Talk:Wars of Scottish Independence

Expansion request
1307-1314 appears to be missing, including Bannockburn. I suspect this has been accidentally deleted during editing and can be restored from an earlier version. Hyperman 42 19:11, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I came looking for that information, also. All we get is a (not very encyclopediac) retelling of the spider story followed by "Bruce later came out of hiding in 1307. The Scots thronged to him, and he defeated the English in a number of battles. His forces continued to grow in strength, encouraged in part by the death of Edward I in July 1307.The Battle of Bannockburn in 1314 was an especially important Scottish victory." First War of Scottish Independence has even less. Hardly does justice to an important part of Scottish/English history, or the impressive guerilla tactics of Robert I. Gwinva 09:59, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

This is quite possibly the worst Wikipedia article on any historical subject that I have ever read. It needs to be fleshed out in some cases, condensed in others and fact checked throughout. Frankly, the whole thing should be deleted and a new article put together by a knowledgable person or persons with some writing skills. Anyone seeking information on this subject should go elsewhere until that is accomplished.

Recent Edit
"The Wars of Scottish Independence were a series of military campaigns fought between the independent Kingdom of Scotland and the Kingdom of England in the late 13th and early 14th centuries."

I've removed the independent from this statement. There's no reason for it to go before the Kingdom of Scotland in this particular context. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 195.194.215.249 (talk) 08:28, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

Wars of Independence or Scottish Imperialism?
I always believed the story of the good Scots fighting the nasty English. But after 50 years I'm no longer so sure. The original kingdom of the Scots, from Ireland, was gaelic and based in the highland north west. The lowlands were (mainly)the Anglo-saxon kingdom of Bernicia, later part of England. When the expansionist Scottish kings acquired the lowlands, they acquired in effect an English Empire - or an empire in England. It was a pyrrhic victory since the demographic consequence was that 'Scotland' then ceased to be a country of the Scots, and became rather the country of the northern English, albeit with a gaelic fringe. With that in mind these 'wars of independence' look very different from the traditional story - instead they look more like an imperial power seeking to protect earlier conquests; or perhaps more like a civil war between Britain's two Anglo-saxon kingdoms. Once it is put under the microscope little in 'traditional' Scottish history ever turns out to be quite what one has always been told it is. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.5.5.22 (talk) 12:54, 16 July 2012 (UTC)


 * It is true that Scottish history has a lot of grey areas, but that is true of all history. Everybody wants their own side to be the good guys. However we should not confuse folklore with history. Folklore always favours the home team, with good heroes and evil villains; but history must strive to remain objectively neutral. Sometimes the grey areas simply have to remain grey. That said, your thesis here seems to have a lot of POV spin, and rewriting the history because you don't like the folklore is always a fools errand. Mediatech492 (talk) 16:18, 16 July 2012 (UTC)

I agree with you 100%. I'd just emphasise what you've written - that history must strive to remain objective - and that rewriting history because you don't like the folklore is indeed a fools errand. What I've been discovering recently however is just how much supposed Scottish 'history' seems to have been rewritten to incorporate POV, spin and folklore in favour unwelcome facts. There's a worrying ammount of it; far more than I would have expected to find. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.5.7.26 (talk) 18:01, 17 July 2012 (UTC)

I agree. The more I read about what actually was going on the more I think that "wars of independence" is badly misleading. The traditional story of this being 'Scotland' versus 'England' is convenient for the tourist trade, those who believe in modern independence, nationalistic folk, and so on - but seems just to be inaccurate. Our understanding of the real history is all the poorer for this, and I'd like to think that Wikipedia is one place where we might work on something better. Better doesn't mean more balanced in favour of England by the way... Rowmn (talk) 13:20, 8 February 2013 (UTC)

Here's an interesting quote. It's not the only source to make the same point.

“In the popular estimate of that struggle two important facts are entirely overlooked (i) that it was primarily a conflict of the last remnant of the English Teutonic settlement with the encroaching Norman power, and (2) that this ‘national Scottish’ resistance, or (to describe the situation in its most paradoxical form) the resistance of the English of Scotland to the Anglo-French of England, was hampered by the active enmity of the Northern and Western ‘Scots’. When modern Scotland emerged from these troubles, not uninfluenced by certain elements of Anglo-French civilisation which she had defied in open war, the division between her and her Celtic neighbours was absolute.” From Specimens of Middle Scots by G Gregory Smith 1902 Introduction p xv Cassandra Cassandrathesceptic (talk) 16:33, 2 December 2014 (UTC)


 * A specific point in this thread in regard to an improvement to the article, the purpose of a talk page, is not evident. If this is, as it would appear, a typical forum posting, you are very well aware you must not. Mutt Lunker (talk) 18:12, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

The real problem with the article is the naive assumption that these conflicts were simple national wars of independence or liberation; i.e. Scotland vs England. They can be better explained in the context of the Norman Conquest of Britain, and in the subsequent Norman civil war 'The Anarchy' which broke out between Stephen and Matilda. Examined from this perspective these wars look more like a continuation of the Norman-French civil war, or commonplace Norman-French power struggles, than wars of national independence in the way we would understand the term today. Cassandra — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.42.236.77 (talk) 14:56, 19 February 2017 (UTC)

Role of the Bishops
Interestingly Scottish historian Neil Oliver in a recent BBC TV programme identifies the prime drivers for independence not Scotland's Anglo-Norman aristocrats, still less 'the people', but rather Scotland's clerics.

Oliver suggests that it was Scotland's bishops, who did not wish to come under the supervision of the Archbishop of York, who actively prompted, promoted and preached armed 'rebellion'.

I must leave it to others to research Oliver's observations further. Cassandra. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.7.102.197 (talk) 13:22, 27 August 2019 (UTC)

Scottish wars of independence
What war is it we’re the baby died at the start In the documentary that i watched thanks xx❤️ 213.107.48.3 (talk) 09:25, 6 January 2022 (UTC)