Only two Queens have been monarchs of Scotland, and one of them actually reigned as the official Queen of Scotland for twenty-five years before being betrayed by the Scots themselves and was finally beheaded by the English Queen Elizabeth – though she blamed her chief minister for the sad death of Mary, Queen of Scots, who had already been Queen of France too.
The other Scottish queen was known as the Maid of Norway, christened Margaret, who ‘ruled’ for only four years. She was an infant queen, granddaughter of Alexander III, and the only child of his daughter Margaret who died at birth. The father was King Erik of Norway, which explains the child’s nickname. When Alexander died in 1286, Margaret was the only direct survivor of the Scottish line of kings. The politicians betrothed her in 1289 (when she was three) to the infant Prince Edward, first Prince of Wales and son of Edward I of England, known as ‘The Hammer of the Scots’ by historians, and as ‘Longshanks’ by Mel Gibson. Luckily for the little girl she died at sea on the way from Norway to Britain at seven years of age. I say luckily because nothing was happy about the life of the young Edward (q.v.), who as Edward II made a mess of everything, married a charming French lady whose nickname (well deserved) was ‘The She-Wolf of France’; Edward preferred the social company of male favourites, and ended his life in prison, possibly murdered in a peculiarly horrible manner (sodomy by red-hot poker) as suggested by his own wife and her lover, Mortimer. In the 13th century, thrones and the nobility inspired little else but jealousy, incest, robbery and assassination. (more…)
