There s so much the English have deviously stolen from the Scots.
Today I m going to tell you how they stole the north of England
If you re interested in the people, places and events in Scottish history,
then click the subscribe button at the bottom right of the screen.
In the meantime, let me tell you a story. In the past I ve told you about the Treaty
of Durham and the English town that belongs to Scotland.
I m not saying that I m a thought leader; but all I ll say is that since that video,
Doncaster City football club have applied to enter the Scottish Cup
on the basis of that Treaty of Durham relationship.
Come on Doncaster Leave Jeremy Clarkston behind and walk north with your head held high.
Today we re going back to the same era we discussed in that video;
the era of the Canmore kings of Scotland to tell you how the rest of the north of
England should belong to us too but it was stolen
and I ve brought you to the scene of the crime. Is 1157 the most important
date in Scottish history? Now a quick recap might be needed.
In 1138 David I of Scotland invaded the north of England
ostensibly in support of Empress Matilda. She was his niece you know.
David s sister had married Henry I of England. They had a daughter Matilda.
David was Henry s bosom buddy and right-hand man.
He d sworn to Henry that he d protect Matilda s rights to the English throne when Henry died.
When Henry did die Matilda s cousin Stephen grabbed the
throne before her..,, The thieving git!
So England broke out into a civil war they call the Anarchy
Now Anarchy wasn t UK wide... That would have to wait for the Sex Pistols
but never mind that bollocks. Even if he
wasn t supporting his Neice s claim to the throne why shouldn t David invade the North of England.
Before our neighbours get upset, think about it Not only was David s niece the nominated English
queen, but David s wife was also the daughter of the previous Earl of Northumbria,
so David and his children were entitled to Northumbria.
The recently deceased Norman king of England had authorised David to marry
the woman who s family had held Northumbria. Even then, the Normans were Johnny come latelys.
David s wife s Grandad had held Northumbria before the Normans ever got here.
Plus, I ve said it before and I ll say it again, David s mum was the Saxon princess who fled the
Norman conquest bringing the rightful Saxon line north to marry into the Scottish Royal family.
David was the last of the children of that line. That s right,
David was sprung from Saxon royal family. He was descended from Edward the
Confessor , Alfred the Great. Why shouldn t the North of England be his?
Dammit all of England should be ours. We re the Great in Great Britain. You d
be screwed without us, it s us that s kept you
going these last forty years. Get me my claymore and I ll tell you
sorry about that. In that video about the English town that
belongs to Scotland I explained how Doncaster was given to David in the Treaty of Durham.
Actually, much more of the North of England had been given to/ taken by David at that time.
Basically pretty much all he d wanted for now. David, and as we ll see the Scottish kings who
followed him, felt a strong entitlement to Cumberland and Northumbria in particular
for the reasons I laid out in my detailed, reasoned and measured explanation earlier.
If you re wondering where this place is, it s Peveril Castle.
The Peverils supported King Steven in that Anarchy that was going on in England.
Fortunes swung back and forth in the conflict,
but for the most part Steven got the upper hand over David s niece Matilda.
Now I d love to say that David was entirely altruistic, invading to support his niece
Matilda, as he d promised her dad. The truth is that when Steven offered
David a deal, whereby Steven got to remain as king of England,
and David got what he wanted in the North of England
Matilda s needs kind of got forgotten.
Of course there were dances about who held what from whom,
but The Treaty of Durham was Steven s acceptance of the political reality
that David was in control of the North of England.
But David was a sly old fox and there were a few more twists and turns.
When Matilda s faction made a comeback and captured Steven, David swung to her aid.
When they screwed it all up at the Rout of Winchester
David had to realign again I m not really painting him
in a very good light here, am I. He was a hugely successful medieval
king and for all his professed piety he was a pretty ruthless political operator.
By May 1149 it seemed clear
that Steven was pretty much in control of the south of England and Matilda s cause was lost.
Then, at David s court in Carlisle, arrived Matilda s son
the sixteen-year-old Henry of Anjou. David s great nephew.
David put on a big ceremony where he knighted the young lad
but before he did, he got Henry to swear an oath that should
Henry ever succeed to the English throne that he would formally recognise Scottish
possession of those northern English counties. Don t get me wrong there wasnever any likelihood
of Henry gaining the English throne , but David was just making sure.
There were two sides of the English debate, and he was makin siccar
that what he d already gained from Stephen he would keep in the unlikely event that Henry
staged a Liverpool style Champion s League second half comeback.
Scotland has around a third of the landmass of Great Britain
and a lot of it is mountainous.
Beautiful for tourism, but not practical for wealth development
in an agrarian, pastoral, arable or for that matter industrial economy.
Imagine if Scotland s borders permanently moved south.
Greater land mass, additional resources, more populous.
What impact would that increase in resources and manpower have made?
How different might history have turned out? Would Scotland have made further gains?
Would The War of the Roses played out differently?
Would the Tudours have reached the English throne?
Might it have impacted on the nature of the Reformation in this archipelago;
global trade, empire, innovation dominance? Would the UK have happened?
What would have been the balance of power in these islands and indeed throughout the world?
As it was Henry did pull off a Liverpool style Champion s league comeback
and five years later he became Henry II of England a year after his great uncle David died.
When Henry did become king, he took this castle from the Peveril s who
had backed Stephen against his mum Matilda. Then three years after his rise to the throne
Henry summoned the successor of the recently deceased David I here to Peveril Castle.
It must have been quite an occasion. David s sixteen-year-old grandson,
recently crowned Malcolm IV of Scotland... a Scotland that was much larger than
the one his grandfather had inherited. Malcolm met with his cousin Henry II of England.
Was it to honour the promises that Henry had made to David and his successors?
No. It was to renege
on those commitments and demand the Scottish king s lands in Cumberland and Northumbria.
We ll never know what might have been if those Northern English
territories had remained the lands of the Scots.
Maybe Doncaster City would be playing in the Scottish Cup already.
I wonder was 1157 the most important date in Scottish history?
If you d like to find out about other key dates in Scottish history then there s a
video coming up on screen now. In the meantime