Scotland

Hannibal in Edinburgh

Dennis Proctor describes how a distinguished Scottish soldier in 1775 traced Hannibal’s route across the Alps.

The Weardale Campaign, 1327

Soon after their humiliating reverse at Weardale, writes I.M. Davis, the English recognized Scottish independence in the Treaty of Northampton.

The Death of Jane Welsh Carlyle

No marriage has been documented so assiduously as that of Thomas and Jane Carlyle. Ronald Pearsall describes how a famous Victorian historian was the first who attempted to unveil its secrets.

The Murder of David Riccio

Four hundred years ago, writes Antonia Fraser, the young Queen of Scots, then struggling to hold her own against her factious nobles, saw a favourite servant butchered at her feet.

John Napier of Merchiston

W. Brownlie Hendry describes how a sixteenth-century Scottish laird, with, in Gibbon's words, ‘a head to contrive and a hand to execute,’ worked out the powerful aid to mathematical calculation known as logarithms.

The Murder of Darnley

Antonia Fraser describes how no murder in the course of history has aroused more argument than the assassination of the Queen of Scots’ husband at Kirk o’Field on the night of February 9th, 1567.

Ninian Winzet, 1519-1592

It was in the spring of 1559 that ‘the uproar for religion’ began in Scotland; J.H. Burns introduces Ninian Winzet, a faithful cleric on the losing side.

James IV: Renaissance Monarch

In September 1513 the fourth James Stewart became the last king to die in battle on British soil. Linda Porter argues that his life and achievements deserve a more positive reassessment.