The Kings & Queens of Scotland

By Richard Oram

2001

First Published

3.80

Average Rating

334

Number of Pages

10H12M

Audio Length

The history of the Scottish monarchy can be presented as a long tale of triumph over adversity, characterized by the personal achievements of its truly remarkable rulers who transformed their fragile kingdom into the master of northern Britain. This volume charts that process, tracing it through the lives of the men and women whose ambitions drove it forward on the often rocky path from its semi-mythical foundations to its integration into the Stewart kingdom of Great Britain. It is a route filled with such towering personalities as Macbeth, Robert the Bruce, and Mary Queen of Scots, whose lives have made an indelible imprint in world history, but directed also by a host of less well-known figures, such as Causantin mac Aeda, who challenged the heirs of Alfred for the mastery of Britain; David I, who extended his kingdom almost to the gates of York; and James IV, builder of the finest navy in northern Europe. Their will and ambition, successes, and failures not only shaped modern Scotland, but have left their mark throughout the British Isles and the wider world.

Avg Rating

3.80

Number of Ratings

5 STARS

26%

4 STARS

33%

3 STARS

37%

2 STARS

1 STARS

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Author

Richard Oram

Author · 4 books

Professor Richard D. Oram F.S.A. (Scot.) is a Scottish historian. He is a professor of medieval and environmental history at the University of Stirling and an honorary lecturer in history at the University of Aberdeen. He is also the director of the Centre for Environmental History and Policy at the University of Stirling. He received his undergraduate training at the University of St. Andrews, where he also carried out his doctoral research, on medieval Galloway. In 2000 he published The Lordship of Galloway (Birlinn). He has since written a biography of King David I of Scotland (Tempus, 2004), and the High Medieval volume, volume 3, in the New Edinburgh History of Scotland series, entitled Domination and Lordship: Scotland, 1070-1230 (2011).