Ainslie Tavern Bond

The bond approved the Earl of Bothwell's acquittal on 12 April of implication in the murder of Lord Darnley, recommended him as an appropriate husband for Mary, Queen of Scots, and pledged to assist in defending such a marriage.

He suggests an alternative reading, that the Lords convened to discuss the bond in Bothwell's lodging in Edinburgh and Ainslie was the caterer who provided the supper.

Chronicle writers including James Melville of Halhill and Claude Nau describe a meeting in Bothwell's house or lodging in Holyrood Palace.

[11] Julian Goodare notes that one copy of the bond text derives from the recollection of John Reid, an associate of the Earl of Morton.

The marriage divided Scotland into two camps and led to the Battle of Carberry Hill on 15 June 1567, at which Mary was defeated and captured, though Bothwell escaped.

The bond of 19 April 1567 was discussed in at the York Conference in October 1568,[13] and mentioned in the document called "Hay's Book of Articles", which narrates events from Darnley's murder to Moray's regency from the Confederate Lords' viewpoint.