power subsided and the kings of Scotland were able to use naval forces to help subdue the Highlands and Islands.

Scottish field armies rarely managed to stand up to the usually larger and more professional armies produced by England, but they were used to good effect by

the Battle of Flodden in 1513, which saw the destruction of a large number of ordinary troops, a large section of the nobility and King James IV
.

Early Middle Ages

See also:
Scotland in the Early Middle Ages
Battle of Dunnichen
in 865

Warriors

In the politically divided world of early medieval Scotland the nucleus of most armed forces was a leader's bodyguard or war-band. In the

Brittonic languages, this was called the teulu, as in teulu Dewr (the "War-band of Deira"). In Latin the most common word in this period is tutores, and derives from the Latin verb tueor, meaning "defend, preserve from danger".[1] In peace-time, the war-band's activity was centred around the "Great Hall". Here, in both Germanic and Celtic cultures, the feasting, drinking and other forms of male bonding that kept up the war-band's integrity would take place. In the contemporaneous Old English epic poem Beowulf, the war-band was said to sleep in the Great Hall after the lord had retired to his adjacent bedchamber.[2] It is not likely that any war-band in the period exceeded 120–150 men, as no hall structure having a capacity larger than this has been found by archaeologists in northern Britain.[3] The war-band was the core of the larger armies that were mobilised from time to time for campaigns of significant size.[2] These wider forces depended on the obligations to defend a province or kingdom by land and sea. Early sources from Dál Riata indicate an attempt to define this as an obligation based on landholding, with obligations to provide a specified number of men or ships based on the amount of land held by an individual.[4] Pictish stones, like that at Aberlemno in Angus, show warriors with swords, spears, bows, helmets and shields.[5] These images may show infantry in formation, or gathered together for protection, and they show mounted troops, sometimes heavily armoured, suggesting a mounted warrior elite.[6]

Hill forts

Main article:
Hill forts in Scotland

Early fortifications in Scotland, particularly in the north and west, included modest stone built towers known as

hillforts in Scotland, most located below the Clyde-Forth line.[8] They appear to have been largely abandoned in the Roman period, but some seem to have been reoccupied after their departure.[9] Most are circular, with a single palisade around an enclosure.[8] Forts of the Early Medieval era were often smaller, more compact, "nucleated" constructions,[10] sometimes utilising major geographical features, as at Dunadd and Dunbarton.[11] The large number of hill forts in Scotland may have made open battle less important than it was in contemporaneous Anglo-Saxon England, and the relatively high proportion of kings who are recorded as dying in fires, suggest that sieges were a more important part of warfare in Northern Britain.[5]

Ships

Main article: Medieval ships
Modern replica of a Viking Knarr

Sea power may also have been important. Irish annals record an attack by the Picts on Orkney in 682, which must have necessitated a large naval force,

long-ship, the key to their success, was a graceful, long, narrow, light, wooden boat with a shallow draft hull designed for speed. This shallow draft allowed navigation in waters only 3 feet (1 m) deep and permitted beach landings, while its light weight enabled it to be carried over portages. Longships were also double-ended, the symmetrical bow and stern allowing the ship to reverse direction quickly without having to turn around.[16][17]

High Middle Ages

See also: Scotland in the High Middle Ages

Land forces

David I knighting a squire.

By the twelfth century the ability to call on wider bodies of men for major campaigns had become formalised as the "common" (communis exercitus) or "Scottish army" (exercitus Scoticanus), based on a universal obligation linked to the holding of variously named units of land.

Wars of Independence.[19] Later decrees indicated that the common army was a levy of all able-bodied freemen aged between 16 and 60, with 8-days warning.[20] It produced relatively large numbers of men serving for a limited period, usually as unarmoured or poorly armoured bowmen and spearmen.[21] In this period it continued to be mustered by the earls and they often led their men in battle, as was the case in the Battle of the Standard in 1138. It would continue to provide the vast majority of Scottish national armies, potentially producing tens of thousands of men for short periods of conflict, into the early modern era.[22]

There also developed obligations that produced smaller numbers of

feudal troops. The introduction of feudalism to Scotland is usually attributed to the Davidian Revolution of the twelfth century. When David I acceded to the Scottish throne in 1124 after spending much of his life living as a baron in England, he brought with him a number of Anglo-Norman vassals, to whom he distributed lands and titles, first in the lowlands and borders and then later in buffer zones in the North and West. Geoffrey Barrow wrote that among other changes this brought "fundamental innovations in military organization". These included the knight's fee, homage and fealty, as well as castle-building and the regular use of professional cavalry,[23] as knights held castles and estates in exchange for service, providing troops on a 40-day basis.[20] David's Norman followers and their retinues were able to provide a force of perhaps 200 mounted and armoured knights, but the vast majority of his forces were the "common army" of poorly armed infantry, capable of performing well in raiding and guerrilla warfare, but only infrequently able to stand up to the English in the field, as they managed to do critically in the wars of independence at Stirling Bridge in 1297 and Bannockburn in 1314.[21]

Castles

Main article:
Castles in Britain

Castles, in the sense of a fortified residence of a lord or noble, arrived in Scotland as part of David I's encouragement of Norman and French nobles to settle with feudal tenures, particularly in the south and east, and were a way of controlling the contested lowlands.

motte-and-bailey constructions, of a raised mount or motte, surmounted by a wooden tower and a larger adjacent enclosure or bailey, both usually surrounded by a fosse (a ditch) and palisade, and connected by a wooden bridge.[27] They varied in size from the very large such as the Bass of Inverurie, to more modest designs like Balmaclellan.[28]

Dunstaffnage Castle, one of the oldest surviving "castles of enceinte", mostly dating from the thirteenth century

In England many of these constructions were converted into stone "

embattled curtain wall.[27] In addition to the baronial castles there were royal castles, often larger and providing defence, lodging for the itinerant Scottish court and a local administrative centre. By 1200 these included fortifications at Ayr and Berwick.[29] In the wars of Scottish Independence Robert I adopted a policy of castle destruction, rather than allow fortresses to be easily taken or retaken by the English and held against him, beginning with his own castles at Ayr and Dumfries,[30] and including Roxburgh and Edinburgh.[31]

Marine forces

Main article: Medieval ships

In the Highlands and Islands, the longship was gradually succeeded by (in ascending order of size) the

clinker-built ships, usually with a centrally-stepped mast, but also with oars that allowed them to be rowed. Like the longship, they had a high stem and stern, and were still small and light enough to be dragged across portages, but they replaced the steering-board with a stern-rudder from the late twelfth century.[33] They could fight at sea, but rarely were able to match armed ships of the Scottish or English navies. However, they could usually outrun larger vessels and were extremely useful in quick raids and in aiding escape.[34] Forces of ships were raised through obligations of a ship-levy through the system of ouncelands and pennylands, which have been argued to date back to the muster system of Dál Riata, but were probably introduced by Scandinavian settlers.[35] Later evidence suggests that the supply of ships for war became linked to feudal obligations, with Celtic-Scandinavian lords, who had previously contributed as a result of a general levy on landholding, coming to hold their lands in exchange for specified numbers and sizes of ships supplied to the king. This process probably began in the thirteenth century, but would be intensified under Robert I.[36] The importance of these ships was underlined by their becoming common in depictions on grave markers and in heraldry throughout the Highlands and Islands.[37]

A carving of a birlinn from a sixteenth-century tombstone in MacDufie's Chapel, Oronsay, as engraved in 1772

There are mentions in Medieval records of fleets commanded by Scottish kings including

Hakon Hakonsson's Kristsúðin, built at Bergen from 1262–3, which was 260 feet (79 m) long, of 37 rooms.[41] In 1263 Hakon responded to Alexander III's designs on the Hebrides by personally leading a major fleet of forty vessels, including the Kristsúðin, to the islands, where they were swelled by local allies to as many as 200 ships.[42] Records indicate that Alexander had several large oared ships built at Ayr, but he avoided a sea battle.[38] Defeat on land at the Battle of Largs and winter storms forced the Norwegian fleet to return home, leaving the Scottish crown as the major power in the region and leading to the ceding of the Western Isles to Alexander in 1266.[43]

Late Middle Ages

See also:
Scotland in the Late Middle Ages

Armies

The Battle of Otterburn (1388) in a miniature from Jean Froissart, Chroniques

Scottish victories in the late thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries have been seen as part of a wider "infantry revolution", that saw a decline in the primacy of the mounted knight on the battlefield. However, it has been pointed out that Scottish medieval armies had probably always been dependent on infantry forces.[44] In the late medieval period Scottish men-at-arms often dismounted to fight beside the infantry, with perhaps a small mounted reserve, and it has been suggested that these tactics were copied and refined by the English, leading to their successes in the Hundred Years' War.[45] Like the English, the Scots deployed mounted archers, and even spearmen, who were particularly useful in the mobile raids that characterised border warfare, but like the English they fought on foot.[46]

By the second half of the fourteenth century, in addition to forces raised on the basis of common service and feudal obligations, money contracts of bonds or bands of

Humbleton Hill in 1402.[47][48]

There were attempts to replace spears with longer pikes of 15.5 feet (5 m) to 18.5 feet (6 m) in the later fifteenth century, in emulation of successes over mounted troops in the Netherlands and Switzerland, but this does not appear to have been successful until the eve of the Flodden campaign in early sixteenth century.

Garde Écossaise.[50]

Fortification

Main article:
Castles in Britain
Ravenscraig Castle, perhaps the first fortification in the British Isles to take account of gunpowder artillery: the large D-plan bastion towers can be seen on either wing

After the Wars of Independence, new castles began to be built, often on a grander scale as "

livery and maintenance" castles, to house retained troops, like Tantallon, Lothian and Doune near Stirling, rebuilt for Robert Stewart, Duke of Albany in the fourteenth century.[27] The largest number of Late Medieval fortifications in Scotland built by nobles, about 800,[51] were of the tower house design.[52][53] Smaller versions of tower houses in southern Scotland were known as peel towers, or pele houses.[54] The defences of tower houses were primarily aimed to provide protection against smaller raiding parties and were not intended to put up significant opposition to an organised military assault, leading historian Stuart Reid to characterise them as "defensible rather than defensive".[55] They were typically a tall, square, stone-built, crenelated building; often also surrounded by a barmkyn or bawn, a walled courtyard designed to hold valuable animals securely, but not necessarily intended for serious defence.[56][57] They were built extensively on both sides of the border with England, and James IV's forfeiture of the Lordship of the Isles in 1494 led to an immediate burst of castle building across the region.[58][59]

Gunpowder weaponry fundamentally altered the nature of castle architecture, with existing castles being adapted to allow the use of gunpowder weapons by the incorporation of "keyhole" gun ports, platforms to mount guns and walls being adapted to resist bombardment.

harl).[63]

Siege engines and artillery

The Wars of Independence brought the first recorded instances of major mechanical artillery in Scotland. Edward I used a range of

Carlisle in 1315 where his siege tower floundered in mud.[66] The disparity in siege technology has been seen as resulting in a policy of castle destruction by Robert I.[31]

Mons Meg at Edinburgh Castle, with its 20" (50 cm) calibre cannonballs

Edward I had the major ingredients for gunpowder shipped to Stirling in 1304, probably to produce a form of

Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, one of which, Mons Meg, still survives. Although these were probably already outdated on the continent, they represented impressive military technology when they reached Scotland.[71] James II enthusiasm for artillery cost him his life and demonstrated some of the dangers of early artillery, when a gun exploded at the siege of Roxburgh in 1460.[72] James III also experienced ill-fortune, when artillery sent from Sigismund, Archduke of Austria sank in a storm en route to Scotland in 1481.[73] James IV brought in experts from France, Germany and the Netherlands and established a foundry in 1511. Edinburgh Castle had a house of artillery where visitors could see cannon cast for what became a formidable train, allowing him to send cannon to France and Ireland and to quickly subdue Norham Castle in the Flodden campaign.[74] However, his 18 heavy artillery pieces had to be drawn by 400 oxen and slowed the advancing Scots army, proving ineffective against the longer range and smaller calibre English guns at the Battle of Flodden.[75]

Navy

Main article: Royal Scots Navy
A model of the Great Michael, the largest ship in the world when launched in 1511

English naval power was vital to Edward I's successful campaigns in Scotland from 1296, using largely merchant ships from England, Ireland and his allies in the Islands to transport and supply his armies.[76] Part of the reason for Robert I's success was his ability to call on naval forces from the Islands. As a result of the expulsion of the Flemings from England in 1303, he gained the support of a major naval power in the North Sea.[76] The development of naval power allowed Robert to successfully defeat English attempts to capture him in the Highlands and Islands and to blockade major English controlled fortresses at Perth and Stirling, the last forcing Edward II to attempt the relief that resulted at English defeat at Bannockburn in 1314.[76] Scottish naval forces allowed invasions of the Isle of Man in 1313 and 1317 and Ireland in 1315. They were also crucial in the blockade of Berwick, which led to its fall in 1318.[76]

After the establishment of Scottish independence, Robert I turned his attention to building up a Scottish naval capacity. This was largely focused on the west coast, with the Exchequer Rolls of 1326 recording the feudal duties of his vassals in that region to aid him with their vessels and crews. Towards the end of his reign he supervised the building of at least one royal

Lord High Admiral was probably founded in this period. In his struggles with his nobles in 1488 James III received assistance from his two warships the Flower and the King's Carvel also known as the Yellow Carvel.[77]

James IV put the enterprise on a new footing, founding a harbour at

Royal Scottish Navy, including the Margaret, and the carrack Michael or Great Michael.[79] The latter, built at great expense at Newhaven and launched in 1511, was 240 feet (73 m) in length, weighed 1,000 tons, had 24 cannon, and was, at that time, the largest ship in Europe.[79][80] Scottish ships had some success against privateers, accompanied the king in his expeditions in the islands and intervened in conflicts Scandinavia and the Baltic.[77] In the Flodden campaign the fleet consisted of 16 large and 10 smaller craft. After a raid on Carrickfergus in Ireland, it joined up with the French and had little impact on the war. After the disaster at Flodden the Great Michael, and perhaps other ships, were sold to the French and the king's ships disappeared from royal records after 1516.[77]

See also

  • Schiltron
  • List of battles between Scotland and England

Notes

  1. ISBN 0-903903-24-5
    , p. 56.
  2. ^
    ISBN 0-903903-24-5
    , pp. 248–9.
  3. ISBN 0-903903-24-5
    , p. 157.
  4. ISBN 0854110704
    , p. 13.
  5. ^
    ISBN 1-4051-0628-X
    , pp. 76–90.
  6. ISBN 1-84486-039-6
    , p. 240.
  7. ISBN 0-521-08741-4
    , pp. 124–5.
  8. ^
    ISBN 0-7864-5918-2
    , pp. 25 and 31.
  9. ISBN 1846036860
    , p. 12.
  10. OCLC 560286204
    .
  11. ISBN 0-521-54740-7
    , p. 34.
  12. ISBN 0-7486-0291-7
    , pp. 171–2.
  13. ISBN 0-7486-1736-1
    , p. 221.
  14. ISBN 0-14-191257-X
    , p. 6.
  15. ISBN 0-521-54740-7
    , pp. 129–30.
  16. ^ "Skuldelev 2 – The great longship", Viking Ship Museum, Roskilde, retrieved 25 February 2012.
  17. ^ N. A. M. Rodger, The Safeguard of the Sea: A Naval History of Britain. Volume One 660–1649 (London: Harper, 1997) pp. 13–14.
  18. ISBN 1-85285-052-3
    , p. 59.
  19. ISBN 0-7486-3333-2
    , pp. 95–9.
  20. ^
    ISBN 0-7486-1238-6
    , p. 58.
  21. ^
    ISBN 0-415-01415-8
    , pp. 30–1.
  22. ISBN 0-521-58602-X
    , p. 23.
  23. ISBN 1-85285-052-3
    , pp. 9–11.
  24. ISBN 978-0-85115-904-1
    , p. 225.
  25. ISBN 978-0-7134-8943-9
    , p. 11.
  26. ISBN 978-0-275-98414-4
    , p. xxiv.
  27. ^
    ISBN 0-85263-748-9
    , p. 21.
  28. ISBN 978-0-7134-8943-9
    , p. 16.
  29. ISBN 978-0-7134-8943-9
    , p. 12.
  30. ISBN 1-4411-5712-3
    , p. 116.
  31. ^
    ISBN 0-300-14568-3
    , p. 124.
  32. ISBN 90-04-18568-2
    , pp. 2–3.
  33. ^ "Highland Galleys" Archived 2006-05-10 at the Wayback Machine Mallaig Heritage Centre, retrieved 25 February 2012.
  34. ISBN 0-521-80996-7
    , p. 54.
  35. ISBN 90-04-13807-2
    , pp. 66–8.
  36. ISBN 0-7486-2022-2
    , p. 375.
  37. ISBN 0-7864-4649-8
    , p. 112.
  38. ^ a b P. F. Tytler, History of Scotland, Volume 2 (London: Black, 1829), pp. 309–10.
  39. ISBN 1-78057-006-6
    , pp. 106–111.
  40. ISBN 0-7509-2977-4
    , p. 147.
  41. ISBN 0-14-191257-X
    , pp. 74–5.
  42. ISBN 0-7864-4038-4
    , p. 157.
  43. ISBN 0-7509-2977-4
    , p. 153.
  44. ISBN 0-85115-774-2
    , p. 42.
  45. ISBN 3-05-004131-5
    , p. 51.
  46. ^
    ISBN 1-84176-980-0
    , p. 24.
  47. ISBN 1-84176-980-0
    , p. 85.
  48. ISBN 0-521-58602-X
    , p. 108.
  49. ISBN 1-84603-325-X
    , p. 23.
  50. ^
    ISBN 0-85976-341-2
    , pp. 16–30.
  51. ISBN 978-0-521-49723-7
    , p. 26.
  52. ISBN 978-2-902685-09-7
    , p. 278.
  53. ISBN 978-1-84176-962-2
    , p. 12.
  54. ISBN 978-0-486-24898-1
    , p. 225.
  55. ISBN 978-1-84176-962-2
    , pp. 12 and 46.
  56. ISBN 978-1-84176-962-2
    , p. 33.
  57. ISBN 978-0-486-24898-1
    , p. 224.
  58. ISBN 978-0-415-02992-6
    , p. 76.
  59. ISBN 978-0-7486-0849-2
    , p. 6.
  60. ISBN 0-85263-748-9
    , p. 27.
  61. ISBN 90-04-13572-3
    , p. 166.
  62. ISBN 978-0-7486-0849-2
    , p. 34.
  63. ISBN 0-521-44461-6
    , pp. 391–2.
  64. ^ "The largest trebuchet ever built: Warwolf in the Siege of Stirling Castle / thefactsource.com". Retrieved 25 March 2020.
  65. ISBN 0-300-14568-3
    , pp. 15–16.
  66. ISBN 1-84603-286-5
    , pp. 33–6.
  67. ISBN 0-520-06266-3
    , p. 501.
  68. ^
    ISBN 1-84383-318-2
    , pp. 60–72.
  69. ISBN 0-313-32736-X
    , p. 144.
  70. ISBN 1-84383-449-9
    , p. 402.
  71. ISBN 1-85109-556-X
    , p. 47.
  72. ISBN 0-521-31923-4
    , p. 100.
  73. ISBN 0-7486-0276-3
    , p. 19.
  74. ISBN 0-7486-1455-9
    , p. 76.
  75. ISBN 1-59884-429-6
    , p. 156.
  76. ^ a b c d N. A. M. Rodger, The Safeguard of the Sea: A Naval History of Britain. Volume One 660–1649 (London: Harper, 1997) pp. 74–90.
  77. ^ a b c d J. Grant, "The Old Scots Navy from 1689 to 1710", Publications of the Navy Records Society, 44 (London: Navy Records Society, 1913-4), pp. i–xii.
  78. ^ N. Macdougall, James IV (East Lothian: Tuckwell, 1997), p. 235.
  79. ^
    ISBN 0-85976-338-2
    , p. 45.
  80. ISBN 90-04-18568-2
    , pp. 33–4.

Bibliography

External links

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