BOOK XVII.
13 Redis Swyr. The pass over Cheviot to the valley of the Rede, a tributary of the Tyne. By it went the road from Jedburgh, and in it is the site of the Battle of Otterburn, 1388. Swyr is A.S. swira or swera, the neck.
15 Outakin Berwik, it allane. “One town in Scotland was left to the King” (Vita Edw. Sec., p. 234). On September 20, 1317, and January 30, 1318, certain burgesses were going to England and France to purchase provisions “for the munition of the town” (Bain, iii., Nos. 575, 588). To save expense (Scala.), the defence of the town itself had been entrusted to the mayor, bailiffs, and burgesses (ibid., No. 593; Vita Edw., p. 234; Scala., p. 148). According to Stevenson’s Chronicler, the citizens had begged to be entrusted with the defence because of their ill-treatment by the royal garrison, August 1, 1317 (p. 5).
17 That capitane was. Roger de Horslee, Keeper of the Castle (Bain, iii., No. 607). He had been appointed, August 19, 1317, to command the castle when the city was committed to the burgesses (Stevenson, p. 5; Rot. Scot., i., p. 175). Cf. on 224.
19 tretit thame richt ill. On February 4, 1318, Edward appointed a commission of three to “inquire into the disputes arisen, or likely to arise, between the burgesses and the garrison of Berwick, to the danger of the town” (Bain, iii., No. 589). Cf. note on 15.
23 a burges, Sim of Spaldyng. “Peter de Spalding” in Scala., p. 144; Lanerc., p. 234; Illustr., p. 5; Trokelowe, p. 103, etc. The Annales Paulini adds John Drory and other accomplices (p. 282). “Peter de Spalding” is on the roll of the garrison of Berwick in 1312 (Bain, iii., p. 399). He was an Englishman living in the town, and received a large sum of money in addition to the promise of lands (Lanercost, pp. 234-235). “A royal sergeant retained by the citizens in the defence of the town.” Douglas, it was said, “corrupted” him with promises of £800 (Stevenson, p. 5). Spalding’s request for his money was “obnoxious” to the Scots, and he was put to death on a trumped-up charge of treason (ibid.).
28 the marschall. Sir Robert Keith.
35 the Kow-yhet. Still the Cow-port (gate) in the middle of the north side of the town.
45 Ane or othir suld wrethit be. I.e., “if he chose anyone to help him, somebody else was sure to be offended.” Apparently he would have to choose between Moray and Douglas. Cf. lines 55-7.
64 Duns park. A favourite rendezvous in that neighbourhood for the Scots army. The “park” would be wooded. In June, 1315, Bruce was reported to be collecting an army in “the Park of Duns,” either to invade England or to besiege Berwick (Bain, iii., No. 440).
67 Athir with ane quheyne of men. Bruce gets out of the dilemma by choosing both leaders, each to bring a small party of his men.
72 the day. April 2, 1318 (Lanerc., p. 234; Ann. Paul., p. 282). Circa March 25 (Illustrations, p. 5). Edward is preparing to retake Berwick on April 18, 1318 (Rot. Scot., i., p. 181).
94 the nycht. The Scots entered “about midnight after the Sabbath day” (Lanerc., p. 234). Edward, “much enraged,” reports that the mayor and bailiffs “allowed the Scottish rebels to enter and take possession,” “through carelessness,” and orders goods belonging to the community of Berwick to be everywhere arrested; April 13, 15 (Bain, iii., Nos. 593, 594).
97 hald a staill. “Occupy a position.” Cf. Bk. XV. 341.
105 till the gude. “For the goods.” Singular form as plural; see Grammar. Cf. also twa part in 103 for two parts.
125 gat the castell. “Got to the castle.”
128 in the bargane slane. Few were slain apart from those who resisted (Lanerc., p. 235; Stevenson, p. 5). According to Baker, in the capture of the town and castle no one was slain who was willing to submit (qui voluit obedire, p. 59).
134 the baner. Apparently the Scots had assembled (“stuffit”) round their banner in the “staill” (97).
150-1 Wilyhame ... of Keth, and of the Gawlistoune. Sir William Keith of Galston, known by either surname, of Keith or of Galston (152). Galston was in Kyle, Ayrshire, and there were Keiths in it at least a hundred years after (Reg. Mag. Sig., p. 228; 17).
176 all that fell, etc. “All that would serve to provision the town.” Cf. on 15.
185 the Mers and Tevidaill. The part of Berwickshire next the Border, “the March,” and Teviotdale.
198 on the sext day. Gray says the castle held out for eleven weeks, and as his father was then in garrison at Norham, he is probably about right. The castle surrendered for lack of food (Scala., p. 144). The account in Stevenson’s Chronicle also implies a siege longer than five days; for he speaks of King Robert assailing the castle with siege-engines, and failing, and of the Scots then settling down to starve out the garrison (Illust., p. 5). Horslee was at Newcastle with the garrison on July 20—that is, about sixteen weeks after the fall of the town—so that the surrender of the castle must have taken place somewhat earlier in the month. Horslee and his garrison had to be supported by the town, and the account therefore would begin with their arrival (Bain, iii., No. 607). Cf. on line 226.
200 till thair cuntre syne went thai. Life and goods were granted them on surrender (Stevenson, p. 5). Cf. previous note.
203 soyn eftir. But, according to the account in Stevenson, King Robert assisted at the attack on the castle. See on 198.
222 At = that. “That he took in hand to hold Berwick.”
224 Bath the castell, and the dungeoune. In his former references Barbour has used the term “castle” to include both the tower or “donjon” or keep and the surrounding wall, apart from the wall of the town proper. The wall (or “wallis”), he says in 169, 170, was not then in a very defensible state. Here he goes back to an older and more technical usage before these two independent elements—donjon and enclosure fortified with a wall—had quite coalesced. The evidence for this differentiation is given at length by Mr. Round in his Geoffrey de Mandeville, Appendix O. One of the citations is precisely parallel to Barbour’s expressions here, the description of a grant of Dublin—town, castle, and donjon—in 1172 to Hugh de Lacy:
“Li riche rei ad dunc baillé (has then entrusted)
Dyvelin en garde, la cité
E la chastel e le dongun,
A Huge de Laci le barun.”
These, then, are the three elements here: the town, which had its own wall; the “castle,” strictly speaking, or walled enclosure; and the “donjon” within the latter.
226 Ryde in-till Inglande. The Lanercost writer places this raid in the month of May, and, it would seem, after the fall of the castle (see on line 198). The Scots on this occasion penetrated England farther than usual, reaching Ripon, Knaresborough, and Skipton, in Craven—i.e., covering a large part of Yorkshire (p. 235). The Gesta de Carn. also dates this raid in May, “soon after Easter,” and says the Scots went as far as Bolton Abbey (p. 55).
227 gret plente of fee. They brought back “a crowd of cattle past numbering” (Lanerc., p. 236). They searched the woods of Knaresborough for the cattle hidden there, and got possession of them (p. 235).
228-9 sum cuntreis trewit he For vittale. I.e., “he made a truce with some districts in return for a supply of victual.” The Scots spoiled Ripon, but refrained from burning the town on payment of 1,000 marks (Lanerc., p. 235).
236 But burges and but oblesteris. Skeat takes exception to “burgesses,” but the town had previously been defended by the burgesses (cf. on 15), and some, no doubt, were willing “to obey” the Scots (cf. on 128). E reads burdowys, which Jamieson supposed to mean “men who fought with clubs,” while Skeat suggests that it is “burdouis for burdonis—i.e., mules!” Mules are a less probable part of the garrison than burgesses. “Oblesteris” are arblasters—i.e., crossbow-men, a minor but constant part of both English and Scottish armies of the time.
239 Johne Crab. A famous sea-rover of the east coast, as on the west was Thomas Dun (Bk. XIV. 376, note). In 1319 Edward was complaining to the Count of Flanders of his “outrages,” and the Count answered (November 19) that “Crabbe” had been banished for murder, and that “he will punish him on the wheel if he catches him” (Bain, iii., No. 673). He was captured in 1332 near Roxburgh, and because the “ungrateful Scots” refused to ransom him he transferred his services to the English (Lanerc., p. 270), and for his assistance at the Siege of Berwick in 1333 was pardoned “all his homicides, felonies, etc., by sea or land” (Bain, iii., 1090). He therefore cannot be the “Cryn, a Fleming, an admiral of the sea, a robber,” killed by Sir Thomas Gray in 1321-2, as is supposed by Sir Herbert Maxwell (Robert the Bruce, p. 267, note; The Scalacronica, trans., p. 63, note). Crab is on record till 1347 (Bain, No. 1504). But “Cryn” may be his nephew “John Crabbekyn” (Bain, iii., No. 417). The Scots slew his son (Lanerc., p. 270). A John Crab gets lands from Bruce in Aberdeen, which, with those in Berwick, are transferred to another in the reign of David II. (Robertson’s Index, 15, 21, etc. ... 32, 9), apparently on his going over to England. He is not, therefore, likely to be the John Crab, a burgess of Aberdeen in later times, and a member of Parliament (1365, 1367), as the editor of the Exchequer Rolls, II., postulates (p. lxxxii., note: Index).
245 engynis and trammys. “Siege-engines and structures of wood.”
246 grec fyre. In all probability “Greek fire,” as Skeat suggests; “t”and “c” are almost indistinguishable in the MSS. of the time. “Greek fire” was the mother of gunpowder; it was a liquid made of sulphur and saltpetre, with the addition of inflammable oils, and its purpose was to set woodwork on fire (cf. Oman’s Art of War, pp. 546, 547). It was used at the Siege of Stirling in 1304 (Bain).
247 Spryngaldis and schotis. The springal (espringale) was a great crossbow on a frame, whose cord was drawn back by a winch; the “shots” were its bolts, or “long darts”: springaldis, ad longa spicula emittenda (Lanercost, p. 231) at the siege of Carlisle in 1315.
250 gynis for crakkis. Contrivances for making explosions—i.e., guns, which at first seem to have been valued for this quality.
271 ger dik thame. I.e., the English were to surround their own encampment at Berwick with a rampart for further security, and to keep off the Scots who might come to its relief.
278 thoucht all suth. “Thought quite rightly.”
285 Of Lancister the Erll Thomas. Bain says that, though Lancaster was clearly summoned (Fœdera, iii., p. 784), “Walsingham, who was not contemporary, seems the only authority for his presence, and if his men had been there they would have been found on the roll,” where they are not given (iii., p. xxvi). But a letter from Hugh le Despenser, the younger, printed by Stevenson in his notes to the Chronicle of Lanercost, expressly names the Earl of Lancaster as having been present (p. 422). Despenser also was at Berwick, and his letter (Anglo-French) is dated September 21 at Newcastle. Strangest fact, Bain, who knew the Chron. de Lanerc., overlooked the mention of Lancaster having accompanied the King to Berwick on p. 239. In Vita Edw. Sec., too, Lancaster is among those at Berwick (pp. 241, 244). Also in Annal. Paul., p. 286; Illustrations, p. 56. Cf. notes below. Maxwell, too, cites Barbour only for Lancaster’s presence (p. 265, note).
286 That syne wes sanctit. See note on 874.
295 all this menyhe. According to the pay-sheet, August 1 to September 24, 8,080 men, apart, however, from the following of Lancaster (cf. on 285 and 852) and the sailors (Bain, iii., No. 668). In Annal. Paul. 30,000 horse! (p. 286).
298 Ordanit ane felde. The “Magdalen Fields” surrounding the town. “The army was spread ont, on the land side, round the circuit of the town” (Vita Edw. Sec., p. 242).
306 all the havyn wes stoppit. “On the side of the sea the sailors present from the Cinque Ports (Quinque Portubus) so watched the entries and exits that no one could possibly get out” (Vita Edw., p. 242).
318-9 sib him ner, Or ... his allye. “Either near relatives or those closely attached to him by some personal tie.” “Allye,” Fr. allié, is a trisyllable. It does not seem to signify, as Skeat suggests, allied “by various marriages,” but only the latter part of the phrase, “relatives and personal friends.”
335 our Ladeis evin. September 7, 1319. So Despenser, in his letter, says Edward came before Berwick on September 7, and “laid siege to the town, with all his host, by sea and by land” (par myer et par terre. Lanerc., p. 422). The English army entered Scotland on August 29 (Ann. Paul., p. 286).
343 coveryngis. Special protective dresses, such as the miner’s “basket” of wicker for those breaching the wall.
344 howis ... staff slyngis. The first were possibly picks on long poles, so resembling hoes, used for pulling down defences. The staff-sling consisted of a wooden shaft about a yard long, to one end of which was attached a sling. The slinger held it by the other end with both hands, and so could discharge a stone or bullet with great force.
359 ilk kyrneill. Each casement or open interval of the battlement. In the repairs of the castle in 1344 the portion of the wall renewed was to be 8 feet broad at “the kernels” (Bain, iii., No. 1434).
380 Sa law. Edward I. had begun to surround Berwick with a stone wall, but Hugh de Cressingham, his Treasurer (1297), had not spent on it the money given for its completion (Hemingburgh, ii., p. 127).
409 the brighous. A barbican or outwork on which the drawbridge rested. In January, 1316, Bruce tried to enter Berwick inter brighous et castrum (Lanercost, p. 232).
421 scho ebbit. I.e., the tide ebbed, and she grounded. A ship grounding in a very low tide (neap) is still said to be “neaped.”
501 he wald nocht sa soyne assale. The English chroniclers say he would not venture to fight with the army of their King (Lanerc., p. 239; Illust., p. 6). On September 9 Edward writes to the Chancellor that “he hears that Robert de Brus and his allies and supporters (fautours) are bound by oaths and hostages to relieve the garrison of Berwick on a fixed day, and will do everything they can” (Bain, iii., No. 664). He therefore summons to Berwick the whole array of York, but Bruce took his own way of relieving.
505 lordis twa. As here, Moray and Douglas (Lanerc., p. 239; Gesta de Carn., p. 57).
508 xv. thousand. “A very great army” (Illustr., p. 6); “no small army” (Gesta de Carn., p. 57); “xx. thousand of the Scottis” (Capgrave, p. 184).
515 thair wiffis. In their previous raid (see on 226) the Scots took captive both men and women (Lanerc., p. 236).
528 it wes pite. “The Scots were raiding savagely in England” (Scotis in Anglia sæventibus.—Trokelowe, p. 103). “Clearing (depopulantes) Northumbria, the bishopric of Durham and Alvertonshire (York), they came as far as Burghbrig” (Illust., p. 66). “They burnt the country and took captives and booty of animals, advancing as far as Burghbrigge” (Lanercost, p. 239). “Burning and spoiling the country on all sides” (Gesta de Carn., p. 57).
535 Burrow-brig. Boroughbridge, on the Ure, near its junction with the Swale, Yorkshire; see previous note. According to Fordun, Moray was at “Boru-brig” at the end of the month of August (Gesta Annalia, cxxxiv.).
536 Mytoun thar-by. Myton is on the Swale, near its junction with the Ure, and so a little east of Boroughbridge.
541 Prestis, clerkis, monkis, and freris, etc. There were two abbots, monks, friars, many priests, with countrymen and townsfolk (Illustr., p. 7; Lanerc., p. 239; Scala., p. 148).
544 Weill twenty thousand. Ten thousand in Trokelowe, p. 103; both numbers excessive.
546 The Archbischop of York. William de Melton (Gesta de Carn., p. 57; and Lanercost, Illustr., etc., as cited). He lost much furniture in the battle, including silver and brass plate (North. Reg., p. 295).
552 other byschoppis. Only the Bishop of Ely, then staying at York (Illust., p. 7; Lanerc., p. 239).
559 in-till battellis twa. “The Scots gathered together, as their wont was, in a single schiltron” (Lanerc., p. 239). They “divided” to take up the chase (ibid.).
573-4 sic abasing Tuk thame. The English accounts give it that their men had no proper leader nor skill in war, while the Scots were excellently equipped in both respects. The strangely assorted array advanced in no proper order of battle, so that the Scots said: “These are not soldiers, they are sportsmen; they won’t be much good” (“Hi non bellatores sed venatores; non multum proficient.”—Vita Edw., p. 244). The Scots then gave a great shout, and the English in terror turned and fled (Lanerc., p. 239).
583 weill ane thousand. All accounts agree that there was a considerable slaughter of the priestly and inexpert warriors, but the English estimates of the slain are much higher than Barbour’s: more than a thousand, besides the drowned (Ann. Paul., p. 287); “2,000 slain with the sword” (Illustr., p. 7); 3,000 (Trokelowe, p. 103); 4,000 (Lanerc., p. 239); besides those drowned in the Swale, about a thousand, says the Lanercost writer (ibid.); “more than the sword slew” (Gesta de Carn., p. 58). There were also many captives, afterwards redeemed; cf. line 579 (ibid., Vita Edw., p. 244). A chantry chapel was afterwards erected for the souls of the slain, and endowed by their friends; to this end a piece of ground was asked from the King in October, 1325 (Bain, iii., No. 875).
597 Of gret gestis ane Sow. Probably, as Skeat hints, for “gestis”—i.e., joists, great beams, which is more likely than Fr. gestes, “deeds” to which it is hard to give, in this connection, a suitable meaning. The famous “Sow” is referred to in Lanercost (suem), p. 239. See below. It was otherwise known as the cat, and was constructed of stout beams, being strictly a penthouse or shelter for the men mining the wall. So here in line 600, and in the Lanercost account (ad murum suffodiendum, p. 239). But in the present case it is combined with the beffroi, or movable tower (lines 601-2), giving the “sow-castle” or “cat-castle” (cf. Oman’s Art of War, pp. 548, 549). Hailes and Skeat miss this point.
598 stalward heling. A strong covering of hides, or, possibly, of iron plates.
634 the Rude-evyn. The eve of the Exaltation of the Rood, September 13.
674 draw the cleket. Probably then “she” was a mangonel, in which a movable beam, between uprights, was pressed back by ropes, and then suddenly let go from a catch (“cleket”), discharges a stone; or a trebuchet, in which the same result was obtained by poising the beam in the middle, and loading the other end with a heavy weight, which added to the force of the missile.
689 set thar-to juntly. “Set close up to.” Cf. line 704. In the Wallace, Stirling Bridge “off gud playne burd was weill and juntly maid” (vii. 1148).
691 wappyt. The correct Scots form. C has swappit. Cf. Gest. Historiale, “wappid (knocked) to ground” (7297), and “A wap wi a corner-stane o’ Wolf’s Crag wad defy the doctor” (Scott’s Bride of Lammermoor, Border edit., P. 349).
713 top-castellis. “Fighting-tops” on the mast, in addition to the structures rising fore and aft above the deck, “fore-castle” and “stern-castle.”
756 The barras. The “barriers,” a fortified post at the outer end of the drawbridge. See Glossary.
757 and brynt it doune. Skeat, in his rubric, explains that they “burnt the drawbridge”—a foolish thing to do if they wanted to cross the ditch! But what seems to have happened was this: the besiegers first seized the “barras,” then brought “doune” the bridge by burning the tackle, probably of ropes and beams, by which it was drawn up against the gate, and so were able to cross, and make their attempt to burn their way through the gate itself. So, too, they could retreat (790) over the fallen bridge. Cf. in Morte Arthure:
“Brittenes (destroys) theire barrers with theire bryghte wapyns,
Bett down a barbycan, and the brygge wynnys.”
(2469-2470).
828 on the morne. I.e., of September 14, seven days after the first attack. Despenser says that the news from England came “before he had been at Berwick (demorce) eight days” (as cited), practically corroborating Barbour.
829 Thar come tithandis. So in Despenser’s letter; in Lanercost (p. 239); Gesta de Carn. (p. 58).
842 His consell fast discordit then. The Lanercost writer says the King wished to send a part of his army into England to deal with the Scots, and keep on the siege with the remainder; but the nobles were unwilling to divide their army and not fight with the returning Scots, and so the whole army started south for this purpose (p. 239).
852 Loncastell. Despenser attributes the raising of the siege to the “procurement” of Lancaster (Lanerc., p. 422). Stevenson’s chronicler says the siege would have been successful “had not disturbers of the peace sown discord between the King and the Earl of Lancaster” (Illust., p. 6). As is here suggested, the friction had been going on for some time according to the author of the Gesta, who explains in detail how the mischief-making was done (p. 57). In the Vita Edw. Sec. various accounts are collected regarding Lancaster’s action, including the “vulgar” story that he had been bribed by Bruce, and there is a discourse of several pages on treason and avarice (p. 244 et seq.).
855 he. Here is the King; in 858 he is Lancaster. The King was inclined to side with the Southerners, whose homes, of course, were in no danger from the Scots. Cf. previous note.
862 his way he tais. According to the Vita Edw., the King went one way to meet the retreating Scots, Lancaster another (as cited).
864 fell eftir sic debat. In 1321 Lancaster and his supporters took up arms against the King and his advisers, the Despensers, on account of misgovernment. Each party blamed the other for the misfortunes of the Scottish war. In March of the following year the Lancastrians were defeated at Boroughbridge by Sir Andrew de Harclay, himself afterwards executed for alleged treasonable dealings with the Scots. Lancaster was captured, and beheaded at Pomfret (cf. line 868).
869 on the hill besyde the toune. “On a certain little hill” (monticulo) beside Pomfret (Lanerc., p. 244).
871 syne drawin and hangit. Though this was in the sentence, it was, by special favour of the King, not carried out. Lancaster, being a relative, was simply beheaded. In any case the drawing and hanging would have come before the beheading. See on IV. 322.
872 a fair menyhe. Many others suffered capital punishment for their share in this rising. The Lanercost writer gives one baron and three knights as having been drawn and hanged in Pomfret at this time, with further details of other victims (p. 245). Cf. also Baker, pp. 65, 66. The names of five hanged on the same day at Pomfret are given in Annal. Paul., p. 303.
874 martir was, Wes sanctit and myraclis did. Lancaster was popularly regarded as a saint, a martyr for righteous government; he having been also a liberal man to the Church and the poor. There were, of course, doubters of his sanctity (Vita Edw. Sec.: contin., p. 290). A chapel was erected on the hill on which he was beheaded; crowds of pilgrims flocked to it, and miracles were said to be worked by God through him (Lanerc., pp. 244-5; Fœdera, iv., p. 421). There was a special service for him—an “Office of St. Thomas of Lancaster,” printed in Wright’s Political Songs (pp. 268-272). Edward III., whose accession was the triumph of the opposition to his father, requested the Pope to give Thomas regular canonization (Fœdera, iv., p. 421). Capgrave says he was canonized in 1389, when all concerned in his execution were dead (p. 253).
889 thai tuk westward the way. The Scots in England retired about September 14, going westwards (versus occidentem tendentes) by Airedale and Wharfdale, and so home by “Gratsehals” (Gesta Edw. Carn., p. 58). When they heard the siege was raised they returned to Scotland by Staynmore and Gillesland and “those western parts” (Lanerc. p. 240). Cf. also Illustrations, p. 7.
891 With prayis, and with presoneris. “With prisoners and plunder of cattle” (Lanerc., p. 240). Also Gesta Edw., p. 58; Vita Edw., p. 244. Prayis is a plural signifying different kinds of “prey.”
922-3 brynt had The brig. Cf. on 757.
940 Berwyk his toune. As the reading from E shows, this is a possessive of a type usually confined to proper names. Cf. III. 232; VI. 435, etc.; and Grammar.
946 Till help his brothir. Wrong by a year. The siege of Berwick was in September, 1319; Edward Bruce was killed in the previous year. The succours here sent were dispatched in September or October, 1318. See on Bk. XVIII. 3, 110.