Government in medieval Scotland

Kingship was the major form of political organisation in the early Middle Ages, with competing minor kingdoms and fluid relationships of over- and under-kingdoms.

In the early period, the kings of the Scots depended on the great lords of the mormaers (later earls) and Toísechs (later thanes), but from the reign of David I, sheriffdoms were introduced, which allowed more direct control and gradually limited the power of the major lordships.

While modern knowledge of early systems of law is limited, royal justice can be seen as developing from the twelfth century onwards with local sheriff, burgh, manorial and ecclesiastical courts and offices of the justicar to oversee administration.

Interaction and intermarriage into subject kingdoms may have opened the way to absorption of such sub-kingdoms and, although there might be later overturnings of such annexation, it is likely that kingship was being gradually monopolised by a handful of the most powerful dynasties.

[4] He was consecrated by the Bishop of St Andrews and placed on the throne by the Mormaers of Strathearn and Fife and his genealogy recited in Gaelic back to his Dalriadric Scottish ancestors by a royal poet from the Highlands.

[6] In the later Middle Ages the king moved between royal castles, particularly Perth and Stirling, but also holding judicial sessions throughout the kingdom, with Edinburgh only beginning to emerge as the capital in the reign of James III at the cost of considerable unpopularity.

[7] The unification of the kingdom, the spread of Anglo-Norman custom, the development of a European trading economy and Robert I's success in achieving independence from England did much to build up the prestige of the institution.

[8] Like most western European monarchies, the Scottish crown in the fifteenth century adopted the example of the Burgundian court, through formality and elegance putting itself at the centre of culture and political life, defined with display, ritual and pageantry, reflected in elaborate new palaces and patronage of the arts.

[10] New Monarchy can also be seen in the reliance of the crown on "new men" rather than the great magnates, the use of the clergy as a form of civil service, and the development of standing armed forces and a navy.

[12] The other major secular posts also had a tendency to become hereditary, with the chamberlain responsible for royal finances and the constable for organising the crown's military forces, while the marishchal had a leadership role in battle.

[13] The council was a virtually full-time institution by the late fifteenth century, and surviving records from the period indicate it was critical in the working of royal justice.

By the end of the fifteenth century, this group was being joined by increasing numbers of literate laymen, often secular lawyers, of which the most successful gained preferment in the judicial system and grants of lands and lordships.

[14] By the early fourteenth century, the attendance of knights and freeholders had become important, and probably from 1326 burgh commissioners joined them to form the Three Estates, meeting in a variety of major towns throughout the kingdom.

[15][16] It acquired significant powers over particular issues, including consent for taxation, but it also had a strong influence over justice, foreign policy, war, and other legislation, whether political, ecclesiastical, social or economic.

[20] In the fifteenth century, parliament was being called on an almost annual basis, more often than its English counterpart, and was willing to offer occasional resistance or criticism to the policies of the crown, particular in the unpopular reign of James III.

[9] However, from about 1494, after his success against the Stewarts and Douglases and over rebels in 1482 and 1488, James IV managed largely to dispense with the institution, and it might have declined, like many other systems of Estates in continental Europe, had it not been for his death in 1513 and another long minority.

[23] The legal tract known as Laws of the Brets and Scots, probably compiled in the reign of David I, set out a system of compensation for injury and death based on ranks and the solidarity of kin groups.

[32] Burghs, towns which had been given this special status usually by the King, also had their own set of local laws dealing mostly with commercial and trade matters and may have become similar in function to sheriff's courts.

[33] Ecclesiastical courts also played an important role in Scotland as they had exclusive jurisdiction over matters such as marriage, contracts made on oath, inheritance and legitimacy.

[34] These courts, unlike their lay counterparts, were generally staffed by educated men who were trained in both Roman and Canon law and offered a more sophisticated form of justice.

[37] Under Robert I in 1318, a parliament at Scone enacted a code of law that drew upon older practices, but it was also dominated by current events and focused on military matters and the conduct of the war.

[49]The relative poverty of the kingdom, difficult terrain and the lack of a system of regular taxation, helped to limit the scale of central administration and government by the Scottish crown.

[50] Until the fifteenth century, the ancient pattern of major lordships survived largely intact, with the addition of two new "scattered earldoms" of Douglas and Crawford, thanks to royal patronage after the wars of independence, mainly in the borders and south-west.

Their acquisition of the crown, and a series of internal conflicts and confiscations, meant that by around the 1460s, the monarchy had transformed its position within the realm, gaining control of most of the "provincial" earldoms and lordships.

In the Highlands, James II created two new provincial earldoms for his favourites: Argyll for the Campbells and Huntly for the Gordons, which acted as a bulwark against the vast Lordship of the Isles built up by the Macdonalds.