International Review of Scottish Studies
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“Female Rebels”: Highlighting Women’s Voices in Robert Forbes’s “The Lyon in Mourning”
No full text“The Lyon in Mourning” was compiled by Episcopalian minister Robert Forbes between 1747 and 1775 to preserve the personal and collective memories of Scottish Jacobites after the defeat at the Battle of Culloden in 1745. The original manuscript, consisting of 10 volumes, is held by the National Library of Scotland and is part of an ongoing project with Simon Fraser University’s Research Centre for Scottish Studies and Digital Humanities Innovation Lab where it has been digitized and made available through the library’s Digital Collections. The topic of women’s roles within the Jacobite cause has been for the most part understudied and, as such, “The Lyon in Mourning” team at SFU is currently mapping the critical terrain of Forbes’s representation of female voices. Uncovering women’s voices in “The Lyon in Mourning,” however, is complex because of the highly mediated nature of the manuscript. By introducing various mediations of women’s stories, this article provides an overview of the preliminary mapping of women’s voices completed so far. It introduces the roles which Jacobite women play in the manuscript and their active contribution to the Jacobite cause, their witnessing of trauma and their demonstrated resilience in the face of defeat. Apart from Anne Leith, whose letters Forbes painstakingly copied, women’s voices in “The Lyon in Mourning” are mediated through the words of men. This article shows, however, that this does not diminish their relevance as these accounts are integral to history
Illegitimacy in the Highest Orders of the Kingdom: The Macbeth narrative in Andrew of Wyntoun\u27s Orygynale Cronikyl
No full textThis article examines the portrayal of Macbeth and Malcolm Canmore as illegitimately born men in Andrew of Wyntoun’s Orygynale Cronikyl. Portraying two kings of Scots as illegitimate sons was an unusual choice and was one that had textual and narrative implications. Wyntoun increased the role and political agency of Macduff of Fife in the narrative to create an eleventh-century precedent that explained the political career of Robert Stewart, Duke of Albany and Earl of Fife and Menteith, as a regent for three Scottish kings. In order to make sense of Macbeth and Malcolm’s portrayals, it is crucial to differentiate between different types of illegitimacy in early fifteenth-century Scotland, as well as identify how each type of illegitimacy impacted issues of good kingship and magnate-noble relations in the text. Although illegitimacy did not outright prevent Malcolm and Macbeth from becoming kings, it did explain Macbeth’s descent into tyranny and Malcolm Canmore’s political impotence. In both cases, the intervention of Macduff of Fife as a kingmaking figure and as representative of the community of the realm of Scotland guaranteed the proper functioning of governance in a manner similar to how Albany served as regent in Scotland at the time
State, Community, and the Suppression of Banditry in Seventeenth-Century Scotland
No full textEric Hobsbawn’s influential thesis of ‘social banditry’ has provoked a great deal of research into the history of brigandage which had done much to enrich our knowledge of early modern society. This work has also helped inform our understanding of how state structures functioned, especially in the early modern period. This article seeks to contribute to that discussion by deploying Scottish evidence. It shows that the suppression of banditry in Scotland – mainly the Highlands – involved a range of tactics and approaches, all of them predicated on co-operation between central government, local elites, and local communities. The necessity of such coordination, the article contends, underlines the political realities of the Scottish state, which worked according to a ‘magisterial’ model that required politically powerful groups to work closely with ordinary communities if they were to achieve their goals
"Ostentatious by nature": Flemish Material Culture at the Marriage of James IV and Margaret Tudor
No full textThis article considers James IV’s use of Flemish and other southern Low Countries material culture at his marriage to Margaret Tudor of England in 1503. Adding to the considerable body of scholarship on the events, which were described in detail by eyewitness John Young, Somerset Herald, it will also draw on the Treasurer’s Accounts and a surviving book of hours to argue that its origins—and those of the luxurious chairs, tapestries, and metalwork—were just as important as the political and diplomatic messages conveyed in their imagery and expense. Flemish goods were regarded as the pinnacle of northern European luxury and were sought after by, among others, James’s new father-in-law, Henry VII. At this critical juncture in Anglo-Scottish relations, therefore, James’s display of such objects capitalized on a common understanding of their cultural power and put him in direct competition with Henry
Errata & Corrigenda to IRSS 43 (2018)
No full textChanges made to the online version of Volume 43 (2018)
Gender, Resistance and Conformity in Early Modern Scotland, 1560-1650
No full textThe article claims that men and women in mixed marriages often subverted patriarchal norms when attempting to escape ecclesiastical censure in early modern Scotland. Ministers held husbands responsible for ensuring the conformity of their households, and they insisted that Protestant husbands bring their wives into the fold. These husbands then argued that they had no right to compel their wives in matters of conscience. Some even insisted that they had no control over their wives whatsoever. They were willing to appear failing in their patriarchal duties in order to protect their wives from the kirk, which was loath to interfere much further in marital relationships. Married women risked excommunication for their defiance, but local authorities were unable to confiscate any of their assets, which were held in trust by their husbands. Catholic women thus used the patriarchal assumptions of religious authorities as a means of undermining religious conformity