Scotland

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.

John Knox and Revolution, 1558

J.H. Burns writes that few men have had a more decisive influence on the history of Scotland than John Knox. At what point in his career did he make up his mind to use his religious authority for political purposes, in order to bring down the “idolatrous sovereignties” that he saw around him? And why did he thus, almost unwittingly, become a revolutionary?

Going to America

J.W. Blake describes how, during the colonial period, just over half a million emigrants—English, Scottish, Irish, French, German, Dutch, Swedish and Finnish—are calculated to have left Europe for a new home in America. Often they reached their goal only at the cost of hideous suffering.

The Act of Union, 1707

By the Act of Union, the Scots lost their Parliament but gained the freedom of the British Empire.