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The Battle of Bannockburn NTS, Glasgow Road, Whins Of Milton, Stirling (2026)

15/06/2026

Bannockburn World Cup Round #1

Bernard, Abbot of Arbroath (SCO) vs Walter Fitz Gilbert (SCO)

Bernard, Abbot of Arbroath, was one of the key administrative figures in Scotland for almost all of Robert I's reign. He was serving as Abbot of Kilwinning in Ayrshire (Bruce's 'backyard', so to speak) in 1296 but was probably forced out by English pressure following the outbreak of the war. He enjoyed a remarkable resurgence under Bruce, who likely sponsored his election as Abbot of Arbroath and also appointed him as his chancellor. This made Bernard responsible for overseeing the production of official royal documentation and gave him a prominent position on the king's council. He may have been present at Bannockburn but is unlikely to have done any fighting, instead providing spiritual support to Bruce and his army and perhaps even continuing to serve an administrative function amid the preparations for the battle. Bernard also appears to have composed a verse chronicle celebrating King Robert's life, fragments of which survive in a fifteenth-century chronicle called the Scotichronicon. The fragmentary nature of the surviving evidence makes it difficult to say much for certain about it, but it was probably compiled between March 1324 and February 1327, a time of truce between Scotland and England when Scottish confidence was high. The tone seems to have been fairly triumphal, glorifying Bruce's cunning tactics and delighting in the birth of the king's son David. It also includes the earliest surviving version of the speech Bruce supposedly gave to his troops ahead of the fighting at Bannockburn. While it is unlikely Bruce gave any such address, it is at least likely what Bruce *wanted* people to think he said, since the document was likely commissioned by him for recitation at his court. As such, it provides valuable insight into Bruce's understanding of his own achievement in 1314. Bernard likely also had considerable influence over the contents of the famous Declaration of Arbroath in 1320 and towards the end of his life he also served as Bishop of the Isles, an appointment that may represent a reward of sorts from King Robert for Bernard's years of faithful service.

Walter Fitz Gilbert was not present at Bannockburn, but was serving the English as captain of Bothwell Castle (pictured, right) in Lanarkshire at the time of the battle. In the 1290s he appears to have been associated with the Stewarts, Bruce's great allies, so why exactly he was not supporting Bruce is unclear. However, following the English defeat at Bannockburn, a company of Englishmen led by Humphrey de Bohun, earl of Hereford, fled from the battlefield to Bothwell, being welcomed in by Walter and his men. Whatever his previous feelings towards Bruce, when Walter learned what had happened in the recent battle, he realised that now was not a good time to be a Scot in English employ. He thus took Humphrey and co. prisoner and wrote to King Robert, who at that time was overseeing the demolition of Stirling Castle, and offered to surrender Bothwell and all of his prisoners to the Scottish king in return for being allowed to switch sides! Bruce welcomed Walter with open arms, since Humphrey was a sufficiently prestigious prisoner to be exchanged for Bruce's wife Elizabeth, daughter from his first marriage Marjory, sister Christina, and Robert Wishart, Bishop of Glasgow, all of whom had been prisoners in England since 1306. In the years that followed, Walter was rewarded for his timely change of allegiance with grants of the baronies of Machan and Cadzow in Lanarkshire and Kinneil in West Lothian. By the 1380s, his grandson David had adopted the surname 'Hamilton' (from another of their Lanarkshire baronies) and the modern dukes of Hamilton are his descendants.

Hit Like to vote for Bernard, hit Heart to vote for Walter!

12/06/2026

Bannockburn World Cup Round #1

Edward Bruce (SCO) vs Gilbert de Clare (ENG)

Edward Bruce was younger brother of King Robert I, and was Robert's only surviving brother by 1314. He may have played more of a role than anyone else - including his elder brother - in dictating the timing of the Battle of Bannockburn. During 1313, probably at an assembly at Dundee in October, Robert granted Edward the earldom of Carrick, which had previously belonged to their mother, Marjory. This may have been an ad hoc way of identifying Edward as the king's preferred heir in case Robert died without a legitimate son of his own. In the months that followed, Edward Bruce was far more active in prosecuting the war against the English than his brother was, which may also indicate that King Robert was unwell and thus unable to lead the Scots in person. When Roxburgh Castle fell to the Bruce Scots in February 1314, Edward Bruce led an armed force south to slight the castle. In April, Edward Bruce led a raid into north-west England while Edward II was mustering his army in the north-east. Most importantly, the late fourteenth-century Scottish poem John Barbour claims that it was Edward, not Robert, Bruce who made the deal with the English garrison at Stirling in May 1314, which brought Edward II's army to Bannockburn in June. At the battle itself, Edward led one of the two main divisions of the Scottish army that routed the much larger English army. In April 1315, Edward was legally recognised as Robert's senior heir if the king died without a legitimate son (formalising the arrangement likely made at the Dundee assembly). In May of that year, Edward crossed over to Ireland and for the next three years maintained a second front against the English there, even assuming the disputed title of High King of Ireland. A late fourteenth-century annalist claimed that Edward's Irish adventure was due to him being 'a very mettlesome and high-spirited man, and would not dwell together with his brother in peace', an assessment echoed elsewhere in the Scottish chronicle tradition. This has left Edward with a reputation for rashness and even incompetence, though recently scholars have begun to challenge this impression.

Gilbert de Clare was the son of Joan of Acre, a daughter of Edward I. This made him Edward II's nephew as well as a wealthy and influential magnate. Being only four years old when his father died in 1295, he was raised by his mother and her new husband Sir Ralph Monthermer (who will be appearing in a later match). He took control of his inheritance soon after his mother died in 1307 and in the years that followed he held a variety of important English offices in Scotland, though he had little opportunity to practically demonstrate his martial skills in any of these roles. He even missed out on participating in his uncle's lacklustre campaign into Scotland in 1310, instead being left to serve as 'custos' (i.e., 'guardian') of England in the king's absence. Gilbert was active in English domestic politics, generally working to reconcile Edward II and his disgruntled magnates, perhaps in the hope that this would pave the way for more effective action against the Bruce Scots. He no doubt welcomed the ambitious campaign his royal uncle launched into Scotland in 1314, but when he was appointed to lead the vanguard of the English, this caused a massive row with Humphrey de Bohun, earl of Hereford, who as Constable of England felt he had a better claim on this prestigious role. King Edward's attempt to compromise by giving the two men joint command only spread further confusion and uncertainty among the leading division of the army. On the first day of the fighting, Gilbert was unhorsed, a fact that must have stung even more because it was likely an ordinary Scottish spearman who did this to him. Worse was to come on the second day however, when the 23-year-old earl was killed in the thick of the fighting. The earliest account of his death claims he acted too rashly, charging too swiftly and thus becoming isolated, surrounded, and ultimately overwhelmed. A later source modifies this slightly, reporting that he had failed to put on his surcoat over his armour in his haste to go into battle and thus the Scots killed him without realising what a valuable prisoner he would have been. Either way, the effect was the same. Having no children of his own, most of his extensive estates were divided among his sisters - Eleanor, Margaret, and Elizabeth. In October 1314, Gilbert's manor at Aylsham in Norfolk was part of a parcel of lands granted to David Strathbogie, a Scottish lord who had chosen to support Edward II over Robert I and had thus lost his extensive claims - including the earldom of Atholl - as a result.

Hit Like to vote for Edward, hit Heart to vote for Gilbert!

11/06/2026

Bannockburn World Cup Round #1

Robert Baston (ENG) vs Christina MacRuairi (SCO)

Robert Baston was a Carmelite friar from Nottingham who accompanied the English army to Banockburn in 1314. Famed in England for his poetry, Baston's role was apparently to witness Edward's anticipated victory and compose a poem celebrating this. Not only did this victory not occur, but Baston was captured by the Scots in the aftermath of the battle. Having been brought before King Robert himself, Baston was compelled to write his promised poem in return for his freedom, only this time to celebrate the *Scottish* victory. This poem survives to us, and while it is perhaps not as triumphal as King Robert may have wished (the opening line is 'Grief is the theme on which I compose this song in unadorned verse'), it nonetheless serves as a valuable, early source of information about the battle. For instance, he mentions having met four Germans ('Bis duo Theutonici') serving in the English army, describes the traps Bruce used to redirect the English army on 23 June ('pits set with stakes, so that they cannot pass without tumbling'), and contrasts the 'baggartry and revelry with Bacchus' that went on in the English camp over night with the focus and valour of the Scots. Edward II's foundation of a Carmelite friary at Beaumont in Oxfordshire in 1318 has been conjectured to have been a reflection of his feeling that he owed Baston some compensation for Baston's experience at Bannockburn.

Christina MacRuairi was probably King Robert's cousin (her mum, Isabella, was likely a younger sister of Bruce's mum, Marjory). As the only legitimate daughter of Alan MacRuairi, lord of Garmoran, Christina had the strongest legal claim on her father's lordship following his death sometime between 1284 and 1293. However, her tenants preferred a male candidate and thus supported her half-brothers Lachlan and Ruairi. When Bruce became King of Scots in 1306, Christina provided him with support from her lands in Ayrshire (formerly belonging to her mum) and perhaps drawing on residual loyalties in Garmoran too. In return, Christina apparently hoped her cousin would use his royal authority to reassert her rights to her father's lordship. A precise chronology is difficult to reconstruct, but it seems that initially Bruce agreed to recognise Ruairi as lord of Garmoran - perhaps even as 'rí Innse Gall' ('King of the Hebrides') - in return for Ruairi accepting Christina's son (also Ruairi) as his heir. This may mean that Christina's tenants fought here at Bannockburn under the leadership of her half-brother. Following the elder Ruairi's death c. 1318, Bruce and Christina seem to have attempted to enforce a new compromise over the Garmoran inheritance, this time deploying Bruce's formidable allies the Campbells to help. Though this compromise does not seem to have long outlived the king himself, Christina was apparently still receiving an annual stipend from the exchequer as late as 1329, suggesting a lifelong relationship between Christina and her royal cousin.

Hit Like to vote for Baston, hit Heart to vote for Christina!

10/06/2026

Bannockburn World Cup Round #1

Angus Óg Macdonald (SCO) vs Sir Henry de Bohun (ENG)

Angus Óg ('the Younger') Macdonald was the lord of Islay and an influential Gaelic-speaking nobleman who was likely an early supporter of Bruce's ambition to be king. He was likely older than Bruce, having been associated with Bruce's grandfather and father as early as September 1286. Angus likely gave shelter to Bruce during the desperate winter of 1306, when Bruce was effectively on the run in his own kingdom. The Macdonalds were one of three kindreds - alongside the MacRuairis and the Macdougalls - who had competed for dominance in the Hebrides since the death of their shared ancestor Somerled in the twelfth-century. Since the Macdougalls were relatives of Bruce's hated rival John Comyn, Bruce probably bought Macdonald support by promising Angus a share of the spoils once he had successfully driven the Macdougalls out of his kingdom. The late fourteenth-century Scottish poet John Barbour names Angus as the leader of the troops from 'the Ilis' [i.e., the Isles] who fought in the king's division here at Bannockburn, perhaps reflecting their status as among the most experienced soldiers in Bruce's army. Angus is sometimes styled 'rí Innse Gall' (‘king of the Hebrides') or 'Lord of the Isles' by modern writers, but he is not described as such by any contemporary source. His son John (whose name may indicate he was born after Bannockburn and named after St John the Baptist, on whose feast day the battle was fought) would however become the first person recorded as using the style 'dominus insularum' ('Lord of the Isles').

Sir Henry de Bohun took part in one of the most famous incidents at the Battle of Bannockburn, but he is simultaneously one of the most difficult figures to say anything about other than what he got up to here. This is in part becuase of the proclivity among the large de Bohun kindred to name their sons 'Henry'! He may have been the Henry de Bohun who in January 1292 inherited the barony of Haresfield in Gloucestershire. This Henry was aged fifteen at the time of his inheritance, meaning he would have been born c. 1277 and making him around 37 at the time of Bannockburn. It would also make him a distant cousin ('cusyne' as the later Scottish poet John Barbour puts it) of Humphrey de Bohun, earl of Hereford. What we can say with more certainty is that he appears to have killed by King Robert himself on the first day of our battle. Three separate versions of the story survive. The Vita Edwardi Secundi ('Life of Edward II'), written in the 1320s, claims that Henry had been scouting the front line of the Scottish army and was trying to withdraw when Bruce chased him down and killed him. Sir Thomas Gray, writing in the 1350s, implies that Henry (who he misnames as Piers Mountforth) was killed by Bruce during the skirmishing at the mouth of the New Park, near where the Visitor Centre now sits. Barbour, writing in the 1370s, reports that Henry took Bruce by surprise while the king was arranging his troops before the fighting began but that Bruce still defeated him, hitting Henry so hard that the king's axe shattered from the sheer force of the blow! While the details differ, all three accounts agree that Bruce killed Henry with an axe near to the site of our Visitor Centre on 23 June. This has become one of the most enduring - if grisly - images associated with the battle.

Hit Like to vote for Angus, hit Heart to vote for Henry!

09/06/2026

Bannockburn World Cup Round #1

Mary Comyn (SCO) vs Maurice, Abbot of Inchaffray (SCO)

Mary Comyn has perhaps the saddest story of anyone associated with the Battle of Bannockburn. Her husband, Sir Edmund Comyn of Kilbride, was killed fighting on the English side at Bannockburn, leaving her a widow with two young daughters Euphemia and Mary. In August 1314, her daughters were given in wardship to minor English lords, and in October Mary was put on trial for having apparently resisted efforts to remove her eldest daughter from her custody (though she was acquitted). In 1316, Mary travelled to Scotland, probably hoping to investigate her chances of extracting revenues from her late husband's lands there. However, Edward II interpreted this as a treasonous act, forfeiting her lands in England and re-granting them to one of the lords who had married her eldest daughter. While living in Scotland, Mary was given lands in Aberdeenshire to support her, though she proved unable to access the revenues due to her as Edmund Comyn's widow. She continued to request permission to return to England and recover her lands there, but not until 1331 did she receive permission to do so.

Maurice became Abbot of Inchaffray in 1304 or 1305, having previously been Prior of Inchmaholme. His Perthshire abbey was home to several relics associated with St Fillan, an eighth-century missionary, making it a popular place of pilgrimage. Maurice may have attended King Robert's inauguration in March 1306, but more importantly may have provided shelter and support for the fugitive king during his difficult first year as king. Bruce appears to have credited his narrow escape from his disastrous defeats at the Battles of Methven and Tyndrum to the intercession of St Fillan, and for the rest of his reign he showed generous patronage to Inchaffray Abbey and to Abbot Maurice in particular. For example, in February 1314, ahead of our battle, Bruce gave a parcel of Perthshire estates to Inchaffray 'for salvation of his soul and for the salvation of the souls of his predecessors and successors, the kings of Scotland'. Abbot Maurice was almost certainly present for - though would not have fought at - Bannockburn, having likely accompanied the relics of St Fillan from Inchaffray to the battlefield to help inspire the troops. The fifteenth-century chronicler Walter Bower credits him with having heard Bruce's confession on 24 June and said mass for the assembled Scots, addressing them with 'a short and effective statement on freedom and the defence of their right'. Bower reports that 'Bare-footed...and wearing his canonicals [i.e., vestments], the said abbot went before them bearing a crucifix like a commander' and encouraged them to kneel and pray to God before the fighting began. In 1322, Maurice was elected Bishop of Dunblane, again probably with Bruce's support, and served in that role until his own death c. 1347.

Hit Like if you want to vote for Mary, hit Love if you want to vote for Maurice.

08/06/2026

Bannockburn World Cup Round #1

Robert Bruce (SCO) vs William Francis (SCO)

Robert Bruce should (hopefully) need no introduction. Leader of the Scottish army here at Bannockburn in June 1314, he was the architect of this remarkable Scottish victory. Though he may have been ill earlier in the year, after the English garrison at Stirling offered to surrender the castle if no-one rescued them before St John the Baptist's Day (24 June), Bruce hastily mustered an army in Torwood south of Stirling and set to work training them in the few relatively manoeuvres they would have to master to pull off his battle plan. On 22 June, he deployed his army in the New Park - on the road into Stirling - with honeycombed pits dug to the south of him and areas of wetland protecting his right flank. When the English arrived on 23rd, this forced them to move east onto the Carse - a wide area of farmland crisscrossed with streams. At dawn on 24th, Bruce led his army onto the Carse, trapping the English army between the Bannock Burn and the Pelstream, nullifying their superior numbers and ultimately forcing them into a humiliating retreat. In the aftermath of the battle, Bruce began the process of redistributing lands forfeited from those Scots who still refused to acknowledge him as king, consolidating his authority & giving the great landowners of Scotland a material interest in the survival of his dynasty.

William Francis may be less well known, but he played a crucial role in the events of 1314 according to the later Scottish poet John Barbour. Barbour reports that in March 1314 Bruce's nephew Thomas Randolph, earl of Moray, was looking for a sneaky way to get into Edinburgh Castle without the English garrison noticing. Francis told Randolph that his father had once been the keeper of Edinburgh Castle and during this time Francis used to climb secretly in and out of the castle to visit a woman in the town below. Using Francis's secret route, Randolph and 30 men thus take the garrison by surprise and capture Edinburgh on behalf of King Robert. A William Francis - possibly our man's father - is mentioned in Ragman Rolls associated with Edinburgh. Our William may also have been the William Francis who received £20 of lands forfeited from the king's enemies at Sprouston in Roxburghshire sometime in the 1320s. More recently, Francis lent his name to the spearman depicted in the character stations in our exhibition.

Hit Like to vote for Robert Bruce, hit Heart to vote for William Francis!

07/06/2026

in 1329, King Robert I of Scotland died in his manor house at Cardross, near Dumbarton. But what killed him?

This question has been the source of much discussion almost since the time of his death. Jean le Bel, a former mercenary who had served on an English campaign against the Scots in summer 1327, claims that Robert died of 'la grosse maladie', a common contemporary euphemism for leprosy. An anonymous chronicler writing at Lanercost Priory in Cumbria also states that Bruce did not lead a Scottish raid into north-east England in 1327 (the raid Le Bel was employed to resist) because he 'had become leprous'. Another northern English chronicler, Sir Thomas Gray, writing in the 1350s, also claims that it was leprosy that led to Bruce's death.

These are however hostile sources, & we should be cautious of accepting them uncritically. Leprosy was seen in the fourteenth-century as being the judgment of God against his enemies & was thus a useful illness to ascribe to someone whose reputation you wanted to undermine. A contemporary witness to the king's condition when he visited Ireland in 1327 reports that he was 'weak' ('febles') & 'could not move more than his tongue' but does not mention leprosy, though they too were hostile & might be expected to have highlighted it if they suspected that was what Bruce was suffering from.

Certainly, it was an illness of some sort that killed Bruce. He was probably already afflicted with it at the time of Bannockburn, having first fallen ill in late 1307 & then suffered periodic flare-ups for the rest of his life. Bruce was ministered to by several physicians - including one, Maino de Maineri, who came from Milan & had taught at the University of Paris. None of their diagnoses survive, though Maineri beleived that some of Bruce's problems came from eating too many eels! The later Scottish poet John Barbour suggests that Bruce contracted his illness 'throuch his cald lying' - i.e., through the harsh conditions he endured while campaigning.

04/06/2026

This time next week the World Cup kicks off, but much more importantly next Monday (8th June) the *Bannockburn* World Cup will begin across our social media platforms.

Over the next six weeks we will be pitting various figures associated with the Battle of Bannockburn against one another and invited our followers on Facebook & Instagram to vote on their preferred winner.

Each post will be accompanied by a brief summary of each individual's achievements, but what criteria you use to make your choice is up to you!

We should probably add that the game depicted in this image - a marginal illustration from a mid fourteenth-century Flemish manuscript of the Roman d'Alexandre - is not football but an early form of bowls.

10/05/2026

in 1307 King Robert scored his first victory against the English in battle near Loudoun Hill in Ayrshire. Though small in scale, this was the first time in a war that had dragged on for eleven years already that a King of Scots had led soldiers into battle and emerged victorious, singling Bruce out as a serious threat to English ambitions in Scotland than his rivals had been.

Bruce had lost the first two battles he fought as king in 1306 & during the following winter he disappears from the surviving record altogether. He likely spent this time travelling the Hebrides & the Western Highlands raising a new army from among the local Gaelic-speaking population. Around February 1307 he returned to Carrick - his childhood home - & mustered what support he could there. His early efforts to disrupt English lordship in the south-west were still fairly desultory however, including a fumbled ambush on the English treasurer at Glen Trool in April.

Having apparently received intelligence that the English Guardian of Scotland - Aymer de Valence, earl of Pembroke - was advancing eastwards roughly along what is now the A71, Bruce dug up the ground on either side of the road, creating three parallel lines of ditches that would force the English to face the Scots on the road. According to the later Scottish poet John Barbour, the Scots were outnumbered 6 to 1, but between the ditches the English would have to face the Scots 1-on-1. If the Scots were overrun at the first ditch, they could retreat to the second, and then again to the third if need be.

In the event, the mounted vanguard of Valence's force appears to have charged the Scots at the first ditch & were repulsed, after which the English withdrew to Ayr. This led a contemporary English observer to complain that Valence 'had retreated before King Hobbe [i.e., Bruce] without doing any exploit'. Nevertheless, the fact that Bruce had inflicted even this minor reversal on an English army made many Scots - such as James Douglas, whose attempts to negotiate with the English crown for the restoration of his lands abruptly stopped after Loudoun Hill - view Bruce as a promising candidate as King of Scots.

The Battle of Loudoun Hill serves as the dramatic climax of the 2018 film 'Outlaw King'. The film gets a lot correct about the battle, including Bruce's anticipation of the English approach & the staggered ditches. It does, however, fudge a number of details. For example, in the film the English charge the ditches, rather than charging at the Scots on the road (admittedly, this serves as a powerful illustration of *why* the English wouldn't charge the ditches). Also, the film has Edward II present at the battle. In reality, he was not only not there, he would not become king until July 1307.

04/05/2026

📢JOB OPPORTUNITY📢

We're advertising for a Visitor Services Assistant to join our team! Fixed-Term until December 2026. The closing date for applications is Friday 8th May.

For more information on how to apply head to our website:

https://www.nts.org.uk/volunteering-jobs/job-search/edinburgh-east

The Battle of Bannockburn NTS

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