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Charlotte Stuart, styled Duchess of Albany (29 October 1753 – 17 November 1789) was the illegitimate daughter of the Jacobite pretender Prince Charles Edward Stuart ("Bonnie Prince Charlie" or the "Young Pretender") and his only child to survive infancy.
Her mother was Clementina Walkinshaw, who was mistress to the Prince from 1752 until 1760. After years of abuse, Clementina left him, taking Charlotte with her. Charlotte spent most of her life in French convents, estranged from a father who refused to make any provision for her. Unable to marry, she herself became a mistress with illegitimate children, taking Ferdinand de Rohan, Archbishop of Bordeaux, as her lover. (Full article...) -
Shapinsay (/ˈʃæpɪnziː/, Scots: Shapinsee) is one of the Orkney Islands off the north coast of mainland Scotland. With an area of 29.5 square kilometres (11.4 sq mi), it is the eighth largest island in the Orkney archipelago. It is low-lying and, with a bedrock formed from Old Red Sandstone overlain by boulder clay, fertile. Consequently, most of the area is given over to farming. Shapinsay has two nature reserves and is notable for its bird life. Balfour Castle, built in the Scottish Baronial style, is one of the island's most prominent features, a reminder of the Balfour family's domination of Shapinsay during the 18th and 19th centuries; the Balfours transformed life on the island by introducing new agricultural techniques. Other landmarks include a standing stone, an Iron Age broch, a souterrain and a salt-water shower.
There is one village on the island, Balfour, from which roll-on/roll-off car ferries sail to Kirkwall on the Orkney Mainland. At the 2011 census, Shapinsay had a population of 307. The economy of the island is primarily based on agriculture with the exception of a few small businesses that are largely tourism-related. A community-owned wind turbine was constructed in 2011. The island has a primary school but, in part due to improving transport links with mainland Orkney, no longer has a secondary school. Shapinsay's long history has given rise to various folk tales. (Full article...) -
Alexander Frederick Douglas-Home, Baron Home of the Hirsel KT, PC (/ˈhjuːm/; 2 July 1903 – 9 October 1995), styled as Lord Dunglass between 1918 and 1951 and the Earl of Home from 1951 until 1963, was a British statesman and Conservative politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1963 to 1964. He is notable for being the last prime minister to hold office while being a member of the House of Lords, before renouncing his peerage and taking up a seat in the House of Commons for the remainder of his premiership. His reputation, however, rests more on his two stints as Foreign Secretary than on his brief premiership.
Within six years of first entering the House of Commons in 1931, Douglas-Home (then called by the courtesy title Lord Dunglass) became a parliamentary aide to Neville Chamberlain, witnessing first-hand Chamberlain's efforts as prime minister to preserve peace through appeasement in the two years before the outbreak of the Second World War. In 1940 Dunglass was diagnosed with spinal tuberculosis and was immobilised for two years. By the later stages of the war he had recovered enough to resume his political career, but he lost his seat in the general election of 1945. He regained it in 1950, but the following year he left the Commons when, on the death of his father, he inherited the earldom of Home and thereby became a member of the House of Lords. Under the premierships of Winston Churchill, Anthony Eden and Harold Macmillan he was appointed to a series of increasingly senior posts, including Leader of the House of Lords and Foreign Secretary. In the latter post, which he held from 1960 to 1963, he supported United States resolve in the Cuban Missile Crisis and in August 1963 was the United Kingdom's signatory to the Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. (Full article...) -
James VII and II (14 October 1633 O.S. – 16 September 1701) was King of England and Ireland as James II and King of Scotland as James VII from the death of his elder brother, Charles II, on 6 February 1685. He was deposed in the Glorious Revolution of 1688. He was the last Catholic monarch of England, Scotland and Ireland. His reign is now remembered primarily for conflicts over religious tolerance, but it also involved struggles over the principles of absolutism and the divine right of kings. His deposition ended a century of political and civil strife in England by confirming the primacy of the English Parliament over the Crown.
James succeeded to the thrones of England, Ireland and Scotland following the death of his brother, with widespread support in all three countries, largely because the principles of eligibility based on divine right and birth were widely accepted. Tolerance of his personal Catholicism did not extend to tolerance of Catholicism in general, and the English and Scottish parliaments refused to pass his measures. When James attempted to impose them by decree, this was met with opposition; some academics have, however, argued that it was a political principle, rather than a religious one, that ultimately led to his removal. (Full article...) -
This painting by John Rogers Herbert depicts a particularly controversial speech before the Assembly by Philip Nye against presbyterian church government.
The Westminster Assembly of Divines was a council of divines (theologians) and members of the English Parliament appointed from 1643 to 1653 to restructure the Church of England. Several Scots also attended, and the Assembly's work was adopted by the Church of Scotland. As many as 121 ministers were called to the Assembly, with nineteen others added later to replace those who did not attend or could no longer attend. It produced a new Form of Church Government, a Confession of Faith or statement of belief, two catechisms or manuals for religious instruction (Shorter and Larger), and a liturgical manual, the Directory for Public Worship, for the Churches of England and Scotland. The Confession and catechisms were adopted as doctrinal standards in the Church of Scotland and other Presbyterian churches, where they remain normative. Amended versions of the Confession were also adopted in Congregational and Baptist churches in England and New England in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The Confession became influential throughout the English-speaking world, but especially in American Protestant theology.
The Assembly was called by the Long Parliament before and during the beginning of the First English Civil War. The Long Parliament was influenced by Puritanism, a religious movement which sought to further reform the church. They were opposed to the religious policies of King Charles I and William Laud, Archbishop of Canterbury. As part of a military alliance with Scotland, Parliament agreed that the outcome of the Assembly would bring the English Church into closer conformity with the Church of Scotland. The Scottish Church was governed by a system of elected assemblies of elders called presbyterianism, rather than rule by bishops, called episcopalianism, which was used in the English church. Scottish commissioners attended and advised the Assembly as part of the agreement. Disagreements over church government caused open division in the Assembly, despite attempts to maintain unity. The party of divines who favoured presbyterianism was in the majority, but the congregationalist party, which held greater influence in the military, favoured autonomy for individual congregations rather than the subjection of congregations to regional and national assemblies entailed in presbyterianism. Parliament eventually adopted a presbyterian form of government but lacked the power to implement it. During the Restoration of the monarchy in 1660, all of the documents of the Assembly were repudiated and episcopal church government was reinstated in England. (Full article...) -
The Battle of Blenheim (German: Zweite Schlacht bei Höchstädt; French: Bataille de Höchstädt; Dutch: Slag bij Blenheim) fought on 13 August [O.S. 2 August] 1704, was a major battle of the War of the Spanish Succession. The overwhelming Allied victory ensured the safety of Vienna from the Franco-Bavarian army, thus preventing the collapse of the reconstituted Grand Alliance.
Louis XIV of France sought to knock the Holy Roman Emperor, Leopold, out of the war by seizing Vienna, the Habsburg capital, and gain a favourable peace settlement. The dangers to Vienna were considerable: Maximilian II Emanuel, Elector of Bavaria, and Marshal Ferdinand de Marsin's forces in Bavaria threatened from the west, and Marshal Louis Joseph de Bourbon, duc de Vendôme's large army in northern Italy posed a serious danger with a potential offensive through the Brenner Pass. Vienna was also under pressure from Rákóczi's Hungarian revolt from its eastern approaches. Realising the danger, the Duke of Marlborough resolved to alleviate the peril to Vienna by marching his forces south from Bedburg to help maintain Emperor Leopold within the Grand Alliance. (Full article...) -
Dunnottar Castle in the Mearns occupies one of the best defensive locations in Great Britain. The site was in use throughout the High Middle Ages, and the castle itself dates to the fourteenth century.
The High Middle Ages of Scotland encompass Scotland in the era between the death of Domnall II in 900 AD and the death of King Alexander III in 1286, which was an indirect cause of the Wars of Scottish Independence.
At the close of the ninth century, various competing kingdoms occupied the territory of modern Scotland. Scandinavian influence was dominant in the northern and western islands, Brythonic culture in the southwest, the Anglo-Saxon or English Kingdom of Northumbria in the southeast and the Pictish and Gaelic Kingdom of Alba in the east, north of the River Forth. By the tenth and eleventh centuries, northern Great Britain was increasingly dominated by Gaelic culture, and by the Gaelic regal lordship of Alba, known in Latin as either Albania or Scotia, and in English as "Scotland". From its base in the east, this kingdom acquired control of the lands lying to the south and ultimately the west and much of the north. It had a flourishing culture, comprising part of the larger Gaelic-speaking world and an economy dominated by agriculture and trade. (Full article...) -
SNAE expedition ship Scotia, in the ice at Laurie Island, South Orkneys, 1903–1904
The Scottish National Antarctic Expedition (SNAE), 1902–1904, was organised and led by William Speirs Bruce, a natural scientist and former medical student from the University of Edinburgh. Although overshadowed in terms of prestige by Robert Falcon Scott's concurrent Discovery Expedition, the SNAE completed a full programme of exploration and scientific work. Its achievements included the establishment of a staffed meteorological station, the first in Antarctic territory, and the discovery of new land to the east of the Weddell Sea. Its large collection of biological and geological specimens, together with those from Bruce's earlier travels, led to the establishment of the Scottish Oceanographical Laboratory in 1906.
Bruce had spent most of the 1890s engaged on expeditions to the Antarctic and Arctic regions, and by 1899 was Britain's most experienced polar scientist. In March of that year, he applied to join the Discovery Expedition; however, his proposal to extend that expedition's field of work into the Weddell Sea quadrant, using a second ship, was dismissed as "mischievous rivalry" by Royal Geographical Society (RGS) president Sir Clements Markham. Bruce reacted by obtaining independent finance; his venture was supported and promoted by the Royal Scottish Geographical Society. (Full article...) -
The Battle of Dunbar was fought between the English New Model Army, under Oliver Cromwell, and a Scottish army commanded by David Leslie on 3 September 1650 near Dunbar, Scotland. The battle resulted in a decisive victory for the English. It was the first major battle of the 1650 invasion of Scotland, which was triggered by Scotland's acceptance of Charles II as king of Britain after the beheading of his father, Charles I on 30 January 1649.
After Charles I's execution, the English Rump Parliament established a republican Commonwealth in England. When their erstwhile ally, Scotland, recognised Charles II as king of all of Britain on 1 May 1650 and began recruiting an army to support him, the English dispatched the New Model Army, under the command of Cromwell. The army crossed into Scotland on 22 July, with a force of over 16,000 men. The Scots withdrew to Edinburgh, stripping the land of provisions. Cromwell attempted to draw the Scots out into a set piece battle, but they resisted, and Cromwell was unable to break through their defensive line. At the end of August, with his army weakened through disease and lack of food, Cromwell withdrew to the port of Dunbar. The Scottish army followed and took up an unassailable position on Doon Hill, overlooking the town. On 2 September, the Scots advanced towards Dunbar and the English took up positions outside the town. The English army was greatly weakened by sickness and lack of food, while many of the Scots' most experienced men had been dismissed in religious purges. (Full article...) -
The Kelpie by Herbert James Draper, 1913
A kelpie, or water kelpie (Scottish Gaelic: Each-Uisge), is a shape-shifting spirit inhabiting lochs in Irish and Scottish folklore. It is usually described as a grey or white horse-like creature, able to adapt human form. Some accounts state that the kelpie retains its hooves when appearing as a human, leading to its association with the Christian idea of Satan as alluded to by Robert Burns in his 1786 poem "Address to the Devil".
Almost every sizeable body of water in Scotland has an associated kelpie story, but the most extensively reported is that of Loch Ness. The kelpie has counterparts across the world, such as the Germanic nixie, the wihwin of Central America and the Australian bunyip. The origins of narratives about the creature are unclear, but the practical purposes of keeping children away from dangerous stretches of water and warning young women to be wary of handsome strangers has been noted in secondary literature. (Full article...) -
The Battle of Inverkeithing was fought on 20 July 1651 between an English army under John Lambert and a Scottish army led by James Holborne as part of an English invasion of Scotland. The battle was fought near the isthmus of the Ferry Peninsula, to the south of Inverkeithing, after which it is named.
An English Parliamentary regime had tried, convicted, and executed Charles I, who was king of both Scotland and England in a personal union, in January 1649. The Scots recognised his son, also named Charles, as king of Britain and set about recruiting an army. An English army, under Oliver Cromwell, invaded Scotland in July 1650. The Scottish army, commanded by David Leslie, refused battle until 3 September when it was heavily defeated at the Battle of Dunbar. The English occupied Edinburgh and the Scots withdrew to the choke point of Stirling. For nearly a year all attempts to storm or bypass Stirling, or to draw the Scots out into another battle, failed. On 17 July 1651 1,600 English soldiers crossed the Firth of Forth at its narrowest point in specially constructed flat-bottomed boats and landed at North Queensferry on the Ferry Peninsula. The Scots sent forces to pen the English in and the English reinforced their landing. On 20 July the Scots moved against the English and in a short engagement were routed. (Full article...) -
The Scotland men's national football team represents Scotland in men's international football and is controlled by the Scottish Football Association. It competes in the three major professional tournaments: the FIFA World Cup, UEFA Nations League and the UEFA European Championship. Scotland, as a country of the United Kingdom, is not a member of the International Olympic Committee, and therefore the national team does not compete in the Olympic Games. The majority of Scotland's home matches are played at the national stadium, Hampden Park.
Scotland is the joint oldest national football team in the world, alongside England, whom they played in the world's first international football match in 1872. Scotland has a long-standing rivalry with England, whom they played annually from 1872 until 1989. The teams have met only nine times since then, most recently in a friendly in September 2023. (Full article...) -
Captain Sir Murray Maxwell, CB, FRS (10 September 1775 – 26 June 1831) was a British Royal Navy officer who served with distinction in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, particularly during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. Maxwell first gained recognition as one of the British captains involved in the successful Adriatic campaign of 1807–1814, during which he was responsible for the destruction of a French armaments convoy at the action of 29 November 1811. As a result of further success in the Mediterranean, Maxwell was given increasingly important commissions and, despite the loss of his ship HMS Daedalus off Ceylon in 1813, was appointed to escort the British Ambassador to China in 1816.
The voyage to China subsequently became famous when Maxwell's ship HMS Alceste was wrecked in the Gaspar Strait, and he and his crew became stranded on a nearby island. The shipwrecked sailors ran short of food and were repeatedly attacked by Malay pirates, but thanks to Maxwell's leadership there were no deaths. Eventually rescued by a British East India Company ship, the party returned to Britain as popular heroes, Maxwell being especially commended. He was knighted for his services, and made a brief and unsuccessful foray into politics before resuming his naval career. In 1831 Maxwell was appointed Lieutenant Governor of Prince Edward Island, but fell ill and died before he could take up the post. (Full article...) -
John Knox (c. 1514 – 24 November 1572) was a Scottish minister, Reformed theologian, and writer who was a leader of the country's Reformation. He was the founder of the Presbyterian Church of Scotland.
Born in Giffordgate, a street in Haddington, East Lothian, Knox is believed to have been educated at the University of St Andrews and worked as a notary-priest. Influenced by early church reformers such as George Wishart, he joined the movement to reform the Scottish church. He was caught up in the ecclesiastical and political events that involved the murder of Cardinal David Beaton in 1546 and the intervention of the regent Mary of Guise. He was taken prisoner by French forces the following year and exiled to England on his release in 1549. (Full article...) -
The Burke and Hare murders were a series of sixteen killings committed over a period of about ten months in 1828 in Edinburgh, Scotland. They were undertaken by William Burke and William Hare, who sold the corpses to Robert Knox for dissection at his anatomy lectures.
Edinburgh was a leading European centre of anatomical study in the early 19th century, in a time when the demand for cadavers led to a shortfall in legal supply. Scottish law required that corpses used for medical research should only come from those who had died in prison, suicide victims, or from foundlings and orphans. The shortage of corpses led to an increase in body snatching by what were known as "resurrection men". Measures to ensure graves were left undisturbed—such as the use of mortsafes—exacerbated the shortage. When a lodger in Hare's house died, he turned to his friend Burke for advice and they decided to sell the body to Knox. They received what was, for them, the generous sum of £7 10s. A little over two months later, when Hare was concerned that a lodger with a fever would deter others from staying in the house, he and Burke murdered her and sold the body to Knox. The men continued their murder spree, probably with the knowledge of their wives. Burke and Hare's actions were uncovered after other lodgers discovered their last victim, Margaret Docherty, and contacted the police. (Full article...) -
A side view of Pitfour House, c. late 19th century
The Pitfour Estate, in the Buchan area of North-East Scotland, was an ancient barony encompassing most of the extensive Longside Parish, stretching from St Fergus to New Pitsligo. It was purchased in 1700 by James Ferguson of Badifurrow, who became the first Laird of Pitfour.
The estate was substantially renovated by Ferguson and the following two generations of his family. At the height of its development in the 18th and 19th centuries the 50-square-mile (130 km2) property had several extravagant features including a two-mile racecourse, an artificial lake and an observatory. The original mansion house was extended before being rebuilt. The surrounding parklands were landscaped, major renovations were undertaken, and follies such as a small replica Temple of Theseus were constructed, in which George Ferguson, the fifth laird, was thought to keep alligators in a cold bath. (Full article...) -
Satellite image of northern Britain and Ireland showing the approximate area of Dál Riata (shaded)
Áedán mac Gabráin (pronounced [ˈaiðaːn mak ˈɡavɾaːnʲ] in Old Irish; Irish: Aodhán mac Gabhráin), also written as Aedan, was a king of Dál Riata from c. 574 until c. 609 AD. The kingdom of Dál Riata was situated in modern Argyll and Bute, Scotland, and parts of County Antrim, Ireland. Genealogies record that Áedán was a son of Gabrán mac Domangairt.
He was a contemporary of Saint Columba, and much that is recorded of his life and career comes from hagiography such as Adomnán of Iona's Life of Saint Columba. Áedán appears as a character in Old Irish and Middle Irish language works of prose and verse, some now lost. (Full article...) -
In the United Kingdom, representative peers were those peers elected by the members of the Peerage of Scotland and the Peerage of Ireland to sit in the British House of Lords. Until 1999, all members of the Peerage of England held the right to sit in the House of Lords; they did not elect a limited group of representatives. All peers who were created after 1707 as Peers of Great Britain and after 1801 as Peers of the United Kingdom held the same right to sit in the House of Lords.
Representative peers were introduced in 1707, when the Kingdom of England and the Kingdom of Scotland were united into the Kingdom of Great Britain. At the time there were 168 English and 154 Scottish peers. The English peers feared that the House of Lords would be swamped by the Scottish element, and consequently the election of a small number of representative peers to represent Scotland was negotiated. A similar arrangement was adopted when the Kingdom of Great Britain and the Kingdom of Ireland merged into the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland in January 1801. (Full article...) -
Elizabeth Angela Marguerite Bowes-Lyon (4 August 1900 – 30 March 2002) was Queen of the United Kingdom and the Dominions of the British Commonwealth from 11 December 1936 to 6 February 1952 as the wife of King George VI. She was concurrently the last Empress of India until the British Raj was dissolved in August 1947. After her husband died, she was officially known as Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother, to avoid confusion with her daughter, Queen Elizabeth II.
Born into a family of British nobility, Elizabeth came to prominence in 1923 when she married Prince Albert, Duke of York, the second son of King George V and Queen Mary. The couple and their daughters, Elizabeth and Margaret, embodied traditional ideas of family and public service. The Duchess undertook a variety of public engagements and became known for her consistently cheerful countenance. (Full article...) -
HMS Ramillies (pennant number: 07) was one of five Revenge-class super-dreadnought battleships built for the Royal Navy during the First World War. They were developments of the Queen Elizabeth-class battleships, with reductions in size and speed to offset increases in the armour protection whilst retaining the same main battery of eight 15-inch (381 mm) guns. Completed in late 1917, Ramillies saw no combat during the war as both the British and the German fleets had adopted a more cautious strategy by this time owing to the increasing threat of naval mines and submarines.
Ramillies spent the 1920s and 1930s alternating between the Atlantic Fleet and the Mediterranean Fleet. Whilst serving in the Mediterranean and Black Seas in the early 1920s, the ship went to Turkey twice in response to crises arising from the Greco-Turkish War, including the Great Fire of Smyrna in 1922. She also saw limited involvement during the Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War. The ship's interwar career was otherwise uneventful. With the outbreak of the Second World War in September 1939, Ramillies was initially assigned to escort duties in the North Atlantic. In May 1940, she was transferred to the Mediterranean Fleet as war with Italy loomed. After the Italians entered the war in June, Ramillies bombarded Italian ports in North Africa, escorted convoys to Malta, and supported the Taranto raid in November. (Full article...) -
Portrait of Mary Wilbraham, Weston Park
John Michael Wright (May 1617 – July 1694) was an English painter, mainly of portraits in the Baroque style. Born and raised in London, Wright trained in Edinburgh under the Scots painter George Jamesone, and sometimes described himself as Scottish in documents. He acquired a considerable reputation as an artist and scholar during a long sojourn in Rome. There he was admitted to the Accademia di San Luca and was associated with some of the leading artists of his generation. He was engaged by Archduke Leopold Wilhelm of Austria, the governor of the Spanish Netherlands, to acquire artworks in Oliver Cromwell's England in 1655.
He took up permanent residence in England from 1656 and served as court painter before and after the English Restoration. A convert to Roman Catholicism, he was a favourite of the restored Stuart court, a client of both Charles II and James II, and was a witness to many of the political manoeuvrings of the era. In the final years of the Stuart monarchy he returned to Rome as part of an embassy to Pope Innocent XI. (Full article...) -
HMS Royal Oak was one of five Revenge-class battleships built for the Royal Navy during the First World War. Completed in 1916, the ship first saw combat at the Battle of Jutland as part of the Grand Fleet. In peacetime, she served in the Atlantic, Home and Mediterranean fleets, more than once coming under accidental attack. Royal Oak drew worldwide attention in 1928 when her senior officers were controversially court-martialled, an event that brought considerable embarrassment to what was then the world's largest navy. Attempts to modernise Royal Oak throughout her 25-year career could not fix her fundamental lack of speed and, by the start of the Second World War, she was no longer suitable for front-line duty.
On 14 October 1939, Royal Oak was anchored at Scapa Flow in Orkney, Scotland, when she was torpedoed by the German submarine U-47. Of Royal Oak's complement of 1,234 men and boys, 835 were killed that night or died later of their wounds. The loss of the outdated ship—the first of five Royal Navy battleships and battlecruisers sunk in the Second World War—did little to affect the numerical superiority enjoyed by the British navy and its Allies, but it had a considerable effect on wartime morale. The raid made an immediate celebrity and war hero of the U-boat commander, Günther Prien, who became the first German submarine officer to be awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross. Before the sinking of Royal Oak, the Royal Navy had considered the naval base at Scapa Flow impregnable to submarine attack, but U-47's raid demonstrated that the German navy was capable of bringing the war to British home waters. The shock resulted in rapid changes to dockland security and the construction of the Churchill Barriers around Scapa Flow, with the added advantage of being topped by roads running between the islands. (Full article...) -
The Anglo-Scottish war (1650–1652), also known as the Third Civil War, was the final conflict in the Wars of the Three Kingdoms, a series of armed conflicts and political machinations between shifting alliances of religious and political factions in England, Scotland and Ireland.
The 1650 English invasion of Scotland was a pre-emptive military incursion by the English Commonwealth's New Model Army, intended to allay the risk of Charles II invading England with a Scottish army. The First and Second English Civil Wars, in which English Royalists, loyal to Charles I, fought Parliamentarians for control of the country, took place between 1642 and 1648. When the Royalists were defeated for the second time the English government, exasperated by the duplicity of Charles I during negotiations, set up a High Court of Justice which found the King guilty of treason and executed him on 30 January 1649. At the time, England and Scotland were separate independent kingdoms, joined politically through a personal union; Charles I was, separately, both the king of Scotland, and the king of England. The Scots had fought in support of the English Parliamentarians in the First English Civil War, but sent an army in support of Charles I into England during the Second. The Parliament of Scotland, which had not been consulted before the execution, declared his son, Charles II, King of Britain. (Full article...) -
The Isle of Skye, or simply Skye (/skaɪ/; Scottish Gaelic: An t-Eilean Sgitheanach or Eilean a' Cheò), is the largest and northernmost of the major islands in the Inner Hebrides of Scotland. The island's peninsulas radiate from a mountainous hub dominated by the Cuillin, the rocky slopes of which provide some of the most dramatic mountain scenery in the country. Although Sgitheanach has been suggested to describe a winged shape, no definitive agreement exists as to the name's origins.
The island has been occupied since the Mesolithic period, and over its history has been occupied at various times by Celtic tribes including the Picts and the Gaels, Scandinavian Vikings, and most notably the powerful integrated Norse-Gaels clans of
MacLeod and MacDonald. The island was considered to be under Norwegian suzerainty until the 1266 Treaty of Perth, which transferred control over to Scotland. (Full article...) -
"From the Doctor to My Son Thomas" is a viral video recorded by actor Peter Capaldi and sent to Thomas Goodall, an autistic nine-year-old boy in England, to console the child over grief from the death of Goodall's grandmother. Capaldi filmed the 42-second video in character as the Twelfth Doctor from the BBC science-fiction series Doctor Who. Capaldi's message had a positive effect on Thomas: he smiled for the first time since learning of his grandmother's death, and gained the courage to go to her funeral.
Thomas' father Ross Goodall posted the video to YouTube on 6 November 2014, wanting to make the video available to his family, but had no idea it would become popular online. The video was viewed over 200,000 times in its first 48 hours online, and more than doubled the next day, and less than a week later it had over 900,000 total views, making it a viral video, with the responses becoming a global phenomenon. (Full article...) -
Walter Weir Wilson Donaldson (2 February 1907 – 24 May 1973) was a Scottish professional snooker and billiards player. He contested eight consecutive world championship finals against Fred Davis from 1947 to 1954, and won the title in 1947 and 1950. Donaldson was known for his long potting and his consistency when playing, and had an aversion to the use of side. In 2012, he was inducted posthumously into the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association's World Snooker Hall of Fame.
Donaldson became a professional player shortly after winning the under-16's British Junior English Billiards Championship in 1922 and won the Scottish professional billiards title six times. He first competed in the World Snooker Championship in 1933, but after a heavy defeat by Joe Davis did not enter again until 1939. After serving in the Fourth Indian Division during World War II, Donaldson entered the 1946 World Championship, where he lost to Davis in his first match. As a player that did not reach the championship final, he was eligible to enter the 1946 Albany Club Professional Snooker Tournament, which he won. Following Joe Davis's retirement from the World Championship in 1946, Donaldson practised intensively and won the 1947 Championship by defeating Fred Davis in the final. Davis won the following two championships, with Donaldson taking the next and then being runner-up to Davis for the next four years. Donaldson then retired from World Championship competition, although he continued to play in the News of the World Snooker Tournament until 1959. (Full article...) -
The Little Minch, home to the blue men
The blue men of the Minch, also known as storm kelpies (Scottish Gaelic: na fir ghorma Scottish Gaelic pronunciation: [nə fiɾʲ ˈɣɔɾɔmə]), are mythological creatures inhabiting the stretch of water between the northern Outer Hebrides and mainland Scotland, looking for sailors to drown and stricken boats to sink. They appear to be localised to the Minch and surrounding areas to the north and as far east as Wick, unknown in other parts of Scotland and without counterparts in the rest of the world.
Apart from their blue colour, the mythical creatures look much like humans, and are about the same size. They have the power to create storms, but when the weather is fine they float sleeping on or just below the surface of the water. The blue men swim with their torsos raised out of the sea, twisting and diving as porpoises do. They are able to speak, and when a group approaches a ship its chief may shout two lines of poetry to the master of the vessel and challenge him to complete the verse. If the skipper fails in that task then the blue men will attempt to capsize his ship. (Full article...) -
William McGregor (13 April 1846 – 20 December 1911) was a Scottish association football administrator in the Victorian era who is regarded as the founder of the Football League (now English Football League), the first organised association football league in the world.
After moving from Perthshire to Birmingham to set up business as a draper, McGregor became involved with local football club Aston Villa, which he helped to establish as one of the leading teams in England. He served the club for over 20 years in various capacities, including president, director and chairman. In 1888, frustrated by the regular cancellation of Villa's matches, McGregor organised a meeting of representatives of England's leading clubs, which led to the formation of the Football League, giving member clubs a guaranteed fixture list each season. This was instrumental in the transition of football from an amateur pastime to a professional business. (Full article...) -
Causantín mac Áeda (Modern Gaelic: Còiseam mac Aoidh, anglicised Constantine II; born no later than 879; died 952) was an early King of Scotland, known then by the Gaelic name Alba. The Kingdom of Alba, a name which first appears in Constantine's lifetime, was situated in modern-day Northern Scotland.
The core of the kingdom was formed by the lands around the River Tay. Its southern limit was the River Forth, northwards it extended towards the Moray Firth and perhaps to Caithness, while its western limits are uncertain. Constantine's grandfather Kenneth I of Scotland (Cináed mac Ailpín, died 858) was the first of the family recorded as a king, but as king of the Picts. This change of title, from king of the Picts to king of Alba, is part of a broader transformation of Pictland and the origins of the Kingdom of Alba are traced to Constantine's lifetime. (Full article...) -
Anne of Denmark (Danish: Anna; 12 December 1574 – 2 March 1619) was the wife of King James VI and I. She was Queen of Scotland from their marriage on 20 August 1589 and Queen of England and Ireland from the union of the Scottish and English crowns on 24 March 1603 until her death in 1619.
The second daughter of King Frederick II of Denmark and Sophie of Mecklenburg-Güstrow, Anne married James at age 14. They had three children who survived infancy: Henry Frederick, Prince of Wales, who predeceased his parents; Princess Elizabeth, who became Queen of Bohemia; and James's future successor, Charles I. Anne demonstrated an independent streak and a willingness to use factional Scottish politics in her conflicts with James over the custody of Prince Henry and his treatment of her friend Beatrix Ruthven. Anne appears to have loved James at first, but the couple gradually drifted and eventually lived apart, though mutual respect and a degree of affection survived. (Full article...) -
Donnchadh (Scottish Gaelic pronunciation: [ˈt̪ɔn̪ˠɔxəɣ]; Latin: Duncanus; English: Duncan) was a Gall-Gaidhil prince and Scottish magnate in what is now south-western Scotland, whose career stretched from the last quarter of the 12th century until his death in 1250. His father, Gille-Brighde of Galloway, and his uncle, Uhtred of Galloway, were the two rival sons of Fergus, Prince or Lord of Galloway. As a result of Gille-Brighde's conflict with Uhtred and the Scottish monarch William the Lion, Donnchadh became a hostage of King Henry II of England. He probably remained in England for almost a decade before returning north on the death of his father. Although denied succession to all the lands of Galloway, he was granted lordship over Carrick in the north.
Allied to John de Courcy, Donnchadh fought battles in Ireland and acquired land there that he subsequently lost. A patron of religious houses, particularly Melrose Abbey and North Berwick priory nunnery, he attempted to establish a monastery in his own territory, at Crossraguel. He married the daughter of Alan fitz Walter, a leading member of the family later known as the House of Stewart—future monarchs of Scotland and England. Donnchadh was the first mormaer or earl of Carrick, a region he ruled for more than six decades, making him one of the longest serving magnates in medieval Scotland. His descendants include the Bruce and Stewart Kings of Scotland, and probably the Campbell Dukes of Argyll. (Full article...) -
David I or Dauíd mac Maíl Choluim (Modern: Daibhidh I mac [Mhaoil] Chaluim; c. 1084 – 24 May 1153) was a 12th-century ruler who was Prince of the Cumbrians from 1113 to 1124 and later King of Scotland from 1124 to 1153. The youngest son of Malcolm III and Margaret of Wessex, David spent most of his childhood in Scotland, but was exiled to England temporarily in 1093. Perhaps after 1100, he became a dependent at the court of King Henry I of England. There he was influenced by the Norman-French culture of the court.
When David's brother Alexander I died in 1124, David chose, with the backing of Henry I, to take the Kingdom of Scotland (Alba) for himself. He was forced to engage in warfare against his rival and nephew, Máel Coluim mac Alaxandair. Subduing the latter seems to have taken David ten years, a struggle that involved the destruction of Óengus, Mormaer of Moray. David's victory allowed expansion of control over more distant regions theoretically part of his Kingdom. After the death of his former patron Henry I, David supported the claims of Henry's daughter and his own niece, Empress Matilda, to the throne of England. In the process, he came into conflict with King Stephen and was able to expand his power in northern England, despite his defeat at the Battle of the Standard in 1138. David I is a saint of the Catholic Church, with his feast day celebrated on 24 May. (Full article...) -
William Speirs Bruce FRSE (1 August 1867 – 28 October 1921) was a British naturalist, polar scientist and oceanographer who organized and led the Scottish National Antarctic Expedition (SNAE, 1902–04) to the South Orkney Islands and the Weddell Sea. Among other achievements, the expedition established the first permanent weather station in Antarctica. Bruce later founded the Scottish Oceanographical Laboratory in Edinburgh, but his plans for a transcontinental Antarctic march via the South Pole were abandoned because of lack of public and financial support.
In 1892 Bruce gave up his medical studies at the University of Edinburgh and joined the Dundee Whaling Expedition to Antarctica as a scientific assistant. This was followed by Arctic voyages to Novaya Zemlya, Spitsbergen and Franz Josef Land. In 1899 Bruce, by then Britain's most experienced polar scientist, applied for a post on Robert Falcon Scott's Discovery Expedition, but delays over this appointment and clashes with Royal Geographical Society (RGS) president Sir Clements Markham led him instead to organise his own expedition, and earned him the permanent enmity of the geographical establishment in London. Although Bruce received various awards for his polar work, including an honorary doctorate from the University of Aberdeen, neither he nor any of his SNAE colleagues were recommended by the RGS for the prestigious Polar Medal. (Full article...) -
Nebula Science Fiction was the first Scottish science fiction magazine. It was published from 1952 to 1959, and was edited by Peter Hamilton, a young Scot who was able to take advantage of spare capacity at his parents' printing company, Crownpoint, to launch the magazine. Because Hamilton could only print Nebula when Crownpoint had no other work, the schedule was initially erratic. In 1955 he moved the printing to a Dublin-based firm, and the schedule became a little more regular, with a steady monthly run beginning in 1958 that lasted into the following year. Nebula's circulation was international, with only a quarter of the sales in the United Kingdom; this led to disaster when South Africa and Australia imposed import controls on foreign periodicals at the end of the 1950s. Excise duties imposed in the UK added to Hamilton's financial burdens, and he was rapidly forced to close the magazine. The last issue was dated June 1959.
The magazine was popular with writers, partly because Hamilton went to great lengths to encourage new writers, and partly because he paid better rates per word than much of his competition. Initially he could not compete with the American market, but he offered a bonus for the most popular story in the issue, and was eventually able to match the leading American magazines. He published the first stories of several well-known writers, including Robert Silverberg, Brian Aldiss, and Bob Shaw. Nebula was also a fan favourite: author Ken Bulmer recalled that it became "what many fans regard as the best-loved British SF magazine". (Full article...) -
The Second War of Scottish Independence broke out in 1332 when Edward Balliol led an English-backed invasion of Scotland. Balliol, the son of former Scottish king John Balliol, was attempting to make good his claim to the Scottish throne. He was opposed by Scots loyal to the occupant of the throne, eight-year-old David II. At the Battle of Dupplin Moor Balliol's force defeated a Scottish army ten times their size and Balliol was crowned king. Within three months David's partisans had regrouped and forced Balliol out of Scotland. He appealed to the English king, Edward III, who invaded Scotland in 1333 and besieged the important trading town of Berwick. A large Scottish army attempted to relieve it but was heavily defeated at the Battle of Halidon Hill. Balliol established his authority over most of Scotland, ceded to England the eight counties of south-east Scotland and did homage to Edward for the rest of the country as a fief.
As allies of Scotland via the Auld Alliance, the French were unhappy about an English expansion into Scotland and so covertly supported and financed David's loyalists. Balliol's allies fell out among themselves and he lost control of most of Scotland again by late 1334. In early 1335 the French attempted to broker a peace. However, the Scots were unable to agree a position and Edward prevaricated while building a large army. He invaded in July and again overran most of Scotland. Tensions with France increased. Further French-sponsored peace talks failed in 1336 and in May 1337 the French king, Philip VI, engineered a clear break between France and England, starting the Hundred Years' War. The Anglo-Scottish war became a subsidiary theatre of this larger Anglo-French war. Edward sent what troops he could spare to Scotland, in spite of which the English slowly lost ground in Scotland as they were forced to focus on the French theatre. Achieving his majority David returned to Scotland from France in 1341 and by 1342 the English had been cleared from north of the border. (Full article...) -
James VI and I (James Charles Stuart; 19 June 1566 – 27 March 1625) was King of Scotland as James VI from 24 July 1567 and King of England and Ireland as James I from the union of the Scottish and English crowns on 24 March 1603 until his death in 1625. Although he long tried to get both countries to adopt a closer political union, the kingdoms of Scotland and England remained individual sovereign states, with their own parliaments, judiciaries, and laws, both ruled by James in personal union.
James was the son of Mary, Queen of Scots, and a great-great-grandson of Henry VII, King of England and Lord of Ireland, and thus a potential successor to all three thrones. He succeeded to the Scottish throne at the age of thirteen months, after his mother was forced to abdicate in his favour. Four different regents governed during his minority, which ended officially in 1578, though he did not gain full control of his government until 1583. In 1589, he married Anne of Denmark. Three of their children survived to adulthood: Henry Frederick, Elizabeth, and Charles. In 1603, James succeeded his cousin Elizabeth I, the last Tudor monarch of England and Ireland, who died childless. He continued to reign in all three kingdoms for 22 years, a period known as the Jacobean era, until his death in 1625. After the Union of the Crowns, he based himself in England (the largest of the three realms) from 1603, returning to Scotland only once, in 1617, and styled himself "King of Great Britain and Ireland". He was a major advocate of a single parliament for England and Scotland. In his reign, the Plantation of Ulster and English colonisation of the Americas began. (Full article...) -
General Gregor MacGregor (24 December 1786 – 4 December 1845) was a Scottish soldier, adventurer, and confidence trickster who attempted from 1821 to 1837 to draw British and French investors and settlers to "Poyais", a fictional Central American territory that he claimed to rule as "Cazique". Hundreds invested their savings in supposed Poyaisian government bonds and land certificates, while about 250 emigrated to MacGregor's invented country in 1822–23 to find only an untouched jungle; more than half of them died. Seen as a contributory factor to the "Panic of 1825", MacGregor's Poyais scheme has been called one of the most brazen confidence tricks in history.
From the Clan Gregor, MacGregor was an officer in the British Army from 1803 to 1810; he served in the Peninsular War. He joined the republican side in the Venezuelan War of Independence in 1812, quickly became a general and, over the next four years, operated against the Spanish on behalf of both Venezuela and its neighbour New Granada. His successes included a difficult month-long fighting retreat through northern Venezuela in 1816. He captured Amelia Island in 1817 under a mandate from revolutionary agents to conquer Florida from the Spanish, and there proclaimed a short-lived "Republic of the Floridas". He then oversaw two calamitous operations in New Granada during 1819 that each ended with his abandoning British volunteer troops under his command. (Full article...) -
Mary, Queen of Scots (8 December 1542 – 8 February 1587), also known as Mary Stuart or Mary I of Scotland, was Queen of Scotland from 14 December 1542 until her forced abdication in 1567.
The only surviving legitimate child of James V of Scotland, Mary was six days old when her father died and she inherited the throne. During her childhood, Scotland was governed by regents, first by the heir to the throne, James Hamilton, Earl of Arran, and then by her mother, Mary of Guise. In 1548, she was betrothed to Francis, the Dauphin of France, and was sent to be brought up in France, where she would be safe from invading English forces during the Rough Wooing. Mary married Francis in 1558, becoming queen consort of France from his accession in 1559 until his death in December 1560. Widowed, Mary returned to Scotland in August 1561. The tense religious and political climate following the Scottish Reformation that Mary encountered on her return to Scotland was further agitated by prominent Scots such as John Knox, who openly questioned whether her subjects had a duty to obey her. The early years of her personal rule were marked by pragmatism, tolerance, and moderation. She issued a proclamation accepting the religious settlement in Scotland as she had found it upon her return, retained advisers such as James Stewart, Earl of Moray (her illegitimate half-brother), and William Maitland of Lethington, and governed as the Catholic monarch of a Protestant kingdom. (Full article...) -
HMS Hood (pennant number 51) was a battlecruiser of the Royal Navy (RN). Hood was the first of the planned four Admiral-class battlecruisers to be built during the First World War. Already under construction when the Battle of Jutland occurred in mid-1916, that battle revealed serious flaws in her design, and despite drastic revisions she was completed four years later. For this reason, she was the only ship of her class to be completed, as the Admiralty decided it would be better to start with a clean design on succeeding battlecruisers, leading to the never-built G-3 class. Despite the appearance of newer and more modern ships, Hood remained the largest warship in the world for 20 years after her commissioning, and her prestige was reflected in her nickname, "The Mighty Hood".
Hood was involved in many showing-the-flag exercises between her commissioning in 1920 and the outbreak of war in 1939, including training exercises in the Mediterranean Sea and a circumnavigation of the globe with the Special Service Squadron in 1923 and 1924. She was attached to the Mediterranean Fleet following the outbreak of the Second Italo-Ethiopian War in 1935. When the Spanish Civil War broke out the following year, Hood was officially assigned to the Mediterranean Fleet until she had to return to Britain in 1939 for an overhaul. By this time, advances in naval gunnery had reduced Hood's usefulness. She was scheduled to undergo a major rebuild in 1941 to correct these issues, but the outbreak of the Second World War in September 1939 kept the ship in service without the upgrades. (Full article...) -
The Great North of Scotland Railway (GNSR) was one of the two smallest of the five major Scottish railway companies prior to the 1923 Grouping, operating in the north-east of the country. Formed in 1845, it carried its first passengers the 39 miles (63 km) from Kittybrewster, in Aberdeen, to Huntly on 20 September 1854. By 1867 it owned 226+1⁄4 route miles (364.1 km) of line and operated over a further 61 miles (98 km).
The early expansion was followed by a period of forced economy, but in the 1880s the railway was refurbished, express services began to run and by the end of that decade there was a suburban service in Aberdeen. The railway operated its main line between Aberdeen and Keith and two routes west to Elgin, connections could be made at both Keith and Elgin for Highland Railway services to Inverness. There were other junctions with the Highland Railway at Boat of Garten and Portessie, and at Aberdeen connections for journeys south over the Caledonian and North British Railways. Its eventual area encompassed the three Scottish counties of Aberdeenshire, Banffshire and Moray, with short lengths of line in Inverness-shire and Kincardineshire. (Full article...) -
Margaret Macpherson Grant (27 April 1834 – 14 April 1877) was a Scottish heiress and philanthropist. Born in Aberlour parish to a local surgeon, she was educated in Hampshire, and was left an only child when her elder brother died in India in 1852. Two years later, she inherited a large fortune from her uncle, Alexander Grant, an Aberlour-born planter and merchant who had become rich in Jamaica.
Macpherson Grant took up residence in Aberlour House, which had been built for her uncle by William Robertson. She lived unconventionally for a woman of her time, dressing in a manner one newspaper called "manly", and entering into what was described as a form of marriage with a female companion, Charlotte Temple, whom she had met in London in 1864. Macpherson Grant donated generously to charitable enterprises, especially those associated with the Scottish Episcopal Church, establishing an orphanage (now the Aberlour Child Care Trust) and founding St Margaret's Episcopal Church in Aberlour. She drank heavily, and despite attempts by friends and family members to persuade her to stop, she always relapsed into alcoholism. (Full article...) -
Sir William Bruce of Kinross, 1st Baronet (c. 1630 – 1710), was a Scottish gentleman-architect, "the effective founder of classical architecture in Scotland," as Howard Colvin observes. As a key figure in introducing the Palladian style into Scotland, he has been compared to the pioneering English architects Inigo Jones and Christopher Wren, and to the contemporaneous introducers of French style in English domestic architecture, Hugh May and Sir Roger Pratt.
Bruce was a merchant in Rotterdam during the 1650s, and played a role in the Restoration of Charles II in 1659. He carried messages between the exiled king and General Monck, and his loyalty to the king was rewarded with lucrative official appointments, including that of Surveyor General of the King's Works in Scotland, effectively making Bruce the "king's architect". His patrons included John Maitland, 1st Duke of Lauderdale, the most powerful man in Scotland at that time, and Bruce rose to become a member of Parliament, and briefly sat on the Scottish Privy Council. (Full article...) -
The Battle of Halidon Hill took place on 19 July 1333 when a Scottish army under Sir Archibald Douglas attacked an English army commanded by King Edward III of England (r. 1327–1377) and was heavily defeated. The year before, Edward Balliol had seized the Scottish Crown from five-year-old David II (r. 1329–1371), surreptitiously supported by Edward III. This marked the start of the Second War of Scottish Independence. Balliol was shortly expelled from Scotland by a popular uprising, which Edward III used as a casus belli, invading Scotland in 1333. The immediate target was the strategically-important border town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, which the English besieged in March.
A large Scottish army advanced to relieve the town. They attempted and failed to draw the English away from Berwick. By mid-July, knowing Berwick was on the verge of surrender and aware they were much stronger than the English, the Scots attacked. They unsuccessfully manoeuvred for position and then launched an assault on the English, who had taken up a favourable defensive position. English longbowmen caused heavy Scottish casualties during their approach, and when the Scots came into contact with the English infantry, the fight was short. The Scottish formations collapsed and the Scots fled in disorder. The English men-at-arms mounted and pursued the Scots for eight miles, causing further heavy casualties. The Scottish commander and many of the Scots' senior nobility were killed during the battle. (Full article...) -
Neilston (Scots: Neilstoun, Scottish Gaelic: Baile Nèill, pronounced [paləˈnɛːʎ]) is a village and parish in East Renfrewshire in the west central Lowlands of Scotland. It is in the Levern Valley, two miles (three kilometres) southwest of Barrhead, 3+3⁄4 miles (6 kilometres) south of Paisley, and 5+3⁄4 miles (9.5 kilometres) south-southwest of Renfrew, at the southwestern fringe of the Greater Glasgow conurbation. Neilston is a dormitory village with a resident population of just over 5,000 people.
Neilston is mentioned in documents from the 12th century, when the feudal lord Robert de Croc, endowed a chapel to Paisley Abbey to the North. Neilston Parish Church—a Category B listed building—is said to be on the site of this original chapel and has been at the centre of the community since 1163. Little remains of the original structure. Before industrialisation, Neilston was a scattered farming settlement composed of a series of single-storey houses, many of them thatched. Some domestic weaving was carried out using local flax. Water power from nearby streams ground corn and provided a suitable environment for bleaching the flax. (Full article...) -
John Wark (born 4 August 1957) is a Scottish former footballer who spent most of his playing time with Ipswich Town. He won a record four Player of the Year awards before becoming one of the four inaugural members of the club's Hall of Fame. Wark had long spells at the club, which bookended his career, and a third, brief interlude dividing his briefer periods at Liverpool and Middlesbrough. A versatile player, Wark played most of his professional games as a midfielder, although he sometimes played as a central defender and on occasion as a striker.
Born in Glasgow, Wark represented Scotland in international football, winning 29 caps and scoring seven goals. This included selection for Scotland in the 1982 FIFA World Cup in which he made three appearances and scored twice. (Full article...) -
Asahi (朝日, Morning Sun) was a pre-dreadnought battleship built for the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) in the late 1890s. As Japan lacked the industrial capacity to build such warships itself, the ship was designed and built in the United Kingdom. Shortly after her arrival in Japan, she became flagship of the Standing Fleet, the IJN's primary combat fleet. She participated in every major naval battle of the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–1905 and was lightly damaged during the Battle of the Yellow Sea and the Battle of Tsushima. Asahi saw no combat during World War I, although the ship participated in the Siberian Intervention in 1918.
Reclassified as a coastal defence ship in 1921, Asahi was disarmed two years later to meet the terms of the Washington Naval Treaty, after which she served as a training and submarine depot ship. She was modified into a submarine salvage and rescue ship before being placed in reserve in 1928. Asahi was recommissioned in late 1937, after the start of the Second Sino-Japanese War, and used to transport Japanese troops. In 1938, she was converted into a repair ship and based first at Japanese-occupied Shanghai, China, and then Cam Ranh Bay, French Indochina, from late 1938 to 1941. The ship was transferred to occupied Singapore in early 1942 to repair a damaged light cruiser and ordered to return home in May. She was sunk en route by the American submarine USS Salmon, although most of her crew survived. (Full article...) -
Anne (6 February 1665 – 1 August 1714) was Queen of Great Britain and Ireland following the ratification of the Acts of Union on 1 May 1707, which merged the kingdoms of Scotland and England. Prior to this, she was Queen of England, Scotland, and Ireland from 8 March 1702.
Anne was born during the reign of her uncle King Charles II. Her father was Charles's younger brother and heir presumptive, James, whose suspected Roman Catholicism was unpopular in England. On Charles's instructions, Anne and her elder sister Mary were raised as Anglicans. Mary married their Dutch Protestant cousin, William III of Orange, in 1677, and Anne married the Lutheran Prince George of Denmark in 1683. On Charles's death in 1685, James succeeded to the throne, but just three years later he was deposed in the Glorious Revolution of 1688. Mary and William became joint monarchs. Although the sisters had been close, disagreements over Anne's finances, status, and choice of acquaintances arose shortly after Mary's accession and they became estranged. William and Mary had no children. After Mary's death in 1694, William reigned alone until his own death in 1702, when Anne succeeded him. (Full article...) -
Burnt Candlemas was a failed invasion of Scotland in early 1356 by an English army commanded by King Edward III, and was the last campaign of the Second War of Scottish Independence. Tensions on the Anglo-Scottish border led to a military build-up by both sides in 1355. In September a nine-month truce was agreed, and most of the English forces left for northern France to take part in a campaign of the concurrent Hundred Years' War. A few days after agreeing the truce, the Scots, encouraged and subsidised by the French, broke it, invading and devastating Northumberland. In late December the Scots escaladed and captured the important English-held border town of Berwick-on-Tweed and laid siege to its castle. The English army redeployed from France to Newcastle in northern England.
The English advanced to Berwick, retaking the town, and moved to Roxburgh in southern Scotland by mid-January 1356. From there they advanced on Edinburgh, leaving a trail of devastation 50–60 miles (80–100 km) wide behind them. The Scots practised a scorched earth policy, refusing battle and removing or destroying all food in their own territory. The English reached and burnt Edinburgh and were resupplied by sea at Haddington. Edward intended to march on Perth, but contrary winds prevented the movement of the fleet he would need to supply his army. While waiting for a better wind, the English despoiled Lothian so thoroughly that the episode became known as "Burnt Candlemas". This was a reference to the custom of the time of taking one's annual stock of candles to the local church on 2 February to be blessed in a ceremony known as candlemas; they were then used over the rest of the year. (Full article...) -
Elgin Cathedral is a historic ruin in Elgin, Moray, north-east Scotland. The cathedral, dedicated to the Holy Trinity, was established in 1224 on land granted by King Alexander II outside the burgh of Elgin and close to the River Lossie. It replaced the cathedral at Spynie, 3 kilometres (2 mi) to the north, which was served by a small chapter of eight clerics. By 1226, the new and developing cathedral was staffed with 18 canons increasing to 23 by 1242. A damaging fire in 1270 resulted in a significantly enlarged building. It remained unaffected by the Wars of Scottish Independence, but again suffered extensive fire damage in 1390 when attacked by Robert III's brother Alexander Stewart, Earl of Buchan, also known as the Wolf of Badenoch. In 1402 the cathedral precinct again suffered an incendiary attack by the followers of the Lord of the Isles.
As the cathedral grew, so did the number of clerics and craftsmen. The repairs following the 1270 and 1390 fires resulted in the doubling in length of the choir and the provision of outer aisles to both the nave and choir. Today, some parts of walls reach their full height while others are at foundation level, but the overall cruciform shape is still discernible. A mostly intact octagonal chapter house dates from the major enlargement after the fire of 1270. The gable wall above the double door entrance that links the west towers is nearly complete and was rebuilt after the fire of 1390. It accommodates a large window opening that now only contains stub tracery work and fragments of a large rose window. The transepts and the south aisle of the choir contain recessed and chest tombs with effigies of bishops and knights. The now grass-covered floor bears large flat slabs that mark the positions of early graves. The residences of the dignitaries, canons and chaplains that stood in the chanonry were also destroyed by the fires of 1270, 1390 and 1402 and formed part of the reconstruction process. Only the precentor's manse is substantially intact, while two others have been incorporated into private buildings. Both west front towers are mostly complete and were part of the initial phase of construction. A protective wall of massive proportions surrounded the cathedral precinct, but only two small sections survive. The wall had four access gates but only one, the Pans Port, still exists. (Full article...) -
HMS Argus was a British aircraft carrier that served in the Royal Navy from 1918 to 1944. She was converted from an ocean liner that was under construction when the First World War began and became the first aircraft carrier with a full-length flight deck that allowed wheeled aircraft to take off and land. After commissioning, the ship was involved for several years in the development of the optimum design for other aircraft carriers. Argus also evaluated various types of arresting gear, general procedures needed to operate a number of aircraft in concert and fleet tactics. The ship was too top-heavy as originally built, and had to be modified to improve her stability in the mid-1920s. She spent one brief deployment on the China Station in the late 1920s before being placed in reserve for budgetary reasons.
Argus was recommissioned and partially modernised shortly before the Second World War and served as a training ship for deck-landing practice until June 1940. The following month she made the first of her many ferry trips to the Western Mediterranean to fly off fighters to Malta; she was largely occupied in this task for the next two years. The ship also delivered aircraft to Murmansk, Russia, Takoradi in the Gold Coast, and Reykjavík, Iceland. By 1942, the Royal Navy was very short of aircraft carriers, and Argus was pressed into front-line service despite her lack of speed and armament. In June, she participated in Operation Harpoon, providing air cover for the Malta-bound convoy. In November, the ship provided air cover during Operation Torch, the invasion of French North Africa, and was slightly damaged by a bomb. After returning to the UK for repairs, Argus was used again for deck-landing practice until late September 1944. In December, she became an accommodation ship, and was listed for disposal in mid-1946. The ship was sold in late 1946 and scrapped the following year. (Full article...)
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The Highland (Scottish Gaelic: Bò Ghàidhealach; Scots: Heilan coo) is a Scottish breed of rustic cattle. It originated in the Scottish Highlands and the Western Islands of Scotland and has long horns and a long shaggy coat. It is a hardy breed, able to withstand the intemperate conditions in the region. The first herd-book dates from 1885; two types – a smaller island type, usually black, and a larger mainland type, usually dun – were registered as a single breed. It is reared primarily for beef, and has been exported to several other countries. (Full article...) -
Edzell Castle is a ruined 16th-century castle, with an early-17th-century walled garden. It is located close to Edzell, and is around 5 miles (8 km) north of Brechin, in Angus, Scotland. Edzell Castle was begun around 1520 by David Lindsay, 9th Earl of Crawford, and expanded by his son, Sir David Lindsay, Lord Edzell, who also laid out the garden in 1604. The castle saw little military action, and was, in its design, construction and use, more of a country house than a defensive structure. It was briefly occupied by English troops during Oliver Cromwell's invasion of Scotland in 1651. In 1715 it was sold by the Lindsay family, and eventually came into the ownership of the Earl of Dalhousie. It was given into state care in the 1930s, and is now a visitor attraction run by Historic Environment Scotland (open all year; entrance charge). The castle consists of the original tower house and building ranges around a courtyard. The adjacent Renaissance walled garden, incorporating intricate relief carvings, is unique in Scotland. It was replanted in the 1930s, and is considered to have links to esoteric traditions, including Rosicrucianism and Freemasonry. (Full article...) -
Rockstar Dundee Limited (formerly Ruffian Games Limited) is a British video game developer and a studio of Rockstar Games based in Dundee. The studio is best known for developing Crackdown 2.
Gary Liddon, Billy Thomson, and Gareth Noyce founded the company as Ruffian Games in April 2008. They had previously worked on Crackdown, with Thompson as its lead designer while at Realtime Worlds. Ruffian Games immediately partnered with Microsoft for Crackdown 2, being chosen over Realtime Worlds. Released in 2010, the game did not sell well enough to allow for a third Crackdown game and Ruffian Games joined co-development projects, including several Kinect games, to stay afloat. Game of Glens and Hollowpoint were cancelled, while a Streets of Rage remake was unsuccessfully pitched. After independently releasing Fragmental and RADtv, the studio was working with Rockstar Games by October 2019. Ruffian Games was acquired by the publisher's parent company, Take-Two Interactive, in October 2020 and became part of Rockstar Games as Rockstar Dundee. (Full article...) -
Kirkandrews, sometimes written as Kirkanders in older documents, is a coastal hamlet about 9 kilometres (6 mi) west-southwest of Kirkcudbright in Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland. It sits in farmland at the head of Kirkandrews Bay, an inlet of Wigtown Bay.
The history of Kirkandrews' name is not altogether clear. Some authors have suggested that it was named for a Northumbrian or Irish saint who established a church here in the first millennium; certainly there was an ancient church at the site, but most recent scholarship suggests that both the original church and its name have been lost, and that a new church was built and dedicated to St Andrew, the apostle and patron saint of Scotland, at some point before 1174. (Full article...) -
The 2002 Scottish Masters (known as the 2002 Regal Scottish Masters for sponsorship reasons) was a professional non-ranking snooker tournament which took place at the Thistle Hotel in Glasgow, Scotland, from 24 to 29 September. It was the final edition of the tournament, as it later lost its sponsorship by the cigarette brand Regal. It was the first of two invitational World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association (WPBSA) competitions in the 2002–03 season. The host broadcaster was BBC Scotland.
Ronnie O'Sullivan, a former world champion, won the tournament, defeating the defending champion John Higgins 9–4 in the final. It was the third time that O'Sullivan had won the Scottish Masters in his career, and he was awarded £65,000 from a prize fund pool of £205,000. In the semi-finals O'Sullivan defeated world number six Stephen Hendry 6–3 and Higgins beat Stephen Lee 6–4; Lee made the tournament's highest break of 139 in his loss. (Full article...) -
The Highlands and Islands Alliance or Càirdeas was a minor Scottish electoral alliance that was active in the late 1990s. Founded in the autumn of 1998 by non-partisan politicians local to the Highlands and Islands, it only contested the inaugural Scottish Parliament election of 1999, where it collected a negligible 1.3% of the regional vote and despite a reasonably publicised campaign, failed to elect any of its candidates. Led by anti-nuclear activist Lorraine Mann, the Alliance was established to better represent marginalised communities in rural Scotland, who they felt had been ignored by government in favour of those in the more densely populated Central Belt. Its policies were near exclusively centred on localism and rural issues, only contesting Scotland's regional additional member system so that electors could vote on nationwide matters through their constituency ballot. After the election, the group remained politically inactive until it was quietly disestablished in August 2004.
Although electorally unimportant, the Alliance's legal campaign to allow political job sharing in the Scottish Parliament attracted considerable media and academic coverage. The dispute has since become the subject of legislative research by both the Northern Ireland Assembly and the British House of Commons, where it informed debate surrounding the Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Act 2002. (Full article...) -
William Adam (1689 – 24 June 1748) was a Scottish architect, mason, and entrepreneur. He was the foremost architect of his time in Scotland, designing and building numerous country houses and public buildings, and often acting as contractor as well as architect. Among his best known works are Hopetoun House near Edinburgh, and Duff House in Banff. His individual, exuberant style built on the Palladian style, but with Baroque details inspired by Vanbrugh and Continental architecture.
In the 18th century, Adam was considered Scotland's "Universal Architect". However, since the early 20th century, architectural critics have taken a more measured view, Colin McWilliam, for instance, finding the quality of his work "varied to an extreme degree". As well as being an architect, Adam was involved in several industrial ventures and improvement schemes, including coal mining, salt panning, stone quarries and mills. In 1731 he began to build up his own estate in Kinross-shire, which he named Blair Adam. He was the father of three architects; John, Robert and James, the last two were the developers of the "Adam style". (Full article...) -
The Aberdeen–Rangers rivalry refers to football matches and related activity involving the Scottish football clubs Aberdeen and Rangers.
Unlike Rangers' Old Firm rivalry with Glasgow neighbours Celtic dating back to the 1900s, the feud with Aberdeen is a comparatively modern phenomenon which developed from the 1970s on a competitive sporting basis but escalated into hostility on the pitch and in the stands, with the animosity continuing into the 21st century. (Full article...) -
The royal arms of Mary, Queen of Scots incorporated into the Tolbooth in Leith (1565) and now in South Leith Parish Church
Government in early modern Scotland included all forms of administration, from the crown, through national institutions, to systems of local government and the law, between the early sixteenth century and the mid-eighteenth century. It roughly corresponds to the early modern era in Europe, beginning with the Renaissance and Reformation and ending with the last Jacobite risings and the beginnings of the industrial revolution. Monarchs of this period were the Stuarts: James IV, James V, Mary Queen of Scots, James VI, Charles I, Charles II, James VII, William III and Mary II, Anne, and the Hanoverians: George I and George II.
The crown remained the most important element of government throughout the period and, despite the many royal minorities, it saw many of the aspects of aggrandisement associated with "new monarchy" elsewhere in Europe. Theories of limited monarchy and resistance were articulated by Scots, particularly George Buchanan, in the sixteenth century, but James VI advanced the theory of the divine right of kings, and these debates were restated in subsequent reigns and crises. The court remained at the centre of political life, and in the sixteenth century emerged as a major centre of display and artistic patronage. The Privy Council and the great offices of state, remained central to the administration of the government, even after the departure of the Stuart monarchs to rule in England from 1603, but they were often sidelined and was abolished after the Act of Union of 1707, with rule direct from London. Parliament was also vital to the running of the country, providing laws and taxation, but it had fluctuating fortunes and never achieved the centrality the national life of its counterpart in England before it was disbanded in 1707. (Full article...) -
Erik William Chisholm (4 January 1904 – 8 June 1965) was a Scottish composer, pianist, organist and conductor sometimes known as "Scotland's forgotten composer". According to his biographer, Chisholm "was the first composer to absorb Celtic idioms into his music in form as well as content, his achievement paralleling that of Bartók in its depth of understanding and its daring", which led some to give him the nickname "MacBartók". As composer, performer and impresario, he played an important role in the musical life of Glasgow between the two World Wars and was a founder of the Celtic Ballet and, together with Margaret Morris, created the first full-length Scottish ballet, The Forsaken Mermaid. After World War II he was Professor and Head of the South African College of Music at the University of Cape Town for 19 years until his death. Chisholm founded the South African College of Music opera company in Cape Town and was a vital force in bringing new operas to Scotland, England and South Africa. By the time of his death in 1965, he had composed over a hundred works. (Full article...)
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Ryan Stewart Gauld (born 16 December 1995) is a Scottish professional footballer who plays as an attacking midfielder for Major League Soccer club Vancouver Whitecaps FC.
He began his professional career at Dundee United, where he helped them reach the 2014 Scottish Cup Final, and his abilities on the ball earned comparisons to Lionel Messi from the Scottish media. In July 2014, he transferred to Portuguese club Sporting CP for a fee of around £3 million. Gauld mainly appeared for the club's B team, and was also loaned to Vitória de Setúbal, Aves, Farense and Hibernian. In July 2019, Gauld moved to Farense on a permanent basis, winning promotion in his first season and scoring nine goals in each of his two years. In July 2021, he signed for MLS club Vancouver Whitecaps FC, where he won the Canadian Championship in 2022 and 2023. (Full article...) -
German submarine U-27 was a Type VIIA U-boat of Nazi Germany's Kriegsmarine built for service in World War II. Her keel was laid down in November 1935 in Bremen. She was commissioned in August 1936 with Korvettenkapitän Hans Ibbeken in command. Ibbeken was relieved on 4 October 1937, by Johannes Franz, who commanded the boat until 6 June 1939 when Hans-Georg von Friedeburg assumed command for barely one month. He was relieved on 8 July again by Johannes Franz, who commanded the boat until her loss on 20 September 1939.
U-27 had a very short career, with only one war patrol and only two enemy ships sunk. Following the sinking of two British trawlers, Davara on 13 September and Rudyard Kipling on 16 September, U-27 was hunted down and sunk west of Lewis, Scotland, by depth charges from the British destroyers HMS Fortune, Faulknor and Forester. All 38 crewmen survived and were made prisoner for the remainder of the war. (Full article...) -
Sir Ewan Forbes, 11th Baronet, MBChB (6 September 1912 – 12 September 1991), was a Scottish nobleman, general practitioner and farmer. Forbes was a trans man; he was christened Elizabeth Forbes-Sempill and officially registered as the youngest daughter of John, Lord Sempill. After an uncomfortable upbringing, he began presenting as a man in the 1930s, following a course of medical treatments in Germany. He formally re-registered his birth as male in 1952, changing his name to Ewan, and was married a month later.
In 1965, he stood to inherit the baronetcy of his elder brother William, Lord Sempill, together with a large estate. This inheritance was challenged by his cousin, who argued that the re-registration was invalid; under this interpretation, Forbes would legally be considered a woman, and thus unable to inherit the baronetcy. The legal position was unclear, and it took three years before a ruling by the Court of Session, which held him to be intersex, finally led to the Home Secretary recognising his claim to the title. The case was heard in great secrecy, with the effect that it was unable to be considered in other judgments on the legal recognition of gender variance, but has become more widely known since his death in 1991. (Full article...) -
The recorded history of Scotland begins with the arrival of the Roman Empire in the 1st century, when the province of Britannia reached as far north as the Antonine Wall. North of this was Caledonia, inhabited by the Picti, whose uprisings forced Rome's legions back to Hadrian's Wall. As Rome finally withdrew from Britain, a Gaelic tribe from Ireland called the Scoti began colonising Western Scotland and Wales. Before Roman times, prehistoric Scotland entered the Neolithic Era about 4000 BC, the Bronze Age about 2000 BC, and the Iron Age around 700 BC.
The Gaelic kingdom of Dál Riata was founded on the west coast of Scotland in the 6th century. In the following century, Irish missionaries introduced the previously pagan Picts to Celtic Christianity. Following England's Gregorian mission, the Pictish king Nechtan chose to abolish most Celtic practices in favour of the Roman rite, restricting Gaelic influence on his kingdom and avoiding war with Anglian Northumbria. Towards the end of the 8th century, the Viking invasions began, forcing the Picts and Gaels to cease their historic hostility to each other and to unite in the 9th century, forming the Kingdom of Scotland. (Full article...) -
Dunrobin Castle (mostly 1835–1845 — present) is a stately home in Sutherland, in the Highland area of Scotland, as well as the family seat of the Earl of Sutherland and the Clan Sutherland. It is located one mile (1.5 kilometres) north of Golspie and approximately five miles (eight kilometres) south of Brora, overlooking the Dornoch Firth.
Dunrobin's origins lie in the Middle Ages, but most of the present building and the gardens were added by Sir Charles Barry between 1835 and 1850. Some of the original building is visible in the interior courtyard, despite a number of expansions and alterations that made it the largest house in the north of Scotland. After being used as a boarding school for seven years, it is now open to the public. (Full article...) -
Maybole Castle is a 16th-century castle located on High Street in Maybole, South Ayrshire, Scotland. Originally built for the Earls of Cassillis, it is an L-shaped construction with Victorian two-storey extensions. It is associated with a legend of John Faa, in which an earl killed Faa and imprisoned his wife, the Countess of Cassilis, in the castle.
The castle became a Category A listed building in 1971. It was added to the Buildings at Risk Register for Scotland in 2009, before receiving funding in the early 21st century for renovations. (Full article...) -
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Scottish art in the eighteenth century is the body of visual art made in Scotland, by Scots, or about Scottish subjects, in the eighteenth century. This period saw development of professionalisation, with art academies were established in Edinburgh and Glasgow. Art was increasingly influenced by Neoclassicism, the Enlightenment and towards the end of the century by Romanticism, with Italy becoming a major centre of Scottish art.
The origins of the tradition of Scottish landscape painting are in the capriccios of Italian and Dutch landscapes undertaken by James Norie and his sons. These were further developed by Jacob More, who added a romantic sensibility to the Scottish landscape. Alexander Nasmyth helped found the Scottish landscape tradition and was highly influential as a teacher in Edinburgh on the subsequent generation of artists. John Knox linked it with the Romantic, historical myth-making novels of Walter Scott and was one of the first artists to take an interest in the urban landscape of Glasgow. Aberdeen-born John Alexander and William Mossman were the leading portrait artists of the first half of the century. Allan Ramsay emerged as the leading portrait painter of the mid-century and to the royal family, noted for his intimate representations. Towards the end of the century Henry Raeburn emerged as the leading portraitist and one of the first artists to spend the majority of their career in Scotland, extending his range to leading figures of the Enlightenment and most famous for his depiction of the Skating Minister. (Full article...)
Urquhart Castle (/ˈɜːrkərt/ ⓘ; Scottish Gaelic: Caisteal na Sròine) is a ruined castle that sits beside Loch Ness in the Highlands of Scotland. The castle is on the A82 road, 21 kilometres (13 mi) south-west of Inverness and 2 kilometres (1.2 mi) east of the village of Drumnadrochit.
The present ruins date from the 13th to the 16th centuries, though built on the site of an early medieval fortification. Founded in the 13th century, Urquhart played a role in the Wars of Scottish Independence in the 14th century. It was subsequently held as a royal castle and was raided on several occasions by the MacDonald Earls of Ross. The castle was granted to the Clan Grant in 1509, though conflict with the MacDonalds continued. Despite a series of further raids the castle was strengthened, only to be largely abandoned by the middle of the 17th century. Urquhart was partially destroyed in 1692 to prevent its use by Jacobite forces, and subsequently decayed. In the 20th century, it was placed in state care as a scheduled monument and opened to the public: it is now one of the most-visited castles in Scotland and received 547,518 visitors in 2019. (Full article...)
The Schiehallion experiment was an 18th-century experiment to determine the mean density of the Earth. Funded by a grant from the Royal Society, it was conducted in the summer of 1774 around the Scottish mountain of Schiehallion, Perthshire. The experiment involved measuring the tiny deflection of the vertical due to the gravitational attraction of a nearby mountain. Schiehallion was considered the ideal location after a search for candidate mountains, thanks to its isolation and almost symmetrical shape.
The experiment had previously been considered, but rejected, by Isaac Newton as a practical demonstration of his theory of gravitation; however, a team of scientists, notably Nevil Maskelyne, the Astronomer Royal, was convinced that the effect would be detectable and undertook to conduct the experiment. The deflection angle depended on the relative densities and volumes of the Earth and the mountain: if the density and volume of Schiehallion could be ascertained, then so could the density of the Earth. Once this was known, it would in turn yield approximate values for those of the other planets, their moons, and the Sun, previously known only in terms of their relative ratios. (Full article...)
Royal Air Force Lossiemouth or more commonly RAF Lossiemouth (IATA: LMO, ICAO: EGQS) is a military airfield located on the western edge of the town of Lossiemouth in Moray, north-east Scotland.
Lossiemouth is one of the largest and busiest fast-jet stations in the Royal Air Force (RAF) and known for its close proximity to flight training areas in Scotland and its favourable local flying conditions. Since the closure of RAF Leuchars in 2015, Lossiemouth is the only operational RAF station in Scotland and is one of two main operating bases for the Eurofighter Typhoon FGR4 in the United Kingdom. It is home to four front-line fast jet units which operate the Typhoon: No. 1 Squadron, No. 2 Squadron, No. 6 Squadron and No. 9 Squadron. All four Squadrons contribute to the Quick Reaction Alert (Interceptor) North capability which provides continuous protection of UK airspace. It is also home to No. 120 Squadron and No. 201 Squadron, both flying the Poseidon MRA1 in the maritime patrol role. It has also been designated as the future home of the RAF's new fleet of three Boeing Wedgetail AEW1 airborne early warning and control aircraft, with deliveries commencing in 2023. There are a number of non-flying units at RAF Lossiemouth including No. 5 Force Protection Wing and an RAF Mountain Rescue Service team. (Full article...)
William Archibald Bowman (born 30 May 1950) is a Scottish Conservative Party politician who served as a Member of the Scottish Parliament (MSP) for the North East Scotland region from December 2016 until he stood down at the 2021 election.
Born in Glasgow, Bowman was privately educated at the High School of Glasgow and George Watson's College. He graduated from the University of Edinburgh with a Bachelor of Commerce in 1973 and received accreditation as a chartered accountant in 1976. He subsequently joined accounting firm Peat Marwick, the predecessor of KPMG, working successively in their Edinburgh and Aberdeen offices until 2001. Having secured promotion as Deputy Senior Partner, Bowman moved to Bucharest in 2002, where he engaged with KPMG's operations in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), with a particular focus on Romania and Moldova. (Full article...)
William Beveridge Liddell (10 January 1922 – 3 July 2001) was a Scottish footballer, who played his entire professional career with Liverpool. He signed with the club as a teenager in 1938 and retired in 1961, having scored 228 goals in 534 appearances (placing Liddell fourth and 12th in the respective club rankings as of June 2022). He was Liverpool's leading goalscorer in the league in eight out of nine seasons from 1949–50 to 1957–58, and surpassed Elisha Scott's club record for most league appearances in 1957.
With Liverpool, Liddell won a league championship in 1947 and featured in the club's 1950 FA Cup Final defeat by Arsenal. He represented Scotland at international level on 29 occasions. While serving as a Royal Air Force navigator during the Second World War, Liddell continued his career by appearing in unofficial games for Liverpool and guesting for various teams in the United Kingdom and Canada. After his retirement from football, in 1961, Liddell occupied himself as a Justice of the Peace (from 1958), bursar of Liverpool University, and voluntary worker. He died in 2001. (Full article...)
Alexander Galloway Raisbeck (26 December 1878 – 12 March 1949) was a Scottish professional football player and manager. After playing junior football for Larkhall Thistle, he was signed by Hibernian where he made his professional debut at the age of 17. Despite playing only ten matches in his first season, he was chosen to represent a Scottish League XI in a match against their Irish counterparts.
In 1898, he joined English First Division side Stoke on a short term deal at the end of the 1897–98 season, playing in four league matches and four Football League test matches to help the club avoid relegation. His form attracted attention from other clubs and he signed for Liverpool in May 1898. He quickly established himself in the first-team and was appointed club captain after two seasons at the age of 21, leading the side to their first ever league title in 1901. Liverpool were relegated in 1904 and Raisbeck subsequently cancelled his plans to leave the club to help them win promotion back to the First Division at the first attempt, winning the Second Division title in 1905. (Full article...)
Architecture in modern Scotland encompasses all building in Scotland, between the beginning of the twentieth century and the present day. The most significant architect of the early twentieth century was Charles Rennie Mackintosh, who mixed elements of traditional Scottish architecture with contemporary movements. Estate house design declined in importance in the twentieth century. In the early decades of the century, traditional materials began to give way to cheaper modern ones. After the First World War, Modernism and the office block began to dominate building in the major cities and attempts began to improve the quality of urban housing for the poor, resulted in a massive programme of council house building. The Neo-Gothic style continued in to the twentieth century but the most common forms in this period were plain and massive Neo-Romanesque buildings.
After the Second World War, brutalist tower blocks were adopted as a solution and this period saw the building of new towns, including Glenrothes and Cumbernauld, but the social and building problems of these constructions soon became apparent. The creation of new towns and council house estates necessitated the rapid supply of new churches. From the 1980s Scottish architecture began to recover its reputation, with new buildings like that created to house the Burrell Collection in Glasgow and more recently the Scottish Parliament Building in Edinburgh. There has also been urban regeneration, involving the replacement and renovation of existing buildings and landscapes. The 1980s saw the growth of speculative house building by developers and the introduction of English brick and half-timbered vernacular styles to Scotland. As the production of state sponsored housing subsided in the 1970s there was a return to conservatism in church design, but there were some original and post-modern designs from the 1980s. (Full article...)
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13-06-07 RaR Biffy Clyro Simon Neil 02 -
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Falkirk Wheel Timelapse, Scotland - Diliff
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FalkirkWheelSide 2004 SeanMcClean -
Gavin Hamilton - Coriolanus Act V, Scene III edit2 -
Jaguar at Edinburgh Zoo -
Jeremiah Gurney - Photograph of Euphrosyne Parepa-Rosa -
Loch Torridon, Scotland -
Mount Stuart House 2018-08-25 -
N. M. Price - Sir Walter Scott - Guy Mannering - At the Kaim of Derncleugh -
NEWScotland-2016-Aerial-Blackness Castle 01 -
Nils Olav inspects the Kings Guard of Norway after being bestowed with a knighthood at Edinburgh Zoo in Scotland -
Paisley Abbey Interior East -
Paisley Abbey from the south east -
Prince James Francis Edward Stuart by Alexis Simon Belle -
Robert William Thomson - Illustrated London News March 29 1873 -
Scotland-2016-West Lothian-Hopetoun House 02 -
Sgùrr nan Gillean from Sligachan, Isle of Skye, Scotland - Diliff -
Sir Anthony Van Dyck - Charles I (1600-49) - Google Art Project -
St Matthew's Church - Paisley - Interior - 5 -
Synthetic Production of Penicillin TR1468 -
The Air Ministry, 1939-1945. CH10270 – Edit 1 -
The Monarch of the Glen, Edwin Landseer, 1851 -
The Skating Minister -
Thomas Keene in Macbeth 1884 Wikipedia crop -
View of loch lomond -
Wemyss Bay railway station concourse 2018-08-25 2 -
William John Macquorn Rankine by Thomas Annan
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Get involved
For editor resources and to collaborate with other editors on improving Wikipedia's Scotland-related articles, see WikiProject Scotland.
To get involved in helping to improve Wikipedia's Scotland related content, please consider doing some of the following tasks or joining one or more of the associated Wikiprojects:
- Visit the Scottish Wikipedians' notice board and help to write new Scotland-related articles, and expand and improve existing ones.
- Visit Wikipedia:WikiProject Scotland/Assessment, and help out by assessing unrated Scottish articles.
- Add the Project Banner to Scottish articles around Wikipedia.
- Participate in WikiProject Scotland's Peer Review, including responding to PR requests and nominating Scottish articles.
- Help nominate and select new content for the Scotland portal.
Do you have a question about The Scotland Portal that you can't find the answer to?
Post a question on the Talk Page or consider asking it at the Wikipedia reference desk.
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