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A Certain Point of View
Jan. 22nd, 2010 05:54 pmI'm not a fan of history in black and white - I much prefer it when the past is presented in shades of grey. Granted, there are some historical figures who do atrocious deeds that it's impossible to get your head round, but most of the time life's a bit more complicated than that.
Yesterday, I talked about one of my favourite unsung heroes of Scottish History - Hugh, 2nd Lord Montgomerie, later 1st Earl of Eglinton. To call him a 'hero' is a bit rich - he was responsible for one or two dodgy deeds that were positively villainous. But he's a wonderful example of a man who can't really be judged retrospectively as having been either absolutely good, or absolutely bad.
When I first tried to get to know him as a character, I spent ages racking my brain and wondering whether or not he was a psychopath. His first claim to fame was when at the tender age of twenty-five, he murdered James, Lord Boyd (then aged fifteen). He then proceeded to instigate a rather messy feud with the Cunninghame family - he seems to have been personally responsible for wiping out two of the Cunninghame Lords/Earls in the space of two or three years. This escalated over his lifetime and culminated, two generations later, in the assassination of his grandson, the 3rd Earl of Eglinton.
Nonetheless, he lived a remarkable life. He was born in 1458 and he died in 1545. His lifetime spanned the reigns of four Scots Kings and Queens and covered the transition between the medieval and early modern periods. Imagine that! Getting born into the age of chivalry and witnessing the gradual erosion of knightly power and the ascension of artillery. At the pinnacle of his career, he was appointed Vice-Regent of Scotland. He was also one of the tutors of the young James V. And he was charged with treason at one point, but hey, in the reign of James V, you weren't really anyone until you'd been charged with treason...
He was certainly no angel. He has been described as 'hawkish' by the historian Norman McDougall and James IV's 'strong man of the west' by another historian. Off the record, I've heard him described in much less flattering and colourful terms by another prominent scholar of Scottish History.
The shennanigans of men like Montgomerie certainly make excellent raw material for historical novels. The end results are tangled webs of intrigue worthy of medieval Florence. But inevitably, since history's very good at selective amnesia, there are questions which always seem to have no answers, however hard you look. For instance, I've always wanted to know just why Hugh Montgomerie decided to bump off James, Lord Boyd in the first place. And how on earth did he manage to survive Flodden? Most of the Scots nobility were bumped off in that little fiasco...
Yesterday, I talked about one of my favourite unsung heroes of Scottish History - Hugh, 2nd Lord Montgomerie, later 1st Earl of Eglinton. To call him a 'hero' is a bit rich - he was responsible for one or two dodgy deeds that were positively villainous. But he's a wonderful example of a man who can't really be judged retrospectively as having been either absolutely good, or absolutely bad.
When I first tried to get to know him as a character, I spent ages racking my brain and wondering whether or not he was a psychopath. His first claim to fame was when at the tender age of twenty-five, he murdered James, Lord Boyd (then aged fifteen). He then proceeded to instigate a rather messy feud with the Cunninghame family - he seems to have been personally responsible for wiping out two of the Cunninghame Lords/Earls in the space of two or three years. This escalated over his lifetime and culminated, two generations later, in the assassination of his grandson, the 3rd Earl of Eglinton.
Nonetheless, he lived a remarkable life. He was born in 1458 and he died in 1545. His lifetime spanned the reigns of four Scots Kings and Queens and covered the transition between the medieval and early modern periods. Imagine that! Getting born into the age of chivalry and witnessing the gradual erosion of knightly power and the ascension of artillery. At the pinnacle of his career, he was appointed Vice-Regent of Scotland. He was also one of the tutors of the young James V. And he was charged with treason at one point, but hey, in the reign of James V, you weren't really anyone until you'd been charged with treason...
He was certainly no angel. He has been described as 'hawkish' by the historian Norman McDougall and James IV's 'strong man of the west' by another historian. Off the record, I've heard him described in much less flattering and colourful terms by another prominent scholar of Scottish History.
The shennanigans of men like Montgomerie certainly make excellent raw material for historical novels. The end results are tangled webs of intrigue worthy of medieval Florence. But inevitably, since history's very good at selective amnesia, there are questions which always seem to have no answers, however hard you look. For instance, I've always wanted to know just why Hugh Montgomerie decided to bump off James, Lord Boyd in the first place. And how on earth did he manage to survive Flodden? Most of the Scots nobility were bumped off in that little fiasco...
