Fresh approaches to one of the most important poems from medieval Scotland. John Barbour's Bruce, an account of the deeds of Robert I of Scotland (1306-29) and his companions during the so-called wars of independence between England and Scotland, is an important and complicated text. Composed c.1375 during the reign of Robert's grandson, Robert II, the first Stewart king of Scotland (1371-90), the poem represents the earliest surviving complete literary work of any length produced in "Inglis" in late medieval Scotland, andis usually regarded as the starting point for any worthwhile discussion of the language and literature of Early Scots. It has also been used as an essential "historical" source for the career and character of that iconic monarch Robert I. But its narrative defies easy categorisation, and has been variously interpreted as a romance, a verse history, an epic or a chivalric biography. This collection re-assesses the form and purpose of Barbour's great poem. It considers the poem from a variety of perspectives, re-examining the literary, historical, cultural and intellectual contexts in which it was produced, and offering important new insights. Steve Boardman is a Reader in History at the University of Edinburgh. Susan Foran, currently an independent scholar, researches chivalry, war and the idea of nation in late medieval historical writing. Contributors: Steve Boardman, Dauvit Broun, Michael Brown, Susan Foran, Chris Given-Wilson, Theo van Heijnsbergen, Rhiannon Purdie, Bioern Tjallen, Diana B. Tyson, Emily Wingfield.

John Bannerman (1932-2008) saw the history of Scotland from a Gaelic perspective, and his outstanding scholarship made thatperspective impossible to ignore. As a historian, his natural home was the era between the Romans and the twelfth century when the Scottish kingdom first began to take shape, but he also wrote extensively on the MacDonald Lordship of the Isles in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, while his work on the Beatons, the notable Gaelic medical kindred, reached into the early eighteenth century. Across this long millennium, Bannerman ranged and wrote with authority and insight on what he termed the 'kin-based society', with special emphasis upon its church and culture, and its relationship with Ireland. This collection opens with Bannerman's ground-breaking and hugely influential edition and discussion of Senchus fer nAlban ('The History of the Men of Scotland'), which featured in his Studies in the History of Dalriada (1974), now long out of print. To this have been added all of his published essays, plus an essay-length study of the Lordship of the Isles which first featured as an appendix in Late Medieval Monumental Sculpture in the West Highlands (1977). The book will be of interest to anyone who wants to know more about the Gaelic dimension to Scotland's past and present.

An examination of the Scottish kingdom's historic links with Ireland, and the beginnings of a Scottish national identity from c. 1290. The close ties between Gaels of Ireland and Scotland are well known, but in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries the elite in the core areas of the kingdom of the Scots apparently turned their backs on Gaelic culture. This book takes a new look at the issue, investigating the extent to which Scottish men of letters of the period identified the Scottish kingdom and its inhabitants with Ireland, and exploring the function of the kingdom's Irish identity. DrBroun argues that a perceived historical link with Ireland was a fundamental feature of the kingdom's identity throughout the period, and discusses the beginnings of a Scottish national identity in the 1290s and early 1300s. His evidence is based on a thorough examination of accounts of Scottish origins, the royal genealogy, and regnal lists, which articulated perceptions of the kingdom's identity; included are new editions of the origin-legend material inBook I of Fordun's Chronica Gentis Scottorum; hitherto unknown witnesses of Scottish king-lists; and texts of the royal genealogy. Dr DAUVIT BROUNis lecturer in Scottish history at the University of Glasgow.

When did Scots first think of Scotland as an independent kingdom? What did they think was Scotland's place in Britain before Wallace and Bruce? The answers put forward in this book provide a fresh perspective on Scotland's relationship with Britain. Broun challenges the idea that the Scots were an ancient nation whose British identity only emerged later on, in the early modern era, and provides new evidence that the idea of Scotland as an independent kingdom in actual fact pre-dated Wallace and Bruce. This leads him to radically reassess several fundamental issues: the fate of Pictish identity and the origins of Alba; the status of Scottish kingship vis-a-vis England; the papacy's recognition of the independence of the Scottish Church; and the idea of Scottish freedom. He also sheds new light on the authorship of John of Fordun's 'Chronicle' - the first full-scale history of the Scots - and explains, in historical terms, the widespread English inability to distinguish between England and Britain. Broun places his arguments in the wider context of the concepts of ultimate secular power in Britain and Ireland and the construction of national histories which were emerging in the middle ages. In conclusion, he casts a fresh aspect on how a Scottish national identity emerged and how the medieval era and, more specifically the Scottish nation, contributed to what is often regarded as an exclusively modern phenomenon.

First full-length survey of the fluid relationship between these two areas at a time of rapid change. This book provides the first comprehensive analysis of the development of northern England and southern Scotland in the formative era of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. How did "middle Britain" come to be divided between twoseparate unitary kingdoms called "England" and "Scotland"? How, and how differently, was government exercised and experienced? How did people identify themselves by their languages and naming practices? What major themes can be detected in the development of ecclesiastical structures and religious culture? What can be learned about the rural and the emerging urban environments in terms of lordly exploitation and control, settlement patterns and how the landscape itself evolved? These are among the key questions addressed by the contributors, who bring to bear multi-faceted approaches to medieval "middle Britain". Above all, by pursuing similarities and differences from a comparative "transnational" perspective it becomes clearer how the "old" interacted with the "new", what was exceptional and what was not, and how far the histories of northern England and southern Scotland point to common or not so commonfoundations and trajectories. KEITH STRINGER is Professor Emeritus of Medieval British History at Lancaster University; ANGUS WINCHESTER is Professor Emeritus of Local and Landscape History at Lancaster University. Contributors: Richard Britnell, Dauvit Broun, Janet Burton, David Ditchburn, Philip Dixon, Piers Dixon, Fiona Edmonds, Richard Oram, Keith Stringer, Chris Tabraham, Simon Taylor, Angus J.L. Winchester.

When did Scots first think of Scotland as an independent kingdom? What did they think was Scotland's place in Britain before the age of Wallace and Bruce? The answers argued in this book offer a fresh perspective on the question of Scotland's relationship with Britain. It challenges the standard concept of the Scots as an ancient nation whose British identity only emerged in the early modern era, but also provides new evidence that the idea of Scotland as an independent kingdom was older than the age of Wallace and Bruce. This leads to radical reassessments of a range of fundamental issues: the fate of Pictish identity and the origins of Alba, the status of Scottish kingship vis-a-vis England, the papacy's recognition of the independence of the Scottish Church, and the idea of Scottish freedom. It also sheds new light on the authorship of John of Fordun's chronicle, the first full-scale history of the Scots, and offers an historical explanation of the widespread English inability to distinguish between England and Britain. All this is placed in the wider context of ideas of ultimate secular power in Britain and Ireland and the construction of national histories in this period. The book concludes with a fresh perspective on the origin of national identity, and the medieval and specifically Scottish contribution to understanding what is often regarded as an exclusively modern phenomenon.