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Kingdom of ScotlandRìoghachd na h-Alba

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The kingdom of the Scots in northern Britain. It grew out of the kingdom of the Picts, which a Gaelic dynasty founded by Kenneth MacAlpin took over in the 840s, and in Gaelic it was called Alba. It later took in Lothian and, in 1266, the Hebrides. Scotland kept its own kings through wars with England from 1296 to 1357, shared a monarch with England from 1603, and joined it in the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707.

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Key events

  1. Kenneth MacAlpin (Cináed mac Ailpín), a Gaelic king from the west, becomes king of the Picts; later tradition counts him the first king of ScotsDisputed

    The year is uncertain: dates of 841, 842, 843 and 848 are all given, and no source describes how he took the Pictish kingdom. At his death in 858 the Annals of Ulster still call him king of the Picts.

  2. Donald II (Domnall son of Constantín) dies; the Annals of Ulster call him king of Alba, the first king to carry that title
  3. Malcolm II and his ally Owain of Strathclyde defeat the Northumbrians at Carham on the TweedDisputed

    Durham sources give 1018; some historians have argued for 1016. The Oxford Companion says the victory confirmed Scotland's hold on Lothian and helped make the Tweed the border; more recent work finds no direct evidence for that link. Carham is in England today.

  4. Scotland's barons send Pope John XXII a letter, dated at Arbroath, asserting the kingdom's independence and Robert I's right to rule: the Declaration of Arbroath

    The letter is dated 6 April 1320. It drew little notice until it was published in the late 17th century; the name "Declaration of Arbroath" is modern.

  5. Keeping his alliance with France, James IV leads an army across the Tweed into England and is killed at Flodden with many of Scotland's nobles

    The Battlefields Trust estimates about 10,000 Scottish and 4,000 English dead. James IV was the last reigning monarch in Britain to be killed in battle. The field, near Branxton, is in England today.

  6. James VI inherits the English throne on the death of Elizabeth I and moves to London as James I; the two kingdoms share a king but keep separate parliaments, laws and churches
  7. The Acts of Union take effect: Scotland and England become one Kingdom of Great Britain with a single parliament at Westminster, while Scotland keeps its own law and church

    The Scottish Parliament approved the treaty on 16 January 1707 by 110 votes to 67, with 46 members absent or abstaining.

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Wars

  1. Wars of Scottish Independence
    Kingdom of Scotland and its allies

    Kingdom of Scotland, Kingdom of France: money and arms, and in 1355 a company of French knights, and Gaelic Irish lords who fought beside Edward Bruce in Ireland (1315–1318), among them Domhnall Ó Néill of Tír Eoghain

    against
    Kingdom of England and its allies

    Kingdom of England, Welsh foot soldiers raised by the English crown, English lordship of Ireland: troops for Edward I's campaigns in Scotland, and the forces that fought Edward Bruce in Ireland (1315–1318), Scottish opponents of Robert Bruce, among them the Comyn family (from 1306), and Edward Balliol and the "Disinherited", lords who had lost lands in Scotland (1332–1356)

    Scotland stayed a separate kingdom under its own king: David II was released in 1357 for a ransom of 100,000 merks, and the treaty left England's claim to overlordship unresolved.

  2. Wars of the Three Kingdoms
    Royalists (Charles I, then Charles II)

    English and Welsh Royalists, Scottish Royalists under the Marquess of Montrose (1644–1645, 1650), and Royalist forces in Ireland under Ormond

    against
    Parliamentarians (the English Parliament, from 1649 the Commonwealth)

    Armies of the English Parliament, from 1645 the New Model Army

    against
    Scottish Covenanters (allied with Parliament from 1643, with Charles II from 1650)

    Covenanter government and armies of Scotland, including the Engagers who fought for Charles I in 1648

    against
    Irish Confederate Catholics (allied with the Royalists from 1649)

    Irish Catholic insurgents of 1641, then the Confederate Catholics of Ireland

    Charles I was executed and the monarchy abolished; England, Scotland and Ireland were ruled from London as one Commonwealth until the monarchy was restored in 1660, and most land held by Irish Catholics was confiscated.