[Ansteorra] Fwd: [MR] BBC: Mary Queen of Scots

[Tim McDaniel]

On Tue, 28 May 2013, Stefan li Rous <StefanliRous at austin.rr.com> wrote:
> I thought some folks might be interested in this message from the
> Kingdom of Atlantia list.
quotes Lord Mungo Napier, The Archer of Mallard Lodge:
> [28 May 1503] James IV of Scotland married Margaret Tudor (sister of
> the soon-to-be king Henry VIII). James was probably the best of the
> Stuarts,

Though James I and Charles II had their good points, but they were
post-period.

> and a pretty good king (as kings go), but a lousy general who died
> with most of his army at Flodden in 1513. He shouldn't have allowed
> his French friends to talk him into invading England, the greatest
> blunder of his otherwise reasonably successful reign.

To be fair to James IV, that wasn't an uncommon fate for Scots.
Rouland Carre (mka Richard R. Hershberger), from the SCA Heralds'
mailing list in 1996, mentioned in
https://groups.google.com/d/msg/rec.arts.sf.written/n0_p3Ecboeg/TbEEJ2z6nKIJ

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At 3:45 PM +0000 11/21/96, Richard R. Hershberger wrote:

On a serious note, Hadrian's wall was built to defend against the
_Picts_.  The Scots didn't exist yet, at least not as a group distinct
from the Irish, and the ancestors of the Scots were still in Scotia,
which is to say Ireland.

On a more recreational note, consider this common pattern in English
history: The king with his army is off fighting in France, as is good,
right, and proper.  The Scots look up from their cattle raids on each
other and realize that the vast bulk of English military power is in
France.  They promptly "organize", which for Scots means that they are
all more or less facing south, and pour across the border.  The
English Warden of the East March looks up from sulking over the cruel
fate which gave him the name "Percy" to see a screaming horde of hairy
barbarians wearing dresses.  He quickly collects the local garrisons,
Boy Scout troups, and 4-H clubs and in a glorious battle destroys the
cream of Scottish military prowess.

[Later, someone mentioned the prowess of Highlanders, especially at
Bannockburn.]

Message-Id: <1.5.4.16.19961121225726.35d71b36 at mail.americanteleport.com>
Date: Fri, 22 Nov 1996 02:53:46 +0000
From: "Richard R. Hershberger" <rrhers... at americanteleport.com>
Subject: Re: Scots (was Re: Fighting Unit Names)
To: SCAH... at LISTSERV.AOL.COM

Once again I am forced into a serious answer: if I recall my Scottish
history, and believe me this is not my specialty, the number of
Highlanders at Bannockburn was small.  (Effrick, am I right about
this?)

We now return to our previously scheduled entertainment: Ah,
Bannockburn!  What can we learn from Bannockburn?  Well, if you take
one of the greatest leaders in Scottish history and put him up against
one of the most ineffectual kings in English history you can manage to
squeeze a Scottish victory out of it.

What more can we learn about Scottish victories?  It would be oh, so
nice if we could detect a pattern, but it is hard to do this with but
a single data point.

Pax,
Rouland,
who has broken his resolve to pick on the French rather than the Scots