If previously we have discussed two of the female members of the Stewart/Stuart Dynasty, such as Margaret Tudor the Queen of Scots and her great great granddaughter, Elizabeth Stuart, the Winter Queen, today the topic is about a figure of the same dynasty, commonly known as the father of the infamous Mary, Queen of Scots.
Yet, the question of his figure remains, after all, who was he? Besides as regarding his relationship with his heiress, why is there so little talk about him? James V's own death is particularly a cause that would make him less "interesting" to many, considering that he wasn't killed in a battlefield like James IV neither had a dramatic death like his daughter, instead dying in his bed. To those who expect to find an extreme end in James V's life is a mistake at the same time it should not be a reason to disregard his deeds as the king he was. So today is an attempt to bring to public discussion that James Stewart was far from only being the father of Mary, Queen of Scots.
Born on the 10th day of April, the year being 1516, at the Linlithgow Palace. His parents were Margaret Tudor and James IV of Scotland, thus making him the grandson of Henry VII of England. When he was seven months old, James inherited the crown from his father, upon his death at the Battle of Flooden as a result of conflicts with the English. Towards the end of the month of September, the 21st day to be specific, the infant king was crowned at the Chapel Royal, located in the Stirling Castle. What we know of his early childhood can be said below:
"In February 1517, James came from Stirling to Holyroodhouse, Edinburgh, but during an outbreak of plague in the city he was moved to the care of Antoine d'Arces at nearby rural Craigmillar Castle. At Stirling, the 10 -year-old James had a guard of 20 footmen dressed in his colours, red and yellow. When he went to the park below the Castle, "by secret and in right fair and soft wedder (weather)", six horsemen would scour the countryside two miles roundabout for intruders. Poets wrote their own nursery rhymes for James and advised him on royal behavior. As a youth, his education was in the care of University of St Andrews poets such as Sir David Lyndsay. William Stewart, in his poem Princelie Majestie, counselled James against ice-skating."
His mother, the Queen Dowager, Margaret Tudor was, in this time, given the regency of her boy king. However, the next year, it was John Stewart, who was next in line for the Scottish throne after his nephew, since Margaret was married to the 6th Earl of Angus, Archbald Douglas. Although many assume this to be a love match, one may assume this was one rather to provide safety for a woman in a foreigner country, a way to gather her allies and forment an alliance to hold her power in Scotland, strenghtening thus an Anglo-Scottish relationship. However, this would prove to be amiss and, as already mentioned, John Stewart came to replace her as regent for the king.
Until, "in 1526 Angus obtained control of the king, and kept him in close confinement until 1528, when James, escaping from Edinburgh to Stirling, put vigorous mesures in execution against the earl, and compelled him to flee to England." It was said that the reason James V had illegitimate children before 20 years of age is related to his stepfather's the earl of Angus desire of alienate him from his duties as king. But, before he managed to get away of Archbald Douglas' claws, "there were several attempts made to free the young king- one by Walter Scott of Branxholme and Buccleuch, who ambushed the king's forces on 25 July 1526 at the battle of Melrose, and was routed off the field. Another attempt later that year, on 4 Sept at the battle of Linlithgow Bridge, failed again to relieve the King (...)".
So when he freed himself from Douglas, "the first action James took as king was to remove Angus from the scene. The Douglas family were forced into exile and James besieged their castle at Tantallon. He then subdued the Border rebels and the chiefs of the Western Isles. As well as taking advice from his nobility and using the services of the Duke of Albany in France and at Rome, James had a team of professional lawyers and diplomats, including Adam Otterburn and Thomas Erskine of Haltoun."
For this reason, James was more sympathetic to the causes of his people, with some historians claiming the nickname of "King of the Commons", especially after a legend that says he would travel every now and then disguised as a man, "describing himself as the 'Gudeman of Ballengeich' ('Gudeman' means 'landlord' or 'farmer', and 'Ballengeich' was the nickname of a road next to Stirling Castle--meaning 'windy pass' in Gaelic)." He was also fond of the English costumes, having been known for being an Anglophile. James could too play a lute instrument, being a very good player; and he was said to have been the author of many poems during his reign, although this cannot be confirmed. With poetry and music being arts he very deeply appreciated, a consequence for this king of Renaissance, James also "maintained a band of Italian musicians who adopted the name Drummond." According to Sir Thomas Wood, "James had a 'a singular good ear and could sing that he had never seen before (sight-read), but his voice was 'rawky' and 'harske'".
In matters of politics, James had much learned from his experience being under the guard of the 6th Earl of Angus. He held constant suspicious from nobility, and even tried to balance it with reasonable comprehension of the needs in articulating with it, which was quite uncommon. James sought to favour peace relations with England, and his uncle, King Henry VIII, was reported to send if not a lion and very expensive gift after he attempted to stop the bad press concerning the English monarch in the High lands. Another of the good deeds of James comes in making a better approach and relationship with the Scottish tribes, even though this would not last long because of his early death in 1542. He also "slowly began to rebuild the shattered finances of the Crown, largely enriching the funds of the monarchy at the expense of the Church."
Being a very pious man, James V was a strike key to opposite the Protestant Reform to reach the High Lands. He burnt at stake the first Scottish Protestant martyr, Patrick Hamilton on the 29th February 1529 and four of his illegitimate sons went to the Church, with the Pope recognizing them as natural sons of the Crown. That leads us to the fact James had at least nine illegitimate children, and the most famous of them was his son with his favourite mistress, Margaret Erksine, the 1st Earl of Moray, James Stewart.
As for his marriage, though it is known he was married twice to two French noble women, it was earlier suggested other names for him. Amongst them, we came up with Catherine de' Médici and his cousin Mary Tudor, having even been in a contract with Mary of Bourbon. And despite looking elsewhere, James decided to renew the Auld Alliance, an old peace treaty arranged between France and Scotland centuries before James's reign and which had traditionally been given benefits for both realms when times requested it. So to put more pressure in to it, James travelled all the way to France himself, once King Francis I found hesitating in sending his daughter's hand Madeleine to a diplomatic marriage because of her poor health. Nonetheless, they were successfully married, but no more than six months and the french princess did not survive, some having claiming that she died in the king's arms.
In the next year, James looked for another bride and King Henry VIII tried to persuade him for doing so. It seems both kings had the same desire of marrying the same woman: Marie de Guise, adopted fille (daughter) of the King Francis. Marie de Guise, or de Lorraine, was the eldest daughter of the duke of Guise. She was reportedly tall, enjoying a robust health and of an admiring beauty, having been already a widow mother of two healthy boys. However, she chose James V over Henry VIII and soon they were married; Marie would deliver two boys also as consort of James but they would not survive infancy, and the only one who did so would be Mary.
With the death of his mother in 1541, any chance of reconciling peace with England was buried with her. Henry VIII proposed a meeting with his nephew in an attempt to persuade him to deter him of the Auld Alliance, but with Marie's pregnancy and the debility of James' health, amongst other problems, leaded Henry Tudor to break in to Scotland. There, despite some victories, the Scottish army fell and the loss would devastate James, leaving him depressed and putting an end to his already poor health. Some accounts say, on the other hand, that what happened to James V of Scotland "on 6 December, (...) was a nervous collapse caused by the defeat, and he may have died from the grief."
He was on his deathbed when Mary was born and, before he was dead, was "reported to have said "it came wi a lass, it'll gang wi a lass" (meaning "it began with a girl and will end with a girl"). This was either a reference to the Stewart dynasty's accenssion to the throne through Marjorie Bruce, daughter of Robert the Bruce or to the medieval origin myth of the Scots nation". Having died on midnight of December 15th 1542, James V of Scotland was buried at Holyrood Abbey, in Edinburgh.
What should be held here in consideration is some aspects that do not match to the perspective of an absolutist king that was trending in England, France and Spain's monarchies. On the contrary, James, as a man, was a patron of the arts, the embodiment of the concept of Renaissance as much as in many ways his uncle tried to be; he had inherited from his mother aspects of the English culture, that, sadly, could not have been deeply approached here because of lack of material. As a king, he was a pious and devouted man who relied on his independence from the secular and religious men, but at the same time he managed to use his relationship as the good Catholic man with the Church not only to fight away Protestantism but to enrich the Scottish crown. He was not corrupt and, as far as it can be said, not a volatile man, despite his temper and melancholy, two characteristics said to have been present at his daughter Mary's character. James was good. Not perfect, but a good king. Unfortunately, because of social expectations considering who can be a hero or who can be a villain, it is not seen as heroic or even a mid term someone who did not embody the tragic elements that his father and later his daughter had. A meaningful death. Nonetheless, James' death would have probably greater meaning in our days where depression is so much more known and better understood. That pride devastated and left our king to the death is as horrifying as being killed by one's beliefs. And that is precising why James Stewart should never be left aside of historiography.
Bibliography:
http://unusualhistoricals.blogspot.com.br/2011/08/illegitimate-children-of-james-v.html
http://www.rampantscotland.com/famous/blfamjames5.htm
http://www.undiscoveredscotland.co.uk/usbiography/monarchs/jamesv.html
http://www.historic-uk.com/HistoryUK/HistoryofScotland/Kings-Queens-of-Scotland/
http://www.mcgonagall-online.org.uk/gems/an-adventure-in-the-life-of-king-james-v-of-scotland
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_V_of_Scotland
http://www.britroyals.com/scots.asp?id=james5_scot
http://www.englishmonarchs.co.uk/stewart_7.htm
http://www.educationscotland.gov.uk/scotlandshistory/renaissancereformation/jamesv/index.asp
http://www.theanneboleynfiles.com/birth-of-james-v-of-scotland-10-april-1512/
http://www.luminarium.org/encyclopedia/james5.htm
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