|
Scotland - Mary, Queen of Scots
Within two years of the birth of Mary in 1542, the Rough Wooing, Henry VIII's military attempt to force a marriage between Mary and his son, Edward, had begun.
This took the form of border skirmishing and it was at this time that the town of Berwick-upon-Tweed was finally taken by the English.
To avoid the "wooing", Mary was sent to France at the age of five, as the intended bride of the heir to the French throne. Her mother stayed in Scotland to look after the interests of Mary — and of France — although the Earl of Arran acted officially as regent.
In 1547, after the death of Henry VIII, forces under the English regent Thomas Somerset were victorious at the battle of Pinkie Cleugh, the climax of the Rough Wooing and followed up by occupying Edinburgh.
However it was to no avail since Queen Mary was in France and Marie de Guise called on French reinforcements who helped stiffen resistance to the English occupation. By 1550, after a change of regent in England, the English withdrew from Scotland completely.
From 1554, Marie took over the regency and continued to advance French interests in Scotland.
French cultural influence resulted in a large influx of French vocabulary into Scots, for example. But anti-French sentiment also grew, particularly among Protestants, who saw the English as their natural allies.
In 1560 Marie died, and with her death the Auld Alliance also died at the Treaty of Edinburgh.
Mary, now nineteen and recently widowed, returned to take up the government of Scotland in a hostile environment. She did not do well and after only seven turbulent years, at the end of which Protestants had gained complete control of Scotland, she had perforce to abdicate and flee to England, leaving her young son, James VI, in the hands of regents.
Click here for full details on the life and death of Mary, Queen of Scots.
Article is provided courtesy of Wikipedia.org and distributed under the terms of GNU Free Documentation License.
Click here for the Scotland360.com History of Scotland Index page.
 
|
 
 
|
