Saint Olaf

‘The conscript fathers of Jarlshof, having settled their own matters, took next under their consideration the case of Swertha, the banished matron who had been expelled from the castle, whom, as an experienced and useful ally, they were highly desirous to restore to her office of housekeeper, should that be found possible. But as their wisdom here failed them, Swertha, in despair, had recourse to the good offices of Mordaunt Mertoun, with whom she had acquired some favour by her knowledge in old Norwegian ballads, and dismal tales concerning the Trows, or Drows (the dwarfs of the Scalds), with whom superstitious eld had peopled many a lonely cavern and brown dale in Dunrossness, as in every other district of Zetland. 'Swertha,' said the youth, 'I can do but little for you, but you may do something for yourself. My father's passion resembles the fury of those ancient champions — those Berserkars, you sing songs about.'

'Ay — ay, fish of my heart,' replied the old woman, with a pathetic whine; 'the Berserkars were champions who lived before the blessed days of St. Olave, and who used to run like madmen on swords, and spears, and harpoons, and muskets, and snap them all into pieces, as a finner* would go through a herring-net, and then, when the fury went off, they were as weak and unstable as water.'…’

Walter Scott managed to bring a saint into a book on piracy.  Saint Olaf was King of Norway from 1015 to 1030.  His influence on Orkney and the Faroes, where ”The Pirate” was set  is remembered still.  Olaf's historical range is wide, from the Baltic countries to England and Normandy (at least).  Samuel Pepys, a frequent source for this blog, is buried at Saint Olave's Chuch Hart Street, in London. King Olaf II Haroldsson’s beatification took place on August 3^rd, 1031, about a year after his death at the Battle of Stiklestad.

Accident at Roxburgh Castle

A freak accident took the life of Scottish King James II, on August 3, 1460.  Sir Walter Scott has the story in “The History of Scotland”.

‘..The truce with England was prolonged for nine years. James, however, seems to have deemed the period favourable for recovering such Scottish possessions as were still held by the English; accordingly we find him breaking through the truce.

It was with this view that the king collected a numerous army, and laid siege to Roxburgh, 'which had now been in possession of the English since the captivity of David II., and, as a military post, was of the greatest importance, being very strongly situated between the Tweed and Teviot, and not far from their confluence, in the most fertile part of the Scottish frontier. John the Lord of the Isles appeared in the royal camp, to atone for former errors and treasonable actions by zeal on the present occasion. He led a select body of Highlanders and islesmen armed with shirts of mail, two-handed swords, bows, and battle-axes, with which he offered to take the vanguard of the army should it be necessary to enter England, and to march a mile before the main body, so as to encounter the first brunt of the onset. Invasion, however, made no part of James's purpose on this occasion. He was desirous to recover possession of Roxburgh, and not being apprehensive of relief from England, resolved to proceed in the siege according to formal rule. He beleaguered the castle on every side, and battered it from the north of the Tweed; his cannon bring placed in the Duke of Roxburgh's park of Fleurs. James was proud of his train of cannon, and of the skill of a French engineer, who could level them so truly as to hit within a fathom of the place he aimed at, which, in those days, was held extraordinary practice. The siege had not continued many days when the arrival of the Earl of Huntley, to whose valour and fidelity the king had been so much indebted, with a gallant body of forces from the north, increased the king's hopes of succeeding in his enterprise. He received his noble and faithful adherent with the greatest marks of respect and regard, and conducted him to see his batteries.

Unhappily, standing in the vicinity of a gun which was about to be discharged, the rude mass, composed of ribs of iron, bound together by hoops of the same metal, burst asunder, and a fragment striking the king on the thigh, broke it asunder, and killed him on the spot. The Earl of Angus was severely wounded on the same occasion.

Thus fell James the second of Scotland, in the twenty-ninth year of his age, and the twenty-fourth of his reign. His person was strong and well put together, and he was reckoned excellent at all exercises…’

Wallace Betrayed

'There is something singularly doubtful about the mode in which Wallace was taken. That he was betrayed to the English is indubitable ; and popular fame charges Sir John Menteith with the indelible infamy. " Accursed," says Arnold Blair, " be the day of nativity of John de Menteith, and may " his name be struck out of the book of life." But John de Menteith was all along a zealous favourer of the English interest, and was governor of Dumbarton Castle by commission from Edward the First; and therefore, as the accurate Lord Hailes has observed, could not be the friend and confidant of Wallace, as tradition states him to be. The truth seems to be, that Menteith thoroughly engaged in the English interest, pursued Wallace closely, and made him prisoner through the treachery of an attendant, whom Peter Langtoft calls Jack Short.


" WilliamWaleis is noinen that master was of theves,
Tiding to the King is comen that robbery mischeivs,
Sir John of Menetest sued William so nigh,
He tok him when he ween'd least, on night, his leman him by,
That was through treason of Jack Short his man,
He was the encheson that Sir John so him ran,
Jack's brother had he slain, the Walleis that is said,
The more Jack was fain to do William that braid."


From this it would appear that the infamy of seizing Wallace, must rest between a degenerate Scottish nobleman, the vassal of England, and a domestic, the obscure agent of his treachery ; between Sir John Menteith, son of Walter, Earl of Menteith, and the traitor Jack Short.'
 
History has ascribed guilt to John de Menteith for betraying William Wallace to the English.  This deed occurred on August 3, 1305.  Menteith was Scottish, but loyal to King Edward I, who'd appointed him Governor of Dunbarton Castle.  Walter Scott includes one Jack Short as a facilitator, based on the chronicle of Peter Langtoft, who was a canon of the Augustinian Priory in Bridlington.  The text above is included in the notes to Canto Second of "The Lord of the Isles", published in "The Poetical Works of Sir Walter Scott".