Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume XIV.djvu/730

 704 SCOTLAND trated to the frith of Tay, and in 84 defeated the Caledonians under Galgacus, while his fleet explored the coasts, and first made certain that Britain was an island. He was unable to com- plete the conquest of the country, and finally withdrew his forces behind a wall and chain of forts with which he had connected the friths of Forth and Clyde. Several other at- tempts were made by the Romans to subdue the north of the island, the most memorable of which was that of the emperor Septimius Severus, who in 209 led an expedition as far as Moray frith, where he made a peace with the Caledonians. But on his withdrawal to the south they rose in insurrection, and a sec- ond expedition was preparing to march for their subjugation when the emperor died at York (Eboracum) in 211. During his resi- dence in Britain Severus reconstructed a wall originally built by Hadrian between the Tyne and the Solway; and shortly before the final abandonment of Britain by the Romans in the early part of the 5th century, they repaired this rampart and that between the friths of Clyde and Forth. From this period for several centuries the predominant race of Scotland is known in history as Picts. (See Piers.) Be- tween the two walls in the province of Va- lentia (Northumberland, Dumfriesshire, &c.) dwelt five tribes who had become practically Romanized and civilized, and after the with- drawal of the Romans formed a union and established a kingdom which was called Reg- num Cumbreiwe, and is also known as the kingdom of Strathclyde. Of this kingdom at the beginning of the 6th century the famous Arthur Pendragon was the sovereign. In this half fabulous period of Scottish history 38 Pic- tish kings are enumerated, from Drest, who succeeded to the throne in 451, to Brud, who died in 843. The most important event of this period was the arrival in Scotland of the Saxons in 449, and their eventual conquest and settlement of the lowlands, where one of their leaders, Edwin, founded the present cap- ital, Edinburgh (Edwinsburgh). About 503 Scotland was also invaded by the Scots, a Celtic tribe from Ireland, who settled on the W. coast and established a kingdom beginning with the reign of Fergus, one of their chiefs, and continuing under a series of kings, of whom little is known till the accession of Kenneth Macalpin in 836, under whom the Scoto-Irish or Scotch became the dominant race in the country, which now began to be called Scot- land. During the reign of Kenneth the Picts disappeared as a people, being according to some authors massacred by the orders of Ken- neth, but according to a more probable theory amalgamated with and absorbed by the Scots. The most important event of the Pictish period was the conversion of the natives to Chris- tianity in the 6th century by St. Columba and other missionaries from Ireland. In 866, un- der the reign of Constantino I., the second of the successors of Kenneth, the Danes, led by the vikings, began to invade Scotland. Their incursions for plunder and conquest continued with little intermission, in spite of frequent repulses, till 1014, when, after a series of de- feats by King Malcolm II., they gave up the contest. Meantime the Scottish kingdom was gradually enlarged by the peaceful annexation of Cumberland about 950, by the conquest of Strathclyde about 970, and of Lothian from England in 1018. This last acquisition was owing to the valor and energy of Malcolm II., who after a vigorous reign was succeeded in 1033 by his grandson, the " gracious Duncan " of Shakespeare, who six years later was killed by Macbeth at Bothgowanan, near Elgin. Mac- beth himself was defeated and slain in 1056 or 1057, after a vigorous reign, and was succeed- ed by Malcolm III. in 1057. During his reign England was conquered by the Normans, and Malcolm, who had married the Saxon princess Margaret, sister of Edgar Atheling, the heir of the Saxon line, invaded and ravaged the north of England. In retaliation William the Con- queror invaded Scotland in 1072 with so pow- erful a force that Malcolm submitted without a struggle, and performed homage to William as his feudal superior for, as the English sub- sequently alleged, his whole kingdom, though the Scotch maintained that the homage was rendered only for the 12 manors which Mal- colm held in England. The question was long a source of dissension between the two king- doms, and led to a war between Malcolm and William Rufus, in which, in 1093, the Scottish king was slain in a battle near Alnwick castle. Of his successors the most conspicuous were Alexander I., David I., Malcolm IV., William the Lion, Alexander II., and Alexander III., in whose reign, terminating in 1286, Scotland made rapid progress in power and civilization. The reign of William the Lion, which lasted 48 years, from 1165 to 1214, was memorable for his capture by Henry II. of England, and his disgraceful treaty with that monarch in 1174, by which he regained his liberty and surrendered the independence of Scotland, agreeing to become the vassal of Henry and to receive English garrisons in Edinburgh, Stirling, and other important places. This state of dependence continued till the death of Henry in 1189, when his successor, Richard Cceur de Lion, anxious to obtain money for his crusade to the Holy Land, agreed for the sum of 10,000 marks to renounce all claim on the part of the English crown to supremacy over Scot- land. William the Lion was succeeded by his son Alexander II., one of the wisest and most vigorous of the Scottish monarchs, whose son Alexander III., dying in 1286, left the crown to an infant granddaughter, Margaret, daugh- ter of Eric, king of Norway. On her voyage from Norway to take possession of the throne, Margaret died in one of the Orkneys. Various competitors for the crown appeared, the prin- cipal of whom were John Balliol and Robert Bruce. Edward I. of England offered or was