A History Of Scotland - Episode 05 - Project Britain (History Documentary)
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00:00How are you doing? Not bad. Good day for it eh? Aye, it's lovely. I can go aboard yeah?
00:13Yeah, no problem.
00:25This is Loch Leven in Perthshire. In 1567 it was at the centre of some of the most turbulent
00:32events Scotland had ever known. On a little island in the middle of the loch, kept as
00:39a prisoner, was a young woman. 24 year old Mary Stewart, Queen of Scots. On their way
00:54to the island was a small group of powerful nobles, intent on stripping the Queen of her
01:02crown. When the nobles arrived here they were brandishing documents that they wanted Mary
01:08to sign and they were prepared to use force and threats to her life to get their way.
01:14They saw themselves as the saviours of Scotland and she was the obstacle in their path. But
01:19Mary refused to cooperate because she knew that with one scratch of the pen she would
01:24cease to be Queen. Mary and the nobles held radically different visions of the nation's
01:35future and Scotland stood divided. From that moment on this loch an incredible transformation
01:43will take place that will not only see Scotland united but a Scottish King ruling the entire
01:50British Isles. The ambition of an unconquered nation and its royal family will be the driving
01:57force that unites two ancient enemies and sets them on the road towards the Great Britain
02:03we know today. A Scottish takeover of England. Who would dare dream of such a thing?
02:33In 1542 Scotland's fate came to rest on the shoulders of a six day old girl when its
02:56King James V died. His daughter Mary Stewart was the last of the great Scottish royal line.
03:04A child of glittering dynastic potential and almost immediately the coveted prize of an
03:16English King. Infant Mary was the solution to a very English problem. Henry VIII had fallen out
03:27with other countries in Europe over religion. He'd broken with the Catholic Church and now
03:33England was vulnerable to invasion. Henry's worst fear was that a hostile army would be
03:40allowed to land in Scotland and from there launch itself into northern England. England's
03:51King Henry VIII was an arch strategist and he came up with a remarkable course of action. He
03:58would kill off the threat from the north by marrying the Queen of Scots to his own son and
04:03by doing that Scotland would become part of England. A group of Scottish nobles were
04:12seduced by Henry's scheme and even signed a marriage treaty on Mary's behalf. But Mary's
04:25guardians backed out which brought Scotland and England once again to the brink of war.
04:37Young Mary was forced to run from one castle to another as Henry sent soldiers to hunt her down
04:44and bring her to him. When they couldn't find her the English generals decided on a new tactic.
04:55Diplomacy on one hand, devastation on the other.
05:11A huge English army invaded southern Scotland.
05:26The English tried to persuade the Scots that a royal marriage to their oldest enemy was in
05:34everyone's interests. But while the politicians were throwing away words like fellowship and
05:39brotherhood and equals, the English soldiers were murdering and raping and burning their
05:45way across southern Scotland. Abbeys like Melrose, then major commercial and cultural
05:56centres, were devastated as southern Scotland was brought to its knees. But the Scots still
06:06wouldn't give up their Queen. Instead they looked to Europe for military help and called on France
06:21their oldest and most trusted ally. Now the French King Henry entered the fight. He would send troops
06:34to help the Scots fight off the English but there was a condition. The infant Mary would have to be
06:38betrothed to his son Francois. So a new marriage treaty was drawn up for five-year-old Mary
06:50promising that she would now one day be Queen of France. The French King duly sent an army to fight
06:58off the English and a boat to spirit his little Scottish Queen to safety and the English scheme
07:06to take over Scotland by marriage was dead.
07:22The magnificent Chateau of the Loire Valley became Mary's refuge as she entered the protection of the French royal family and charmed the man who had gone to war for her hand.
07:45She is the most perfect child that I have ever seen, he wrote.
07:55Mary was welcomed in here like a long-lost daughter. In fact the King Henry treated her like one of his own
08:00children. She lived in the royal nursery alongside the Dauphin, her future husband, and she received
08:06a fantastic renaissance education. Literature, rhetoric, as well as music and dancing and sport.
08:12She was a precious jewel and in this setting she shone brightest of all.
08:26Her future husband Francois was short and clumsy but Mary was tall, elegant and charming.
08:34All through her childhood, at court appearances and in private, she impressed her French guardians
08:41and she was groomed for a glittering future, not only in France and Scotland, but potentially beyond.
08:54Mary's veins contained very royal blood, blood that gave her acclaim to an even bigger prize.
09:00The crown of England. She was only fourth in line but Mary's French guardians knew where that claim
09:07could take them, if fortune smiled their way, and that one day Mary Stewart might just be their key
09:15to the back door of England.
09:22Her claim to be a contender for the English throne was a huge success.
09:26Her claim to be a contender for the English throne had always been a long shot
09:29but events back across the channel took a couple of unexpected twists. In quick succession,
09:35an English king and an English queen, both from the house of Tudor, died without leaving heirs.
09:40Suddenly, in 1558, Mary, in French eyes at least, became the perfect heir for the English throne.
09:49There was just one problem. Elizabeth Tudor, Henry VIII's illegitimate daughter,
09:58also now claimed to be Queen of England. She had been born just eight months after her parents'
10:04wedding and in the eyes of many, she was not only illegitimate as a daughter but would be
10:11And in the eyes of many, she was not only illegitimate as a daughter
10:15but would be illegitimate as a queen.
10:29So Mary's French family stoked her ambition as she became the vehicle for theirs.
10:35They encouraged her to dream that now the crown of England really could be hers too.
10:45If she got it, one single united empire would stretch from Scotland in the north
10:51to France in the south. This would be a Catholic empire,
10:57vast and powerful, that would dominate the west of Europe.
11:05Wasn't that what God had in mind for Mary?
11:17But her rival Elizabeth was English, Protestant and a Tudor.
11:24So she got the crown and Mary's dream of a vast Catholic empire slipped away.
11:34And soon, even the certainty of her own French crown was under threat.
11:50The Protestant Reformation was coming. This religious revolution was spreading across Europe,
11:56promising to sweep away Catholic monarchs like François and Mary.
12:05Just a few months into the reign,
12:07a group of rebels stormed the chateau at Amboise and tried to capture the king.
12:15So who were the rebels?
12:18They were Protestants, but they were lords. We know their name.
12:25And they wanted to plot against the royal family and the king,
12:29François II, was young and weak.
12:35The revolt failed and a very public and a very bloody example was made of the rebels.
12:44How much of this would Mary, Queen of Scots, have seen with her own eyes?
12:49We know she saw the bodies at the balconies of the chateau because she was in the chateau.
12:54So it was the first time she was confronted to such a thing.
12:58Such violence.
12:59Yes, first time she saw this.
13:01And the bodies were hung from here to show the people.
13:03Yes, to make an example.
13:05This is what you get.
13:06Yes.
13:18Just a few months later, Mary's time as Queen of France came to an abrupt end.
13:26Her young husband, François, died of an ear infection,
13:31leaving Mary a widow and a powerless dowager queen.
13:37The glittering future that Mary had been brought up to believe in
13:41disappeared before her eyes.
13:45France, the Catholic Empire, life at the centre of the Valois court.
13:51It was all suddenly over.
13:54Over.
13:59So Mary looked to home.
14:04But home had changed.
14:06The reformation that was pitting Protestant against Catholic
14:10from France to Holland and beyond had spread to Scotland
14:14with dramatic results and very little bloodshed so far.
14:19Swiftly and comprehensively, the Scottish church had gone over to the new creed.
14:26Life in Scotland was suddenly very different indeed.
14:31Edinburgh's tiny Magdalene Chapel was where the leaders of that reformation met
14:36to plan their brave new world.
14:41And they now wanted to change more than just the church.
14:44What was undertaken in this room was the sweeping,
14:47all-encompassing reform of Scottish society.
14:50They started with religion, but they wanted to reach out
14:52and touch every part of people's lives.
14:55And, of course, it couldn't help but be a direct attack
14:59on the power of the monarch.
15:05Mary's most loyal supporters, Roman Catholics,
15:08who had dominated the country in her absence,
15:11Roman Catholics, who had dominated the country in her absence,
15:14were driven from power as Protestant nobles took control of the country.
15:29The movement's spiritual leader was a preacher called John Knox.
15:34He called for those who practised the Catholic mass to be put to death.
15:39He even went so far as to claim that Catholic monarchs could be justly deposed.
15:48Catholic monarchs like Mary.
15:52When the Scottish nobles heard Mary was coming back,
15:55different factions sought her out.
15:57One Catholic earl wanted Mary to return as a Catholic figurehead
16:01in a war to drive out the Protestants.
16:04Another offer came from her Protestant half-brother,
16:07he wanted Mary to come back and work with the new Protestant regime.
16:11If she accepted his offer, he promised she could remain a Catholic
16:15as long as she kept her religion a secret
16:18and only practised her faith in private.
16:24One August day in 1561, Mary Stewart sailed into Scottish waters.
16:32She had chosen to work with the Protestant regime.
16:38Her ships were almost a week ahead of schedule,
16:40so there was no welcoming party.
16:43But a few rounds of the ship's cannon promptly assembled a small,
16:47curious crowd as Scotland's Queen finally came home.
17:08SINGING CONTINUES
17:33During Mary's first private Mass on her first Sunday back,
17:36a mob gathered outside Holyrood to protest.
17:39They jeered and shouted that they were going to kill the priest,
17:42but they couldn't get to Mary.
17:44Eventually they went away,
17:46but the secret of the Queen's private faith was out
17:49and the truth hung in the air like a bad smell.
17:56John Knox wouldn't even tolerate Mary's private faith.
17:59That one Mass, he said, was more fearful than if 10,000 armed men
18:04were landed in any part of the realm
18:06to suppress the whole Protestant religion.
18:11From the pulpit of St Giles, he openly preached against her.
18:19Knox was brought before the Queen and straight to Mary's face,
18:22he questioned her right to rule Scotland.
18:24Why? First of all, she was Catholic and Scotland was a Catholic country.
18:28First of all, she was Catholic and Scotland wasn't, not any more.
18:31Second, she was a woman.
18:33But Mary had lived long enough
18:34to have seen the realities of religious reformation.
18:37She was no innocent, so she faced them down.
18:40Scotland could remain Protestant.
18:41In private, however, she would remain Catholic.
18:48No matter how violently Mary and Knox disagreed,
18:51there would be no bloodbaths here.
18:55Mary had survived her first crisis.
18:57And now, she had the business of ruling to attend to.
19:13Mary began to tour the whole country,
19:15winning over the powerful regional nobles with her beauty and her cultivated charm,
19:21rekindling old loyalties that ran deeper than the new religious ties.
19:27Sending a clear signal that she was back and in charge.
19:34This is a moment from Scottish history that stays with you.
19:37Mary was back and she was making a success of it.
19:40But she'd been Queen all of her life.
19:42She'd been surrounded by the magnificence of the French court
19:45and she'd had her ambitions to be Queen of England inflated and fanned.
19:50Now, after all that, could she really reconcile herself
19:53to a life lived here, out on the edge of the world?
19:57MUSIC
20:02The bigger stage, England, was always on her mind.
20:07The trouble was, the English already had their leading lady.
20:12But by 1564, Elizabeth had neither married nor produced an heir.
20:18So Mary seized the initiative.
20:27MUSIC
20:30Mary began surveying the field for suitable contenders for marriage.
20:37But Mary wasn't just looking for a husband.
20:39She was looking for a stud to maintain or even improve the bloodline.
20:44Someone who could finally help her fulfil her dynastic potential.
20:50First, she investigated Catholic suitors, Spaniards and French.
20:55The French one was her dead husband's adolescent brother.
21:00And the Spanish one promptly lost his mind.
21:04Elizabeth offered her own favourite.
21:07But eventually, Mary settled on something much closer to home.
21:11An English cousin.
21:14Like her, he's a good dancer, a good huntsman.
21:18Tall, good-looking and young.
21:21MUSIC
21:26His name was Henry, Lord Darnley, and he was the boy who would be king.
21:32MUSIC
21:38After a whirlwind romance, Mary and Darnley married.
21:42And Scotland was poised to have a cocky 19-year-old,
21:45not just as its queen's husband, but as its out-and-out king.
21:51All with Mary's blessing.
21:53But then something strange happened.
21:56A clue lies here, in the National Museum of Scotland.
22:00So what have we here now?
22:01Well, we have a coin which was struck to commemorate the marriage
22:05of Mary, Queen of Scots, and Henry, Lord Darnley, in July 1565.
22:10And that's the happy couple?
22:11Indeed, yes. Face to face, staring into each other's eyes.
22:14And the inscription has Henry's name before Mary's.
22:17So it's Henry and King before Mary and Queen.
22:20That's right, yes.
22:20So I think it was probably considered fairly soon after this had gone into circulation
22:25that it was in fact conveying an unfortunate message.
22:28And they were withdrawn from circulation very rapidly and replaced with a different type.
22:32What replaced it?
22:33It was replaced by a different coin, the same size, but with different designs on it.
22:37So surely that's mysterious, that two coins should replace one another so quickly?
22:42Well, Mary, of course, was of higher status than Henry Darnley.
22:47And the coin seemed to convey that he was at least equal, if not, in fact, superior status.
22:52So the new issue was brought out, which had Mary's name first,
22:56making sure that the correct hierarchy was maintained.
22:59So he's been put in his place by the time the second coin comes out?
23:01Yes, that's right. Yes, very much so.
23:03So quite clearly, these two coins tell us what we need to know about that relationship.
23:09Well, yes. The fact that this happened in Scotland so rapidly
23:12is an indication of something that has to do with the relationship between Mary and Henry.
23:17Something unusual going on here.
23:23Darnley roamed about Edinburgh, drunk and debauched,
23:27mouthing off about not being king and making enemies in the process.
23:32If Mary had once encouraged him to dream of being king, she now backtracked.
23:38And well, she could, because Darnley had done his job by then.
23:43He'd made his wife pregnant.
23:47For five months, Mary and Henry would remain in Edinburgh,
23:50where they spent some time.
23:52One day, Mary was as proud of them as she was of Darnley.
23:54And in Edinburgh, where Darnley was living,
23:56she and Henry would spend some time as much as they could talk.
23:59In Edinburgh, they'd spend some time making love in the fields,
24:02in the fields of their old house,
24:04in the fields of their old house.
24:06In Edinburgh, where Mary's home was rarely seen,
24:09Darnley would make love to Mary on the Sunday morning.
24:12Well, that's one reason why we've got this story.
24:14of Stirling Castle to celebrate James's baptism and it was a major political event.
24:24Mary had ordered that a huge round table be set up here to remind the guests of King Arthur,
24:30the mythical king of Britain, and James was hailed as Little Arthur,
24:34the future king of a reunited Britain.
24:36The visiting English ambassador was suitably offended at the Scottish royal family's claim
24:45to be the future rulers of the whole British Isles. It was a very provocative gesture.
24:54But it was realistic. Time was running out for Elizabeth. She was already in her mid-thirties
24:59and it was becoming less and less likely that she would ever produce her own heir
25:03and if she didn't or couldn't, where would that leave England? Answer, in Scotland's hands.
25:20Whether Elizabeth liked it or not, baby James would be the next in line.
25:25So the English queen now seemed poised to do something remarkable.
25:30Bury the hatchet with Mary and name her son James as the successor to the English throne.
25:39Until that is, Mary's poor choice in men came back to haunt her.
25:50The house where darnly Mary's husband was staying was blown up with gunpowder packed into its
25:54basement, but it wasn't the blast that killed him. His body was found some distance away from
26:00the scene of the explosion. In all likelihood, he was strangled as he tried to flee for his life.
26:10The Scottish nobles had finally run out of patience with Darnley.
26:17But some said the blood on their hands was ordained by the queen herself
26:21and Mary's behaviour seemed to prove those suspicions.
26:27She didn't rush into mourning clothes, nor did she give her husband a state funeral.
26:32Instead, Darnley's body was dumped at night somewhere in Holyrood Abbey.
26:40You get a sense of Darnley's tragedy here. The story goes that he's buried alongside these other dead,
26:47but they have gravestones and he doesn't. No one knows for sure where he was buried,
26:52and no one really cares. Yet he was practically a king of Scotland.
27:00His sordid death changed everything for Mary. Elizabeth would have stopped any more talk of
27:07her succession. Until that is, Mary could be cleared of any involvement in Darnley's murder.
27:13But that wasn't about to happen.
27:20Instead, she married the man most people suspected of carrying out the murder.
27:25His name was James Hepburn, Earl of Bothwell.
27:32There were, of course, rumours that he kidnapped her, that he raped her,
27:35that she married him to keep her honour. But none of that could alter the fact that from the outside
27:41from the point of view of the ministers, the nobles, and the mob, it looked bad.
27:53Those factions who had always opposed her, chief among them the hardline Protestants,
27:58now rose up against Mary and her power-hungry new husband,
28:01and Scotland teetered on the point of civil war.
28:05Mary and Bothwell met their opponents outside Edinburgh,
28:09ready to calm their kingdom with violence.
28:14But on the battlefield, Mary begged her opponents to avoid bloodshed,
28:18and to allow Bothwell to escape. In return, she offered herself into captivity.
28:34Mary was taken to Loch Leven Castle.
28:44And when the nobles came to force her to sign her abdication documents, at first, Mary resisted.
28:53But it was only so long she could put up with the threats to her life.
28:56So she signed, and gave up her power. Gave up her country.
29:11A few months later, Mary escaped, and tried to get it back. But it was too late.
29:18The army that she raised was defeated at Glasgow, and Mary fled to England,
29:23where she threw herself on Elizabeth's mercy. But Elizabeth put her back in prison.
29:30The future of Scotland once again rested on the shoulders of a Stuart infant.
29:39Mary's life was now in danger, and she had no choice but to give up her power.
29:46She had no choice but to give up her power, and she had no choice but to give up her life.
29:54Of a Stuart infant.
29:59This is the 110th psalm, and it's believed to have been sung at the coronation of Mary's son,
30:05James, here in the Church of the Holy Rood in Stirling.
30:19It was the worst attended Scottish coronation of all time.
30:23After the psalms came the sermon, and it was given by the firebrand preacher John Knox himself.
30:44It wasn't unusual for an infant to become a king, especially not a Stuart king.
30:48But there was something momentous about the day, and it marked a turning point in the history of
30:53the nation. For the first time, a king of Scotland had been crowned in a Protestant ceremony.
31:04That ceremony sent a clear signal. When it came to religion,
31:09Scotland was now firmly on the same Protestant side as England.
31:13As James grew up, his religious education became the most important project in the land.
31:20Scotland's leading scholar, George Buchanan, was the man brought in to ensure that James
31:24was set against his mother's religion for good. He had once been a confidant of Mary's,
31:31but then he had turned against her, and now he had power over her son.
31:37James and Buchanan spent a lot of their time here at Stirling Castle,
31:41and through this little door is supposedly the schoolroom where they had all their lessons
31:44in Latin, history and rhetoric, and of course, lots and lots of Bible lessons.
32:06You can't help but feel for little James. He was here without a mother or a father.
32:21He was kept away from the people. He was almost a captive himself,
32:26and he wasn't here to do what he wanted. He was here to do what he was told.
32:31To make matters worse, the man responsible for his education
32:34was not above inflicting physical punishment. After one beating inflicted by Buchanan,
32:40James's guardian, the Countess of Marr, accused him of going too far.
32:44Buchanan retorted, I have whipped his arse. You may kiss it if you want to.
33:01And just what was his tutor trying to beat into him?
33:04Something his mother never fully grasped. The limits of royal authority.
33:31In the new Protestant Scotland, the role of the monarch was under review.
33:36The will of the people was what mattered now,
33:39and Buchanan wanted to ensure that James got the message.
33:43He even wrote a book to help James be the right sort of king.
33:51Listen to this. It's from George Buchanan's personal note to James VI
33:56at the start of his book about kingship.
33:58I have sent you this book to steer you through the reefs of flattery.
34:02It may not only admonish you, but also keep you to the path which you have once embarked upon,
34:06and if you should stray from it, rebuke you and drag you back again.
34:11Now, it's all couched in very affectionate language, but there's no mistaking Buchanan's intent.
34:16It says to me that he wants to control the young prince.
34:19In fact, he wants to create a puppet king.
34:31Buchanan went on to say that if the king caused the people to despise or distrust him
34:36by reigning like a tyrant, the people were perfectly justified in getting rid of him.
34:41It was meant as a warning, not necessarily as a prediction.
34:47But just a few years later, James came to understand
34:50exactly what his teacher had been trying to tell him.
34:58A group of Protestant nobles lured 16-year-old James to this castle
35:02and took him prisoner.
35:04James's crime?
35:08He had been keeping dangerous company,
35:12the company of an older, charismatic French cousin.
35:19Esmé Stewart was the only family James had ever known,
35:23and James had grown fond of her.
35:26She was the only woman he had ever met.
35:28Esmé Stewart was the only family James had ever known,
35:32and James had grown bold with him around.
35:36Once-trusted advisors had found themselves sidelined.
35:39Some had even been executed,
35:42and his cousin had been promoted in their place.
35:46Esmé Stewart was two things the Protestant nobles feared most.
35:50He was French, and he had Catholic sympathies.
35:54Even more worrying, he had an influence, even a power, over young James.
36:04Protestant nobles felt their power slipping,
36:07and in England, Elizabeth grew worried at developments north of her border.
36:14So, with her support, Esmé Stewart was forced back to France.
36:19And James came to share his captive mother's fate.
36:28James stews in captivity as days turn into weeks, turn into months, and into a year.
36:34He's just a young boy.
36:36He knows his mother has been imprisoned in England for years,
36:39so maybe this is his lot.
36:41Or perhaps his captors have another, more grisly fate in mind for him.
36:49But his jailers didn't seem to know what to do with him.
36:53For the best part of a year, they moved him around the country.
36:57Until, finally, James escaped.
37:07He sought out his loyal supporters and raised an army
37:11to take on his captors and get his kingdom back.
37:19A few skirmishes later, James marched into Edinburgh
37:23and took full control of Scotland.
37:29And it wasn't long before James showed just what kind of king he intended to be.
37:35The book of his old tutor, George Buchanan,
37:38that had been written by his father, James,
37:40was the first book he'd ever read.
37:42It was a book that was about the history of England,
37:45the book of his old tutor, George Buchanan,
37:48that contained all those ideas of the king's rightful place.
37:52The book designed to rebuke James
37:53and drag him back to the correct path was banned.
37:59James would be guided not by the will of the people,
38:02but by God alone.
38:05James would be an absolute monarch.
38:16But what of England, and of the queen who had wanted James jailed?
38:28Elizabeth was facing war in Europe,
38:30and now she sought an alliance with the Scottish king.
38:34But James had a price in mind.
38:37Nothing less than a guarantee that he would be her heir.
38:41Childless Elizabeth guaranteed nothing,
38:44but she did offer a bond of friendship,
38:47and little Arthur was almost where he wanted to be.
38:53But this so-called friendship was about to face its toughest test.
39:12In her 19th year in Elizabeth's English prison,
39:15Mary had grown reckless.
39:19Almost everything she'd hoped for had been lost.
39:22The Catholic Empire, power in France, power in Scotland,
39:27even her liberty.
39:29So when she received an offer to join up to a murderous plot,
39:33she said yes.
39:37The plot was an elaborate one.
39:40Mary was to be liberated, Elizabeth was to be executed,
39:43and a Catholic army would land here on the south coast of England.
39:46They would sweep up through the country to London
39:49and secure Mary's position.
39:51It was nothing less than a plan for a holy war.
40:01Mary wrote a letter agreeing to Elizabeth's murder.
40:05The letter was intercepted.
40:09Mary was tried for treason and sentenced to death.
40:23James now faced the toughest decision of his life.
40:27Just how far should he go in pleading for the life of the mother
40:30he hadn't seen since he was a baby?
40:32If he was seen to be weak, if he did nothing,
40:34then the Scottish people themselves might rise in defence of Mary.
40:38But if he shouted too loudly
40:40and severed his ties with England and with Elizabeth,
40:44what would that mean for his place,
40:45his unspoken place in the line of succession?
40:56He sent ambassadors to London with clear written instructions.
41:01The one to deal very earnestly both with the Queen
41:04and her counsellors for our sovereign mother's life.
41:08The other that are titled to that crown be not prejudged.
41:13In other words, do nothing to jeopardise my claim to the English throne.
41:22James's next letter begged Elizabeth merely to exile Mary.
41:26But by then, it was clear that James was not going to make war
41:30to save his mother's life.
41:38The English royal coat of arms bears a lion,
41:41and the Scottish coat of arms bears a unicorn,
41:44the mythical wild animal that cannot be tamed...
41:49..except by a virgin.
42:07Now the Virgin Queen had tamed her troublesome unicorn.
42:17Mary went to the block dressed as a Catholic martyr
42:20and still claiming to be the rightful Queen of England.
42:24Nothing became her in life like her death.
42:37James expected Elizabeth to reward him for his loyalty,
42:41but he was in for a shock,
42:43as again she refused to officially name him
42:45as her chosen successor for the English crown.
42:50So James set about proving himself as a king...
42:54..in Scotland.
43:07First, the Stuart line had to be strengthened.
43:11James chose a wife, Princess Anne of Protestant Denmark,
43:16who quickly gave birth to an heir, Henry.
43:20And then she produced a spear, Charles.
43:25Sometimes by force, but more often than not by guile,
43:29James started to stabilise his turbulent kingdom.
43:32Words were his main weapons, and books were his ammunition,
43:36in the constant struggle to stay in control.
43:41He even sought out copies of books from across the known world.
43:53So what have we got here, Ian?
43:54Something rather intriguing.
43:56A treasure trove of books,
43:57a collection of books from all over the world.
44:00Something rather intriguing.
44:02A translation into Scots of Machiavelli's famous treatise
44:06on statecraft, The Prince,
44:08done by William Fowler for his sovereign, James VI.
44:13And here is the first page.
44:14The Prince of Nicholas Machiavelli,
44:16secretary and citizen of Florence,
44:19translated Firth of the Italian tongue.
44:22Rather nice usage of Firth, out of the Italian tongue.
44:25What is The Prince all about?
44:26You know, what's the essence of Machiavelli's work?
44:30Power.
44:31The getting, the keeping, the exercise of power,
44:36and the use of it for the prince's ends,
44:38and for the good of his state.
44:46Machiavelli's book, The Prince,
44:48has become the most famous book on power in the world.
44:51It advises kings to act like a fox,
44:53as well as a lion, in keeping hold of it,
44:57which James did amazingly well.
45:00And gradually, he established himself
45:03as a king who ruled with his head,
45:05and not with his heart.
45:07A son who was the opposite of his mother,
45:11though every bit as ambitious.
45:20Elizabeth's stubborn refusal to name James
45:22as her chosen successor became irrelevant.
45:27The writing was on the wall for Tudor England.
45:30And James was the only real contender for the crown.
45:34Like his mother, the perfect solution
45:37to a very English problem.
45:40James had already proven himself
45:42to be an adept ruler in Scotland.
45:44He had succeeded where Mary had failed.
45:47He was also the right sex
45:49and the right religion to rule in England.
45:51And what's more, he had done something
45:53the Tudors had never been very good at.
45:55He produced viable heirs.
45:58Now, all he had to do was live longer than Elizabeth.
46:11But Elizabeth lived on and on and on.
46:19In fact, Elizabeth I lived longer
46:21than any English monarch had ever lived before.
46:24Little Arthur was forced to bide his time
46:28and contemplate his master plan
46:30for when he finally took over in England.
46:47James was 36 when he received the news
46:50he'd spent half a lifetime waiting for.
46:54Elizabeth was dead.
46:57The Tudors were finished.
47:00And England needed a king.
47:04James received the news just three days
47:06after the death of Elizabeth.
47:08The kingmakers wanted him to go down south.
47:10He was to go immediately and directly to the seat of power.
47:14But James had other ideas.
47:16For one thing, he was going to take his time.
47:18And for another, he wasn't going to travel long.
47:22And for another, he wasn't going to travel light.
47:24He was going to take his whole entourage,
47:26all the pomp and circumstance he could manage.
47:28This was to be a triumphal tour of the promised land.
47:39Now, a moment that Scottish kings
47:41could only have dreamed of had arrived.
47:45A Scottish takeover of England was happening.
47:49And the moment belonged to a king who had proven himself
47:52as a clever and effective ruler.
47:55One of the most accomplished kings Scotland had ever produced.
48:07He entered London just a few days after an outbreak of plague.
48:19Shortly after, he took a barge along the Thames to the Tower,
48:22where he finally saw the English crown jewels
48:26that now belonged to him.
48:32Put yourself in James's position.
48:35This was the seat of power of his most ancient foe,
48:38the enemies of his blood.
48:40The people who had burned, raped and murdered his forebears
48:43were now his enemies.
48:45The people who had burned, raped and murdered his forebears,
48:48who had sought to dominate his nation for 300 years,
48:52were offering everything they had,
48:54throne and crown included, to him.
48:56Imagine what that must have felt like.
49:16After the grand entrance, the great words of welcome,
49:19James unveiled his master plan.
49:22And it went way beyond just being the king of two separate kingdoms.
49:27Now, according to James,
49:29was the chosen moment for a new country to be born.
49:38James had a crystal-clear vision of the future
49:41and his place in it.
49:43This was to be a Great Britain,
49:45united under a common religion,
49:47common laws and common citizenship.
49:49He would be at the top, king and emperor of it all.
49:52And most crucially,
49:54it was to be a union of two equal nations.
49:58But that was precisely where the problem lay.
50:14What's so equal about Scotland and England?
50:17said the English nobility.
50:19England, they thought,
50:21was clearly the superior nation.
50:23Richer, more developed, stronger.
50:31What benefit would there be
50:33in joining with backward and impoverished Scots?
50:38Yet, a Scot was now their king.
50:43And he was determined to take his idea of Great Britain
50:47to Parliament.
50:51It didn't exactly go down a storm.
50:55James was accustomed to getting his own way
50:59with Parliament in Scotland.
51:01He expected unquestioning obedience.
51:03But the men here would not roll over.
51:05Certainly not for an upstart Scot.
51:08Inside Parliament,
51:10it quickly became clear
51:12that James wasn't about to get his own way.
51:18And outside Parliament,
51:20relations between Scots and English
51:22were on the point of breaking down.
51:32James exacerbated the situation
51:34by his own actions.
51:37He began to shower his inner Scottish circle
51:39with gifts.
51:41Money, pensions, land.
51:43English estates were dealt out
51:45to Scottish nobles.
51:51And suddenly, England seemed to be ruled
51:53by a clique of very powerful Scots,
51:55blocking the way of English courtiers
51:57and nobles to riches and royal favour.
52:01Scots in London began to acquire
52:03a reputation as being on the make
52:06and tight-fisted
52:08and closed ranks around their king.
52:12Their prominence was to make them a target
52:14in one of the most spectacular conspiracies
52:16in British history.
52:20One group had come to especially hate James
52:22and his expatriate entourage
52:26and decided to take matters
52:28into their own hands.
52:32English Catholics felt the Scottish king
52:35was down with empty promises of tolerance
52:37and so they turned not only against James
52:39but against all Scots in London.
52:45One of these conspirators
52:47was a mercenary called Guy Fawkes.
52:57The gunpowder was heaped up
52:59under the houses of Parliament
53:01but the institution itself was not the target.
53:04James was Protestant Scottish King James.
53:06They later said they had enough gunpowder
53:08to blast him all the way back to Scotland.
53:12After the plot had been foiled,
53:14after Guy Fawkes had been tortured
53:16and made his confession,
53:18it was revealed that the conspirators
53:20had detailed maps and plans
53:22giving the locations of the houses
53:24of every prominent Scot in London.
53:26What they had planned was nothing less
53:28than the ethnic cleansing of the whole city.
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