Portal:Scotland/Selected article/Week 37, 2012

Government in Medieval Scotland, includes all forms of politics and administration of the minor kingdoms that emerged after the departure of the Romans from Britain in the fifth century, through the development and growth of the combined Scottish and Pictish kingdom of Alba into the kingdom of Scotland, until the adoption of the reforms of the Renaissance in the fifteenth century. 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. The primary function of these kings was as war leaders, but there were also ritual elements to kingship, evident in ceremonies of coronation.

The unification of the Scots and Picts from the tenth century that produced the kingdom of Alba retained some of these ritual aspects in the coronation at Scone. While the Scottish monarchy remained a largely itinerant institution, Scone remained one of its most important locations, with royal castles at Stirling and Perth becoming significant in the later Middle Ages before Edinburgh developed as a capital in the second half of the fifteenth century. The Scottish crown grew in prestige throughout the era and adopted the conventional offices of western European courts and later elements of their ritual and grandeur. 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.