Gavin Douglas
Encyclopedia
Gavin Douglas was a Scottish
bishop, makar
and translator. Although he had an important political career, it is for his poetry that he is now chiefly remembered. His principal pioneering achievement was the Eneados
, a full and faithful vernacular translation of the Aeneid
of Virgil and the first successful example of its kind in the British Isles. Other extant poetry includes his Palice of Honour and possibly King Hart.
Douglas was educated at St Salvator's College, St Andrews
and was a friend and correspondent of many of the internationally renowned men of his age, including Polydore Vergil
, John Major
, Cardinal Wolsey and Henry, 3rd Lord Sinclair
. Because of his powerful family connections and role in high public life, he is the best-documented of the early Scottish makars. Indeed, of poets in the British Isles before him, only the biography of Chaucer is as well documented or understood. All his literary work was composed before his fortieth year while he was provost of St Giles
in Edinburgh.
After the Battle of Flodden, Douglas became heavily involved in affairs of state, seeking a dominant role as one of the Lords of Council and bidding to attain one or more of the many see
s, including the archbishopric of St Andrews
, left vacant in the destructive aftermath of the Scottish defeat. He finally attained to the bishopric of Dunkeld
in 1516, although only after a bitter struggle.
In 1517, in his more settled public position, Douglas was one of the leading members of the embassy to Francis I
which negotiated the Treaty of Rouen
, but his role in the volatile politics of the period, mainly centring around control over the minority
of James V
, was deeply contentious. By late 1517 he had managed to earn the enduring hostility of the Queen Mother
, a former ally, and in subsequent years became manifestly involved in political manoeuvring against the Regent Albany. At the same time he remained ambitious for the St Andrews archbishopric which fell vacant once again in 1521. His career was cut short when he died suddenly during a brief period in exile in London
.
Douglas's literary work was composed in a highly polished Middle Scots
, often aureate in style. After the Eneados he is not known to have produced any further poetry, despite being at the height of his artistic powers when it was completed in 1513
six weeks before the Battle of Flodden.
, East Lothian
, the third son of Archibald, 5th Earl of Angus
.
He was a student at St Andrews
, 1489–1494, and thereafter, it is supposed, at Paris. In 1496 he obtained the living of Monymusk
, Aberdeenshire
, and later he became parson of Lynton (mod. East Linton
) and rector of Hauch (mod. Prestonkirk
), in East Lothian
; and about 1501 was preferred to the deanery or provostship
of the collegiate church
of St Giles, Edinburgh
, which he held with his parochial charges. From this date until the Battle of Flodden, in September 1513, he appears to have been occupied with his ecclesiastical duties and literary work. Indeed all the extant writings by which he has earned his place as a poet and translator belong to this period. After the disaster at Flodden he was completely absorbed in public business.
. No more than four of works by him are known to exist; The Palice of Honour, Conscience, his major translation the Eneados, and possibly King Hart.
No manuscript of the poem is extant. The earliest surviving edition (c. 1553) was printed at London by William Copland (d. 1569); an Edinburgh edition, from the press of Henry Charteris (d. 1599), followed in 1579. From certain indications in the latter and the evidence of some odd leaves discovered by David Laing
, it has been concluded that there was an earlier Edinburgh edition, which has been ascribed to Thomas Davidson
, printer, and dated c. 1540.
translation of Virgil
's Aeneid
, completed in 1513
, and the first full translation of a major poem from classical antiquity
into any modern Germanic language. His translation, which is faithful throughout, includes the thirteenth book by Mapheus Vegius
. Each of the thirteen books in addition is introduced by an original verse prologue. These deal with a variety of subjects, sometimes semi-autobiographical, in a variety of styles.
Conscience is a short four-stanza poem. Its subject is the "conceit" that men first clipped away the "con" from "conscience" to leave "science" and "na mair"; then they lost "sci" and had nothing but "ens": that schrew, Riches and geir.
King Hart is a poem of doubtful accreditation. Like The Palice of Honor, it is a later allegory and, as such, of high literary merit. Its subject is human life told in the allegory of King Hart (Heart) in his castle, surrounded by his five servitors (the senses), Queen, Plesance, Foresight and other courtiers. The poem runs to over 900 lines and is written in eight-lined stanzas. The text is preserved in the Maitland folio manuscript in the Pepysian library, Cambridge. It is not known to have been printed before 1786, when it appeared in Pinkerton's
Ancient Scottish Poems.
of the capital. The latter dying soon afterwards (January 1514) in Wigtownshire
, where he had gone as justiciar
, and his son having been killed at Flodden, the succession fell to Gavin's nephew Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of Angus
.
The marriage of this youth to James IV
's widow on 6 August 1514 did much to identify the Douglases with the English party in Scotland, as against the French party led by the Duke of Albany, and incidentally to determine the political career of his uncle Gavin. During the first weeks of the queen's sorrow after the battle, Gavin, with one or two colleagues of the council, acted as personal adviser, and it may be taken for granted that he supported the pretensions of the young earl. His own hopes of preferment had been strengthened by the death of many of the higher clergy at Flodden.
The first outcome of the new connection was his appointment to the Abbacy of Aberbrothwick
by the queen regent, before her marriage, probably in June 1514. Soon after the marriage (of Gavin's nephew) she nominated him Archbishop of St Andrews
, in succession to William Elphinstone
, archbishop-designate. But John Hepburn, prior of St Andrews, having obtained the vote of the chapter, expelled him, and was himself in turn expelled by Andrew Forman
, Bishop of Moray
, who had been nominated by the pope. In the interval, Douglas's rights in Aberbrothwick had been transferred to James Beaton
, Archbishop of Glasgow
, and he was now without title or temporality. The breach between the Queen's party and Albany's had widened, and the queen's advisers had begun an intrigue with England, to the end that the royal widow and her young son should be removed to Henry
's court. In those deliberations Gavin Douglas took an active part, and for this reason stimulated the opposition which successfully thwarted his preferment.
, Bishop of Dunkeld
, Douglas's hopes revived. The queen nominated him to the now vacant seat, which he ultimately obtained, though not without trouble. For John Stewart, 2nd Earl of Atholl
had forced his brother, Andrew Stewart
, prebendary of Craig, upon the chapter, and had put him in possession of the bishop's palace. The queen appealed to the pope and was seconded by her brother of England, with the result that the pope's sanction was obtained on 18 February 1515. Some of the correspondence of Douglas and his friends incident to this transaction was intercepted. When Albany came from France and assumed the regency, these documents and the "purchase" of the bishopric from Rome contrary to statute were made the basis of an attack on Douglas, who was imprisoned in Edinburgh Castle
, thereafter in St Andrews Castle
(under the charge of his old opponent, Prior Hepburn), and later in Dunbar Castle
, and again in Edinburgh. The pope's intervention procured his release, after nearly a year's imprisonment. The queen meanwhile had retired to England. After July 1516 Douglas appears to have been in possession of his see, and to have patched up a diplomatic peace with Albany.
On 17 May 1517 the Bishop of Dunkeld proceeded with Albany to France
to conduct the negotiations which ended in the Treaty of Rouen
. He was back in Scotland towards the end of June. Albany's longer absence in France permitted the partyfaction of the nobles to come to a head in a plot by James Hamilton, 1st Earl of Arran
to seize the Earl of Angus, the Queen's husband. The issue of this plot was the well-known fight of Cleanse the Causeway
, in which Gavin Douglas's part stands out in picturesque relief. The triumph over the Hamiltons had an unsettling effect upon the Earl of Angus. He made free of the queen's rents and abducted Lord Traquair's daughter. The Queen set about to obtain a divorce, and used her influence for the return of Albany as a means of undoing her husband's power. Albany's arrival in November 1521, with a large body of French men-at-arms, compelled Angus, with the bishop and others, to flee to the Borders
. From this retreat Gavin Douglas was sent by the earl to the English court, to ask for aid against the French party and against the queen, who was reported to be the mistress of the regent. Meanwhile he was deprived of his bishopric, and forced, for safety, to remain in England, where he effected nothing in the interests of his nephew. The declaration of war by England against Scotland, in answer to the recent Franco-Scottish negotiations, prevented his return. His case was further complicated by the libellous animosity of James Beaton
, Archbishop of Glasgow
(whose life he had saved in the "Cleanse the Causeway" incident), who was anxious to put himself forward and thwart Douglas in the election to the archbishopric of St Andrews, left vacant by the death of Forman.
which raged in London, and died at the house of his friend Lord Dacre
. During the closing years of exile he was on intimate terms with the historian Polydore Virgil, and one of his last acts was to arrange to give Polydore a corrected version of Major
's account of Scottish affairs. Douglas was buried in the church of the Savoy
, where a monumental brass (removed from its proper site after the fire in 1864) still records his death and interment.
For Douglas's career see, in addition to the public records and general histories, John Sage
's Life in Thomas Ruddiman
's edition, and that by John Small
in the first volume of his edition The Poetical Works of Gavin Douglas (1874).
bishop, makar
and translator. Although he had an important political career, it is for his poetry that he is now chiefly remembered. His principal pioneering achievement was the Eneados
, a full and faithful vernacular translation of the Aeneid
of Virgil and the first successful example of its kind in the British Isles. Other extant poetry includes his Palice of Honour and possibly King Hart.
Douglas was educated at St Salvator's College, St Andrews
and was a friend and correspondent of many of the internationally renowned men of his age, including Polydore Vergil
, John Major
, Cardinal Wolsey and Henry, 3rd Lord Sinclair
. Because of his powerful family connections and role in high public life, he is the best-documented of the early Scottish makars. Indeed, of poets in the British Isles before him, only the biography of Chaucer is as well documented or understood. All his literary work was composed before his fortieth year while he was provost of St Giles
in Edinburgh.
After the Battle of Flodden, Douglas became heavily involved in affairs of state, seeking a dominant role as one of the Lords of Council and bidding to attain one or more of the many see
s, including the archbishopric of St Andrews
, left vacant in the destructive aftermath of the Scottish defeat. He finally attained to the bishopric of Dunkeld
in 1516, although only after a bitter struggle.
In 1517, in his more settled public position, Douglas was one of the leading members of the embassy to Francis I
which negotiated the Treaty of Rouen
, but his role in the volatile politics of the period, mainly centring around control over the minority
of James V
, was deeply contentious. By late 1517 he had managed to earn the enduring hostility of the Queen Mother
, a former ally, and in subsequent years became manifestly involved in political manoeuvring against the Regent Albany. At the same time he remained ambitious for the St Andrews archbishopric which fell vacant once again in 1521. His career was cut short when he died suddenly during a brief period in exile in London
.
Douglas's literary work was composed in a highly polished Middle Scots
, often aureate in style. After the Eneados he is not known to have produced any further poetry, despite being at the height of his artistic powers when it was completed in 1513
six weeks before the Battle of Flodden.
, East Lothian
, the third son of Archibald, 5th Earl of Angus
.
He was a student at St Andrews
, 1489–1494, and thereafter, it is supposed, at Paris. In 1496 he obtained the living of Monymusk
, Aberdeenshire
, and later he became parson of Lynton (mod. East Linton
) and rector of Hauch (mod. Prestonkirk
), in East Lothian
; and about 1501 was preferred to the deanery or provostship
of the collegiate church
of St Giles, Edinburgh
, which he held with his parochial charges. From this date until the Battle of Flodden, in September 1513, he appears to have been occupied with his ecclesiastical duties and literary work. Indeed all the extant writings by which he has earned his place as a poet and translator belong to this period. After the disaster at Flodden he was completely absorbed in public business.
. No more than four of works by him are known to exist; The Palice of Honour, Conscience, his major translation the Eneados, and possibly King Hart.
No manuscript of the poem is extant. The earliest surviving edition (c. 1553) was printed at London by William Copland (d. 1569); an Edinburgh edition, from the press of Henry Charteris (d. 1599), followed in 1579. From certain indications in the latter and the evidence of some odd leaves discovered by David Laing
, it has been concluded that there was an earlier Edinburgh edition, which has been ascribed to Thomas Davidson
, printer, and dated c. 1540.
translation of Virgil
's Aeneid
, completed in 1513
, and the first full translation of a major poem from classical antiquity
into any modern Germanic language. His translation, which is faithful throughout, includes the thirteenth book by Mapheus Vegius
. Each of the thirteen books in addition is introduced by an original verse prologue. These deal with a variety of subjects, sometimes semi-autobiographical, in a variety of styles.
Conscience is a short four-stanza poem. Its subject is the "conceit" that men first clipped away the "con" from "conscience" to leave "science" and "na mair"; then they lost "sci" and had nothing but "ens": that schrew, Riches and geir.
King Hart is a poem of doubtful accreditation. Like The Palice of Honor, it is a later allegory and, as such, of high literary merit. Its subject is human life told in the allegory of King Hart (Heart) in his castle, surrounded by his five servitors (the senses), Queen, Plesance, Foresight and other courtiers. The poem runs to over 900 lines and is written in eight-lined stanzas. The text is preserved in the Maitland folio manuscript in the Pepysian library, Cambridge. It is not known to have been printed before 1786, when it appeared in Pinkerton's
Ancient Scottish Poems.
of the capital. The latter dying soon afterwards (January 1514) in Wigtownshire
, where he had gone as justiciar
, and his son having been killed at Flodden, the succession fell to Gavin's nephew Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of Angus
.
The marriage of this youth to James IV
's widow on 6 August 1514 did much to identify the Douglases with the English party in Scotland, as against the French party led by the Duke of Albany, and incidentally to determine the political career of his uncle Gavin. During the first weeks of the queen's sorrow after the battle, Gavin, with one or two colleagues of the council, acted as personal adviser, and it may be taken for granted that he supported the pretensions of the young earl. His own hopes of preferment had been strengthened by the death of many of the higher clergy at Flodden.
The first outcome of the new connection was his appointment to the Abbacy of Aberbrothwick
by the queen regent, before her marriage, probably in June 1514. Soon after the marriage (of Gavin's nephew) she nominated him Archbishop of St Andrews
, in succession to William Elphinstone
, archbishop-designate. But John Hepburn, prior of St Andrews, having obtained the vote of the chapter, expelled him, and was himself in turn expelled by Andrew Forman
, Bishop of Moray
, who had been nominated by the pope. In the interval, Douglas's rights in Aberbrothwick had been transferred to James Beaton
, Archbishop of Glasgow
, and he was now without title or temporality. The breach between the Queen's party and Albany's had widened, and the queen's advisers had begun an intrigue with England, to the end that the royal widow and her young son should be removed to Henry
's court. In those deliberations Gavin Douglas took an active part, and for this reason stimulated the opposition which successfully thwarted his preferment.
, Bishop of Dunkeld
, Douglas's hopes revived. The queen nominated him to the now vacant seat, which he ultimately obtained, though not without trouble. For John Stewart, 2nd Earl of Atholl
had forced his brother, Andrew Stewart
, prebendary of Craig, upon the chapter, and had put him in possession of the bishop's palace. The queen appealed to the pope and was seconded by her brother of England, with the result that the pope's sanction was obtained on 18 February 1515. Some of the correspondence of Douglas and his friends incident to this transaction was intercepted. When Albany came from France and assumed the regency, these documents and the "purchase" of the bishopric from Rome contrary to statute were made the basis of an attack on Douglas, who was imprisoned in Edinburgh Castle
, thereafter in St Andrews Castle
(under the charge of his old opponent, Prior Hepburn), and later in Dunbar Castle
, and again in Edinburgh. The pope's intervention procured his release, after nearly a year's imprisonment. The queen meanwhile had retired to England. After July 1516 Douglas appears to have been in possession of his see, and to have patched up a diplomatic peace with Albany.
On 17 May 1517 the Bishop of Dunkeld proceeded with Albany to France
to conduct the negotiations which ended in the Treaty of Rouen
. He was back in Scotland towards the end of June. Albany's longer absence in France permitted the partyfaction of the nobles to come to a head in a plot by James Hamilton, 1st Earl of Arran
to seize the Earl of Angus, the Queen's husband. The issue of this plot was the well-known fight of Cleanse the Causeway
, in which Gavin Douglas's part stands out in picturesque relief. The triumph over the Hamiltons had an unsettling effect upon the Earl of Angus. He made free of the queen's rents and abducted Lord Traquair's daughter. The Queen set about to obtain a divorce, and used her influence for the return of Albany as a means of undoing her husband's power. Albany's arrival in November 1521, with a large body of French men-at-arms, compelled Angus, with the bishop and others, to flee to the Borders
. From this retreat Gavin Douglas was sent by the earl to the English court, to ask for aid against the French party and against the queen, who was reported to be the mistress of the regent. Meanwhile he was deprived of his bishopric, and forced, for safety, to remain in England, where he effected nothing in the interests of his nephew. The declaration of war by England against Scotland, in answer to the recent Franco-Scottish negotiations, prevented his return. His case was further complicated by the libellous animosity of James Beaton
, Archbishop of Glasgow
(whose life he had saved in the "Cleanse the Causeway" incident), who was anxious to put himself forward and thwart Douglas in the election to the archbishopric of St Andrews, left vacant by the death of Forman.
which raged in London, and died at the house of his friend Lord Dacre
. During the closing years of exile he was on intimate terms with the historian Polydore Virgil, and one of his last acts was to arrange to give Polydore a corrected version of Major
's account of Scottish affairs. Douglas was buried in the church of the Savoy
, where a monumental brass (removed from its proper site after the fire in 1864) still records his death and interment.
For Douglas's career see, in addition to the public records and general histories, John Sage
's Life in Thomas Ruddiman
's edition, and that by John Small
in the first volume of his edition The Poetical Works of Gavin Douglas (1874).
bishop, makar
and translator. Although he had an important political career, it is for his poetry that he is now chiefly remembered. His principal pioneering achievement was the Eneados
, a full and faithful vernacular translation of the Aeneid
of Virgil and the first successful example of its kind in the British Isles. Other extant poetry includes his Palice of Honour and possibly King Hart.
Douglas was educated at St Salvator's College, St Andrews
and was a friend and correspondent of many of the internationally renowned men of his age, including Polydore Vergil
, John Major
, Cardinal Wolsey and Henry, 3rd Lord Sinclair
. Because of his powerful family connections and role in high public life, he is the best-documented of the early Scottish makars. Indeed, of poets in the British Isles before him, only the biography of Chaucer is as well documented or understood. All his literary work was composed before his fortieth year while he was provost of St Giles
in Edinburgh.
After the Battle of Flodden, Douglas became heavily involved in affairs of state, seeking a dominant role as one of the Lords of Council and bidding to attain one or more of the many see
s, including the archbishopric of St Andrews
, left vacant in the destructive aftermath of the Scottish defeat. He finally attained to the bishopric of Dunkeld
in 1516, although only after a bitter struggle.
In 1517, in his more settled public position, Douglas was one of the leading members of the embassy to Francis I
which negotiated the Treaty of Rouen
, but his role in the volatile politics of the period, mainly centring around control over the minority
of James V
, was deeply contentious. By late 1517 he had managed to earn the enduring hostility of the Queen Mother
, a former ally, and in subsequent years became manifestly involved in political manoeuvring against the Regent Albany. At the same time he remained ambitious for the St Andrews archbishopric which fell vacant once again in 1521. His career was cut short when he died suddenly during a brief period in exile in London
.
Douglas's literary work was composed in a highly polished Middle Scots
, often aureate in style. After the Eneados he is not known to have produced any further poetry, despite being at the height of his artistic powers when it was completed in 1513
six weeks before the Battle of Flodden.
, East Lothian
, the third son of Archibald, 5th Earl of Angus
.
He was a student at St Andrews
, 1489–1494, and thereafter, it is supposed, at Paris. In 1496 he obtained the living of Monymusk
, Aberdeenshire
, and later he became parson of Lynton (mod. East Linton
) and rector of Hauch (mod. Prestonkirk
), in East Lothian
; and about 1501 was preferred to the deanery or provostship
of the collegiate church
of St Giles, Edinburgh
, which he held with his parochial charges. From this date until the Battle of Flodden, in September 1513, he appears to have been occupied with his ecclesiastical duties and literary work. Indeed all the extant writings by which he has earned his place as a poet and translator belong to this period. After the disaster at Flodden he was completely absorbed in public business.
. No more than four of works by him are known to exist; The Palice of Honour, Conscience, his major translation the Eneados, and possibly King Hart.
No manuscript of the poem is extant. The earliest surviving edition (c. 1553) was printed at London by William Copland (d. 1569); an Edinburgh edition, from the press of Henry Charteris (d. 1599), followed in 1579. From certain indications in the latter and the evidence of some odd leaves discovered by David Laing
, it has been concluded that there was an earlier Edinburgh edition, which has been ascribed to Thomas Davidson
, printer, and dated c. 1540.
translation of Virgil
's Aeneid
, completed in 1513
, and the first full translation of a major poem from classical antiquity
into any modern Germanic language. His translation, which is faithful throughout, includes the thirteenth book by Mapheus Vegius
. Each of the thirteen books in addition is introduced by an original verse prologue. These deal with a variety of subjects, sometimes semi-autobiographical, in a variety of styles.
Conscience is a short four-stanza poem. Its subject is the "conceit" that men first clipped away the "con" from "conscience" to leave "science" and "na mair"; then they lost "sci" and had nothing but "ens": that schrew, Riches and geir.
King Hart is a poem of doubtful accreditation. Like The Palice of Honor, it is a later allegory and, as such, of high literary merit. Its subject is human life told in the allegory of King Hart (Heart) in his castle, surrounded by his five servitors (the senses), Queen, Plesance, Foresight and other courtiers. The poem runs to over 900 lines and is written in eight-lined stanzas. The text is preserved in the Maitland folio manuscript in the Pepysian library, Cambridge. It is not known to have been printed before 1786, when it appeared in Pinkerton's
Ancient Scottish Poems.
of the capital. The latter dying soon afterwards (January 1514) in Wigtownshire
, where he had gone as justiciar
, and his son having been killed at Flodden, the succession fell to Gavin's nephew Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of Angus
.
The marriage of this youth to James IV
's widow on 6 August 1514 did much to identify the Douglases with the English party in Scotland, as against the French party led by the Duke of Albany, and incidentally to determine the political career of his uncle Gavin. During the first weeks of the queen's sorrow after the battle, Gavin, with one or two colleagues of the council, acted as personal adviser, and it may be taken for granted that he supported the pretensions of the young earl. His own hopes of preferment had been strengthened by the death of many of the higher clergy at Flodden.
The first outcome of the new connection was his appointment to the Abbacy of Aberbrothwick
by the queen regent, before her marriage, probably in June 1514. Soon after the marriage (of Gavin's nephew) she nominated him Archbishop of St Andrews
, in succession to William Elphinstone
, archbishop-designate. But John Hepburn, prior of St Andrews, having obtained the vote of the chapter, expelled him, and was himself in turn expelled by Andrew Forman
, Bishop of Moray
, who had been nominated by the pope. In the interval, Douglas's rights in Aberbrothwick had been transferred to James Beaton
, Archbishop of Glasgow
, and he was now without title or temporality. The breach between the Queen's party and Albany's had widened, and the queen's advisers had begun an intrigue with England, to the end that the royal widow and her young son should be removed to Henry
's court. In those deliberations Gavin Douglas took an active part, and for this reason stimulated the opposition which successfully thwarted his preferment.
, Bishop of Dunkeld
, Douglas's hopes revived. The queen nominated him to the now vacant seat, which he ultimately obtained, though not without trouble. For John Stewart, 2nd Earl of Atholl
had forced his brother, Andrew Stewart
, prebendary of Craig, upon the chapter, and had put him in possession of the bishop's palace. The queen appealed to the pope and was seconded by her brother of England, with the result that the pope's sanction was obtained on 18 February 1515. Some of the correspondence of Douglas and his friends incident to this transaction was intercepted. When Albany came from France and assumed the regency, these documents and the "purchase" of the bishopric from Rome contrary to statute were made the basis of an attack on Douglas, who was imprisoned in Edinburgh Castle
, thereafter in St Andrews Castle
(under the charge of his old opponent, Prior Hepburn), and later in Dunbar Castle
, and again in Edinburgh. The pope's intervention procured his release, after nearly a year's imprisonment. The queen meanwhile had retired to England. After July 1516 Douglas appears to have been in possession of his see, and to have patched up a diplomatic peace with Albany.
On 17 May 1517 the Bishop of Dunkeld proceeded with Albany to France
to conduct the negotiations which ended in the Treaty of Rouen
. He was back in Scotland towards the end of June. Albany's longer absence in France permitted the partyfaction of the nobles to come to a head in a plot by James Hamilton, 1st Earl of Arran
to seize the Earl of Angus, the Queen's husband. The issue of this plot was the well-known fight of Cleanse the Causeway
, in which Gavin Douglas's part stands out in picturesque relief. The triumph over the Hamiltons had an unsettling effect upon the Earl of Angus. He made free of the queen's rents and abducted Lord Traquair's daughter. The Queen set about to obtain a divorce, and used her influence for the return of Albany as a means of undoing her husband's power. Albany's arrival in November 1521, with a large body of French men-at-arms, compelled Angus, with the bishop and others, to flee to the Borders
. From this retreat Gavin Douglas was sent by the earl to the English court, to ask for aid against the French party and against the queen, who was reported to be the mistress of the regent. Meanwhile he was deprived of his bishopric, and forced, for safety, to remain in England, where he effected nothing in the interests of his nephew. The declaration of war by England against Scotland, in answer to the recent Franco-Scottish negotiations, prevented his return. His case was further complicated by the libellous animosity of James Beaton
, Archbishop of Glasgow
(whose life he had saved in the "Cleanse the Causeway" incident), who was anxious to put himself forward and thwart Douglas in the election to the archbishopric of St Andrews, left vacant by the death of Forman.
which raged in London, and died at the house of his friend Lord Dacre
. During the closing years of exile he was on intimate terms with the historian Polydore Virgil, and one of his last acts was to arrange to give Polydore a corrected version of Major
's account of Scottish affairs. Douglas was buried in the church of the Savoy
, where a monumental brass (removed from its proper site after the fire in 1864) still records his death and interment.
For Douglas's career see, in addition to the public records and general histories, John Sage
's Life in Thomas Ruddiman
's edition, and that by John Small
in the first volume of his edition The Poetical Works of Gavin Douglas (1874).
Kingdom of Scotland
The Kingdom of Scotland was a Sovereign state in North-West Europe that existed from 843 until 1707. It occupied the northern third of the island of Great Britain and shared a land border to the south with the Kingdom of England...
bishop, makar
Makar
A makar is a term from Scottish literature for a poet or bard, often thought of as royal court poet, although the term can be more generally applied. The word functions in a manner similar to the Greek term which means both maker and poet...
and translator. Although he had an important political career, it is for his poetry that he is now chiefly remembered. His principal pioneering achievement was the Eneados
Eneados
The Eneados is a Middle Scots translation of Virgil's Aeneid, completed by Gavin Douglas in 1513. It is the first complete translation of any major work of classical antiquity into an Anglic language...
, a full and faithful vernacular translation of the Aeneid
Aeneid
The Aeneid is a Latin epic poem, written by Virgil between 29 and 19 BC, that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Trojan who travelled to Italy, where he became the ancestor of the Romans. It is composed of roughly 10,000 lines in dactylic hexameter...
of Virgil and the first successful example of its kind in the British Isles. Other extant poetry includes his Palice of Honour and possibly King Hart.
Douglas was educated at St Salvator's College, St Andrews
St Salvator's College, St Andrews
St Salvator's College of the University of St Andrews was founded in 1450 by Bishop James Kennedy on North Street, St Andrews. Several of these original medieval buildings survive, including the college chapel, tower, tenement building and the Hebdomodar's building...
and was a friend and correspondent of many of the internationally renowned men of his age, including Polydore Vergil
Polydore Vergil
Polydore Vergil was an Italian historian, otherwise known as PV Castellensis. He is better known as the contemporary historian during the early Tudor dynasty. He was hired by King Henry VIII of England, who wanted to distance himself from his father Henry VII as much as possible, to document...
, John Major
John Mair
John Mair was a Scottish philosopher, much admired in his day and an acknowledged influence on all the great thinkers of the time. He was a very renowned teacher and his works much collected and frequently republished across Europe...
, Cardinal Wolsey and Henry, 3rd Lord Sinclair
Lord Sinclair
Lord Sinclair is a title in the Peerage of Scotland. It was created in 1449 for William Sinclair, 3rd Earl of Orkney. In 1470, Lord Orkney surrendered the earldom in return for the earldom of Caithness. In 1477, Lord Caithness wished to disinherit his eldest son from his first marriage to Lady...
. Because of his powerful family connections and role in high public life, he is the best-documented of the early Scottish makars. Indeed, of poets in the British Isles before him, only the biography of Chaucer is as well documented or understood. All his literary work was composed before his fortieth year while he was provost of St Giles
St. Giles' Cathedral
St Giles' Cathedral, more properly termed the High Kirk of Edinburgh, is the principal place of worship of the Church of Scotland in Edinburgh. Its distinctive crown steeple is a prominent feature of the city skyline, at about a third of the way down the Royal Mile which runs from the Castle to...
in Edinburgh.
After the Battle of Flodden, Douglas became heavily involved in affairs of state, seeking a dominant role as one of the Lords of Council and bidding to attain one or more of the many see
Episcopal See
An episcopal see is, in the original sense, the official seat of a bishop. This seat, which is also referred to as the bishop's cathedra, is placed in the bishop's principal church, which is therefore called the bishop's cathedral...
s, including the archbishopric of St Andrews
St Andrew's Cathedral, St Andrews
The Cathedral of St Andrew is a historical church in St Andrews, Fife, Scotland, which was the seat of the Bishops of St Andrews from its foundation in 1158 until it fell into disuse after the Reformation. It is currently a ruined monument in the custody of Historic Scotland...
, left vacant in the destructive aftermath of the Scottish defeat. He finally attained to the bishopric of Dunkeld
Dunkeld Cathedral
Dunkeld Cathedral stands on the north bank of the River Tay in Dunkeld, Perth and Kinross, Scotland. Built in square-stone style of predominantly grey sandstone, the cathedral proper was begun in 1260 and completed in 1501...
in 1516, although only after a bitter struggle.
In 1517, in his more settled public position, Douglas was one of the leading members of the embassy to Francis I
Francis I of France
Francis I was King of France from 1515 until his death. During his reign, huge cultural changes took place in France and he has been called France's original Renaissance monarch...
which negotiated the Treaty of Rouen
Treaty of Rouen
The Treaty of Rouen was signed on August 26, 1517 between France and Scotland. The treaty provided the renewal of the Auld Alliance in terms of mutual military assistance and reciprocal aid...
, but his role in the volatile politics of the period, mainly centring around control over the minority
Minor (law)
In law, a minor is a person under a certain age — the age of majority — which legally demarcates childhood from adulthood; the age depends upon jurisdiction and application, but is typically 18...
of James V
James V of Scotland
James V was King of Scots from 9 September 1513 until his death, which followed the Scottish defeat at the Battle of Solway Moss...
, was deeply contentious. By late 1517 he had managed to earn the enduring hostility of the Queen Mother
Margaret Tudor
Margaret Tudor was the elder of the two surviving daughters of Henry VII of England and Elizabeth of York, and the elder sister of Henry VIII. In 1503, she married James IV, King of Scots. James died in 1513, and their son became King James V. She married secondly Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of...
, a former ally, and in subsequent years became manifestly involved in political manoeuvring against the Regent Albany. At the same time he remained ambitious for the St Andrews archbishopric which fell vacant once again in 1521. His career was cut short when he died suddenly during a brief period in exile in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
.
Douglas's literary work was composed in a highly polished Middle Scots
Middle Scots
Middle Scots was the Anglic language of Lowland Scotland in the period from 1450 to 1700. By the end of the 13th century its phonology, orthography, accidence, syntax and vocabulary had diverged markedly from Early Scots, which was virtually indistinguishable from early Northumbrian Middle English...
, often aureate in style. After the Eneados he is not known to have produced any further poetry, despite being at the height of his artistic powers when it was completed in 1513
1513 in poetry
Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature .-Events:* Gavin Douglas completed the Eneados, a complete Scots translation of Virgil's Aeneid and the first full and faithful translation into any Germanic language of a major poem from classical antiquity.*...
six weeks before the Battle of Flodden.
Early life
Gavin (Gawin or Gawane) Douglas was born c. 1474, at Tantallon CastleTantallon Castle
Tantallon Castle is a mid-14th-century fortress, located east of North Berwick, in East Lothian, Scotland. It sits atop a promontory opposite the Bass Rock, looking out onto the Firth of Forth...
, East Lothian
East Lothian
East Lothian is one of the 32 council areas of Scotland, and a lieutenancy Area. It borders the City of Edinburgh, Scottish Borders and Midlothian. Its administrative centre is Haddington, although its largest town is Musselburgh....
, the third son of Archibald, 5th Earl of Angus
Archibald Douglas, 5th Earl of Angus
Archibald Douglas, 5th Earl of Angus , was a late medieval Scottish magnate. He became known as "Bell the Cat"...
.
He was a student at St Andrews
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews, informally referred to as "St Andrews", is the oldest university in Scotland and the third oldest in the English-speaking world after Oxford and Cambridge. The university is situated in the town of St Andrews, Fife, on the east coast of Scotland. It was founded between...
, 1489–1494, and thereafter, it is supposed, at Paris. In 1496 he obtained the living of Monymusk
Monymusk
Monymusk is a planned village in the Marr area of Aberdeenshire, Scotland which was almost entirely rebuilt in 1840, although its history dates back to 1170.It is a site for fishing on the nearby River Don.-External links:* *...
, Aberdeenshire
Aberdeenshire
Aberdeenshire is one of the 32 unitary council areas in Scotland and a lieutenancy area.The present day Aberdeenshire council area does not include the City of Aberdeen, now a separate council area, from which its name derives. Together, the modern council area and the city formed historic...
, and later he became parson of Lynton (mod. East Linton
East Linton
East Linton is a town in East Lothian, Scotland, situated on the River Tyne and A199 road five miles east of Haddington, with a population of 1,774...
) and rector of Hauch (mod. Prestonkirk
Prestonkirk Parish Church
Prestonkirk Parish Church is a Church of Scotland parish church at East Linton, in the parish of Traprain, East Lothian, Scotland, UK, close to Preston Mill, Smeaton, Phantassie, and the River Tyne.-Building:...
), in East Lothian
East Lothian
East Lothian is one of the 32 council areas of Scotland, and a lieutenancy Area. It borders the City of Edinburgh, Scottish Borders and Midlothian. Its administrative centre is Haddington, although its largest town is Musselburgh....
; and about 1501 was preferred to the deanery or provostship
Provost (religion)
A provost is a senior official in a number of Christian churches.-Historical Development:The word praepositus was originally applied to any ecclesiastical ruler or dignitary...
of the collegiate church
Collegiate church
In Christianity, a collegiate church is a church where the daily office of worship is maintained by a college of canons; a non-monastic, or "secular" community of clergy, organised as a self-governing corporate body, which may be presided over by a dean or provost...
of St Giles, Edinburgh
Edinburgh
Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland, the second largest city in Scotland, and the eighth most populous in the United Kingdom. The City of Edinburgh Council governs one of Scotland's 32 local government council areas. The council area includes urban Edinburgh and a rural area...
, which he held with his parochial charges. From this date until the Battle of Flodden, in September 1513, he appears to have been occupied with his ecclesiastical duties and literary work. Indeed all the extant writings by which he has earned his place as a poet and translator belong to this period. After the disaster at Flodden he was completely absorbed in public business.
Literary career to 1513
Douglas today is remembered most for his literary legacy produced during the years 1501–1513. For most of this period he was provost of St Giles in EdinburghEdinburgh
Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland, the second largest city in Scotland, and the eighth most populous in the United Kingdom. The City of Edinburgh Council governs one of Scotland's 32 local government council areas. The council area includes urban Edinburgh and a rural area...
. No more than four of works by him are known to exist; The Palice of Honour, Conscience, his major translation the Eneados, and possibly King Hart.
Palice of Honour
The Palice of Honour, dated 1501, is a dream-allegory extending to over 2000 lines, composed in nine-lined stanzas. It is his earliest work. In its descriptions of the various courts on their way to the palace, and of the poet's adventures—first, when he incautiously slanders the court of Venus, and later when after his pardon he joins in the procession and passes to see the glories of the palace—the poem carries on the literary traditions of the courts of love, as shown especially in the "Romaunt of the Rose" and "The Hous of Fame." The poem is dedicated to James IV, not without some lesson in commendation of virtue and honour.No manuscript of the poem is extant. The earliest surviving edition (c. 1553) was printed at London by William Copland (d. 1569); an Edinburgh edition, from the press of Henry Charteris (d. 1599), followed in 1579. From certain indications in the latter and the evidence of some odd leaves discovered by David Laing
David Laing (Scottish antiquary)
David Laing was a Scottish antiquary.The son of William Laing, a bookseller in Edinburgh, where he was born, he was educated at the Canongate Grammar School. At fourteen he was apprenticed to his father. Shortly after the death of the latter in 1837, Laing was elected to the librarianship of the...
, it has been concluded that there was an earlier Edinburgh edition, which has been ascribed to Thomas Davidson
Thomas Davidson (printer)
Thomas Davidson was licensed to be the King's Printer in Scotland during the reign of James V. He was born in Birse, Aberdeenshire, a son of Thomas Davidson of Auchenlayes, close to the beginning of the 16th century. His family held lands near to Huntly and on the monastic estates of Monymusk...
, printer, and dated c. 1540.
Eneados
Douglas's most important literary achievement is the Eneados, a ScotsScots language
Scots is the Germanic language variety spoken in Lowland Scotland and parts of Ulster . It is sometimes called Lowland Scots to distinguish it from Scottish Gaelic, the Celtic language variety spoken in most of the western Highlands and in the Hebrides.Since there are no universally accepted...
translation of Virgil
Virgil
Publius Vergilius Maro, usually called Virgil or Vergil in English , was an ancient Roman poet of the Augustan period. He is known for three major works of Latin literature, the Eclogues , the Georgics, and the epic Aeneid...
's Aeneid
Aeneid
The Aeneid is a Latin epic poem, written by Virgil between 29 and 19 BC, that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Trojan who travelled to Italy, where he became the ancestor of the Romans. It is composed of roughly 10,000 lines in dactylic hexameter...
, completed in 1513
1513 in poetry
Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature .-Events:* Gavin Douglas completed the Eneados, a complete Scots translation of Virgil's Aeneid and the first full and faithful translation into any Germanic language of a major poem from classical antiquity.*...
, and the first full translation of a major poem from classical antiquity
Classical antiquity
Classical antiquity is a broad term for a long period of cultural history centered on the Mediterranean Sea, comprising the interlocking civilizations of ancient Greece and ancient Rome, collectively known as the Greco-Roman world...
into any modern Germanic language. His translation, which is faithful throughout, includes the thirteenth book by Mapheus Vegius
Maffeo Vegio
Maffeo Vegio was an Italian poet who wrote in Latin; he is regarded by many as the finest Latin poet of the fifteenth-century. Born near Lodi, he studied at the University of Pavia, and went on to write some fifty works of both prose and poetry....
. Each of the thirteen books in addition is introduced by an original verse prologue. These deal with a variety of subjects, sometimes semi-autobiographical, in a variety of styles.
Other accredited works
Two other poems are accredited to Gavin Douglas, King Hart and ConscienceConscience is a short four-stanza poem. Its subject is the "conceit" that men first clipped away the "con" from "conscience" to leave "science" and "na mair"; then they lost "sci" and had nothing but "ens": that schrew, Riches and geir.
King Hart is a poem of doubtful accreditation. Like The Palice of Honor, it is a later allegory and, as such, of high literary merit. Its subject is human life told in the allegory of King Hart (Heart) in his castle, surrounded by his five servitors (the senses), Queen, Plesance, Foresight and other courtiers. The poem runs to over 900 lines and is written in eight-lined stanzas. The text is preserved in the Maitland folio manuscript in the Pepysian library, Cambridge. It is not known to have been printed before 1786, when it appeared in Pinkerton's
John Pinkerton
John Pinkerton was a Scottish antiquarian, cartographer, author, numismatist, historian, and early advocate of Germanic racial supremacy theory....
Ancient Scottish Poems.
Political career after September 1513
Three weeks after the Battle of Flodden he, still Provost of St Giles, was admitted a burgess of Edinburgh. His father, the "Great Earl," was then the civil provostProvost (civil)
A provost is the ceremonial head of many Scottish local authorities, and under the name prévôt was a governmental position of varying importance in Ancien Regime France.-History:...
of the capital. The latter dying soon afterwards (January 1514) in Wigtownshire
Wigtownshire
Wigtownshire or the County of Wigtown is a registration county in the Southern Uplands of south west Scotland. Until 1975, the county was one of the administrative counties used for local government purposes, and is now administered as part of the council area of Dumfries and Galloway...
, where he had gone as justiciar
Justiciar
In medieval England and Ireland the Chief Justiciar was roughly equivalent to a modern Prime Minister as the monarch's chief minister. Similar positions existed on the Continent, particularly in Norman Italy. The term is the English form of the medieval Latin justiciarius or justitiarius In...
, and his son having been killed at Flodden, the succession fell to Gavin's nephew Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of Angus
Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of Angus
Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of Angus was a Scottish nobleman active during the reigns of James V and Mary, Queen of Scots...
.
The marriage of this youth to James IV
James IV of Scotland
James IV was King of Scots from 11 June 1488 to his death. He is generally regarded as the most successful of the Stewart monarchs of Scotland, but his reign ended with the disastrous defeat at the Battle of Flodden Field, where he became the last monarch from not only Scotland, but also from all...
's widow on 6 August 1514 did much to identify the Douglases with the English party in Scotland, as against the French party led by the Duke of Albany, and incidentally to determine the political career of his uncle Gavin. During the first weeks of the queen's sorrow after the battle, Gavin, with one or two colleagues of the council, acted as personal adviser, and it may be taken for granted that he supported the pretensions of the young earl. His own hopes of preferment had been strengthened by the death of many of the higher clergy at Flodden.
The first outcome of the new connection was his appointment to the Abbacy of Aberbrothwick
Abbot of Arbroath
Abbot of Arbroath was the head of the Tironensian Benedictine monastic community of Arbroath Abbey, Angus, Scotland, founded under the patronage of King William of Scotland from Kelso Abbey and dedicated to St Thomas of Canterbury. The abbot, John Gedy, was granted the mitre on 26 June 1396...
by the queen regent, before her marriage, probably in June 1514. Soon after the marriage (of Gavin's nephew) she nominated him Archbishop of St Andrews
Archbishop of St Andrews
The Bishop of St. Andrews was the ecclesiastical head of the Diocese of St Andrews and then, as Archbishop of St Andrews , the Archdiocese of St Andrews.The name St Andrews is not the town or church's original name...
, in succession to William Elphinstone
William Elphinstone
William Elphinstone was a Scottish statesman, Bishop of Aberdeen and founder of the University of Aberdeen.He was born in Glasgow, and educated at the University of Glasgow, taking the degree of M.A. in 1452. After practising for a short time as a lawyer in the church courts, he was ordained a...
, archbishop-designate. But John Hepburn, prior of St Andrews, having obtained the vote of the chapter, expelled him, and was himself in turn expelled by Andrew Forman
Andrew Forman
Andrew Forman was a Scottish diplomat and prelate who became Bishop of Moray in 1501, Archbishop of Bourges in France, in 1513, Archbishop of St Andrews in 1514 as well as the headship of several monasteries....
, Bishop of Moray
Bishop of Moray
The Bishop of Moray or Bishop of Elgin was the ecclesiastical head of the Diocese of Moray in northern Scotland, one of Scotland's 13 medieval bishoprics...
, who had been nominated by the pope. In the interval, Douglas's rights in Aberbrothwick had been transferred to James Beaton
James Beaton
Dr. James Beaton was a Scottish church leader, the uncle of Dr. David Cardinal Beaton and the Keeper of the Great Seal of Scotland....
, Archbishop of Glasgow
Archbishop of Glasgow
The Bishop of Glasgow, from 1492 Archbishop of Glasgow, was the ecclesiastical head of the Diocese of Glasgow and then, as Archbishop of Glasgow, the Archdiocese of Glasgow...
, and he was now without title or temporality. The breach between the Queen's party and Albany's had widened, and the queen's advisers had begun an intrigue with England, to the end that the royal widow and her young son should be removed to Henry
Henry VIII of England
Henry VIII was King of England from 21 April 1509 until his death. He was Lord, and later King, of Ireland, as well as continuing the nominal claim by the English monarchs to the Kingdom of France...
's court. In those deliberations Gavin Douglas took an active part, and for this reason stimulated the opposition which successfully thwarted his preferment.
Bishop of Dunkeld
In January 1515 on the death of George BrownGeorge Brown (bishop)
George Brown was a late 15th century and early 16th century Scottish churchman. He first appears on record in 1478 as the rector of the church of Tyningham, and is called a clerk of the diocese of Brechin...
, Bishop of Dunkeld
Bishop of Dunkeld
The Bishop of Dunkeld is the ecclesiastical head of the Diocese of Dunkeld, one of the largest and more important of Scotland's 13 medieval bishoprics, whose first recorded bishop is an early 12th century cleric named Cormac...
, Douglas's hopes revived. The queen nominated him to the now vacant seat, which he ultimately obtained, though not without trouble. For John Stewart, 2nd Earl of Atholl
John Stewart, 2nd Earl of Atholl
John Stewart, 2nd Earl of Atholl was the second Earl of Atholl. He fought in the Battle of Flodden Field on 9 September 1513.-Biography:He was born after 1475 to John Stewart, 1st Earl of Atholl and Eleanor Sinclair. He married Lady Janet Campbell, daughter of Archibald Campbell, 2nd Earl of Argyll...
had forced his brother, Andrew Stewart
Andrew Stewart (d. 1541)
Andrew Stewart was a 16th century Scottish noble and cleric. He was the legitimate son of John Stewart, 1st Earl of Atholl and Eleanor Sinclair, daughter of William Sinclair, Earl of Orkney. His paternal grandmother was Joan Beaufort, former queen-consort of Scotland...
, prebendary of Craig, upon the chapter, and had put him in possession of the bishop's palace. The queen appealed to the pope and was seconded by her brother of England, with the result that the pope's sanction was obtained on 18 February 1515. Some of the correspondence of Douglas and his friends incident to this transaction was intercepted. When Albany came from France and assumed the regency, these documents and the "purchase" of the bishopric from Rome contrary to statute were made the basis of an attack on Douglas, who was imprisoned in Edinburgh Castle
Edinburgh Castle
Edinburgh Castle is a fortress which dominates the skyline of the city of Edinburgh, Scotland, from its position atop the volcanic Castle Rock. Human habitation of the site is dated back as far as the 9th century BC, although the nature of early settlement is unclear...
, thereafter in St Andrews Castle
St Andrews Castle
St Andrew's Castle is a picturesque ruin located in the coastal Royal Burgh of St Andrews in Fife, Scotland. The castle sits on a rocky promontory overlooking a small beach called Castle Sands and the adjoining North Sea. There has been a castle standing at the site since the times of Bishop Roger...
(under the charge of his old opponent, Prior Hepburn), and later in Dunbar Castle
Dunbar Castle
Dunbar Castle is the remnants of one of the most mighty fortresses in Scotland, situated over the harbour of the town of Dunbar, in East Lothian.-Early history:...
, and again in Edinburgh. The pope's intervention procured his release, after nearly a year's imprisonment. The queen meanwhile had retired to England. After July 1516 Douglas appears to have been in possession of his see, and to have patched up a diplomatic peace with Albany.
On 17 May 1517 the Bishop of Dunkeld proceeded with Albany to France
Kingdom of France
The Kingdom of France was one of the most powerful states to exist in Europe during the second millennium.It originated from the Western portion of the Frankish empire, and consolidated significant power and influence over the next thousand years. Louis XIV, also known as the Sun King, developed a...
to conduct the negotiations which ended in the Treaty of Rouen
Treaty of Rouen
The Treaty of Rouen was signed on August 26, 1517 between France and Scotland. The treaty provided the renewal of the Auld Alliance in terms of mutual military assistance and reciprocal aid...
. He was back in Scotland towards the end of June. Albany's longer absence in France permitted the partyfaction of the nobles to come to a head in a plot by James Hamilton, 1st Earl of Arran
James Hamilton, 1st Earl of Arran
James Hamilton, 1st Earl of Arran and 2nd Lord Hamilton was a Scottish nobleman and first cousin of James IV of Scotland.-Biography:...
to seize the Earl of Angus, the Queen's husband. The issue of this plot was the well-known fight of Cleanse the Causeway
Cleanse the Causeway
The skirmish known as Cleanse the Causeway, or Clear the Causeway, took place in the High Street of Edinburgh, Scotland, on April 30, 1520, between rivals James Hamilton, 1st Earl of Arran, chief of Clan Hamilton, and Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of Angus, chief of Clan Douglas.The skirmish was the...
, in which Gavin Douglas's part stands out in picturesque relief. The triumph over the Hamiltons had an unsettling effect upon the Earl of Angus. He made free of the queen's rents and abducted Lord Traquair's daughter. The Queen set about to obtain a divorce, and used her influence for the return of Albany as a means of undoing her husband's power. Albany's arrival in November 1521, with a large body of French men-at-arms, compelled Angus, with the bishop and others, to flee to the Borders
Scottish Borders
The Scottish Borders is one of 32 local government council areas of Scotland. It is bordered by Dumfries and Galloway in the west, South Lanarkshire and West Lothian in the north west, City of Edinburgh, East Lothian, Midlothian to the north; and the non-metropolitan counties of Northumberland...
. From this retreat Gavin Douglas was sent by the earl to the English court, to ask for aid against the French party and against the queen, who was reported to be the mistress of the regent. Meanwhile he was deprived of his bishopric, and forced, for safety, to remain in England, where he effected nothing in the interests of his nephew. The declaration of war by England against Scotland, in answer to the recent Franco-Scottish negotiations, prevented his return. His case was further complicated by the libellous animosity of James Beaton
James Beaton
Dr. James Beaton was a Scottish church leader, the uncle of Dr. David Cardinal Beaton and the Keeper of the Great Seal of Scotland....
, Archbishop of Glasgow
Archbishop of Glasgow
The Bishop of Glasgow, from 1492 Archbishop of Glasgow, was the ecclesiastical head of the Diocese of Glasgow and then, as Archbishop of Glasgow, the Archdiocese of Glasgow...
(whose life he had saved in the "Cleanse the Causeway" incident), who was anxious to put himself forward and thwart Douglas in the election to the archbishopric of St Andrews, left vacant by the death of Forman.
Death
In 1522 Douglas was stricken by the plagueBubonic plague
Plague is a deadly infectious disease that is caused by the enterobacteria Yersinia pestis, named after the French-Swiss bacteriologist Alexandre Yersin. Primarily carried by rodents and spread to humans via fleas, the disease is notorious throughout history, due to the unrivaled scale of death...
which raged in London, and died at the house of his friend Lord Dacre
Thomas Dacre, 2nd Baron Dacre
Thomas Dacre, 2nd Baron Dacre of Gilsland, KG was the son of Humphrey Dacre, 1st Baron Dacre of Gilsland and Mabel Parr; great-aunt of queen consort Catherine Parr, the sixth and final wife of King Henry VIII of England.-Early career:He was born in Cumberland...
. During the closing years of exile he was on intimate terms with the historian Polydore Virgil, and one of his last acts was to arrange to give Polydore a corrected version of Major
John Mair
John Mair was a Scottish philosopher, much admired in his day and an acknowledged influence on all the great thinkers of the time. He was a very renowned teacher and his works much collected and frequently republished across Europe...
's account of Scottish affairs. Douglas was buried in the church of the Savoy
Savoy Palace
The Savoy Palace was considered the grandest nobleman's residence of medieval London, until it was destroyed in the Peasants' Revolt of 1381. It fronted the Strand, on the site of the present Savoy Theatre and the Savoy Hotel that memorialise its name...
, where a monumental brass (removed from its proper site after the fire in 1864) still records his death and interment.
For Douglas's career see, in addition to the public records and general histories, John Sage
John Sage (bishop)
John Sage was a Scottish nonjuring bishop and controversialist in the Jacobite interest.-Life:He was born at Creich, Fifeshire, where his ancestors had lived for seven generations. His father was a captain in the royalist forces at the time of the taking of Dundee by George Monck in 1651...
's Life in Thomas Ruddiman
Thomas Ruddiman
Thomas Ruddiman was a Scottish classical scholar.-Life:He was born at Raggal, Banffshire, where his father was a farmer, and educated at the University of Aberdeen. Through the influence of Dr Archibald Pitcairne he became an assistant in the Advocates' Library, Edinburgh...
's edition, and that by John Small
John Small (librarian)
-Life:The son of John Small and Margaret Brown his wife, he was born at Edinburgh in 1828. He was educated at the Edinburgh Academy and the university, where he graduated M.A. in 1847. In the same year, on the death of his father, who was acting librarian of the university library, he succeeded to...
in the first volume of his edition The Poetical Works of Gavin Douglas (1874).
Modern Editions
- Gavin Douglas's Translation of the Aeneid, edited by Gordon Kendal, 2 volumes, London, MHRA, 2011
- Virgil's Aeneid translated into Scottish Verse by Gavin Douglas, Bishop of Dunkeld, edited by David F.C. Coldwell, 4 Volumes, Edinburgh, Blackwood for The Scottish Text Society, 1957–64
- Gavin Douglas: A selection from his Poetry, edited by Sydney Goodsir SmithSydney Goodsir SmithSydney Goodsir Smith was a Scottish poet, artist, dramatist and novelist. He wrote poetry in literary Scots often referred to as Lallans, and was a major figure of the Scottish Renaissance....
, Edinburgh, Oliver & Boyd for The Saltire Society, 1959 - Selections from Gavin Douglas, edited by David F. C. Coldwell, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1964
- The Shorter Poems of Gavin Douglas, edited by Priscilla J Bawcutt, Edinburgh, Blackwood for The Scottish Text Society, 1967 (reprint 2003)
- The palis of honoure [by] Gawyne Dowglas, Amsterdam, Theatrum Orbis Terrarum; New York, Da Capo Press, 1969
- The Makars: the poems of Henryson, Dunbar, and Douglas, edited, introduced, and annotated by J.A. Tasioulas, Edinburgh, Canongate Books, 1999
Primary sources
Gavin Douglas (c. 1474 – September 1522) was a ScottishKingdom of Scotland
The Kingdom of Scotland was a Sovereign state in North-West Europe that existed from 843 until 1707. It occupied the northern third of the island of Great Britain and shared a land border to the south with the Kingdom of England...
bishop, makar
Makar
A makar is a term from Scottish literature for a poet or bard, often thought of as royal court poet, although the term can be more generally applied. The word functions in a manner similar to the Greek term which means both maker and poet...
and translator. Although he had an important political career, it is for his poetry that he is now chiefly remembered. His principal pioneering achievement was the Eneados
Eneados
The Eneados is a Middle Scots translation of Virgil's Aeneid, completed by Gavin Douglas in 1513. It is the first complete translation of any major work of classical antiquity into an Anglic language...
, a full and faithful vernacular translation of the Aeneid
Aeneid
The Aeneid is a Latin epic poem, written by Virgil between 29 and 19 BC, that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Trojan who travelled to Italy, where he became the ancestor of the Romans. It is composed of roughly 10,000 lines in dactylic hexameter...
of Virgil and the first successful example of its kind in the British Isles. Other extant poetry includes his Palice of Honour and possibly King Hart.
Douglas was educated at St Salvator's College, St Andrews
St Salvator's College, St Andrews
St Salvator's College of the University of St Andrews was founded in 1450 by Bishop James Kennedy on North Street, St Andrews. Several of these original medieval buildings survive, including the college chapel, tower, tenement building and the Hebdomodar's building...
and was a friend and correspondent of many of the internationally renowned men of his age, including Polydore Vergil
Polydore Vergil
Polydore Vergil was an Italian historian, otherwise known as PV Castellensis. He is better known as the contemporary historian during the early Tudor dynasty. He was hired by King Henry VIII of England, who wanted to distance himself from his father Henry VII as much as possible, to document...
, John Major
John Mair
John Mair was a Scottish philosopher, much admired in his day and an acknowledged influence on all the great thinkers of the time. He was a very renowned teacher and his works much collected and frequently republished across Europe...
, Cardinal Wolsey and Henry, 3rd Lord Sinclair
Lord Sinclair
Lord Sinclair is a title in the Peerage of Scotland. It was created in 1449 for William Sinclair, 3rd Earl of Orkney. In 1470, Lord Orkney surrendered the earldom in return for the earldom of Caithness. In 1477, Lord Caithness wished to disinherit his eldest son from his first marriage to Lady...
. Because of his powerful family connections and role in high public life, he is the best-documented of the early Scottish makars. Indeed, of poets in the British Isles before him, only the biography of Chaucer is as well documented or understood. All his literary work was composed before his fortieth year while he was provost of St Giles
St. Giles' Cathedral
St Giles' Cathedral, more properly termed the High Kirk of Edinburgh, is the principal place of worship of the Church of Scotland in Edinburgh. Its distinctive crown steeple is a prominent feature of the city skyline, at about a third of the way down the Royal Mile which runs from the Castle to...
in Edinburgh.
After the Battle of Flodden, Douglas became heavily involved in affairs of state, seeking a dominant role as one of the Lords of Council and bidding to attain one or more of the many see
Episcopal See
An episcopal see is, in the original sense, the official seat of a bishop. This seat, which is also referred to as the bishop's cathedra, is placed in the bishop's principal church, which is therefore called the bishop's cathedral...
s, including the archbishopric of St Andrews
St Andrew's Cathedral, St Andrews
The Cathedral of St Andrew is a historical church in St Andrews, Fife, Scotland, which was the seat of the Bishops of St Andrews from its foundation in 1158 until it fell into disuse after the Reformation. It is currently a ruined monument in the custody of Historic Scotland...
, left vacant in the destructive aftermath of the Scottish defeat. He finally attained to the bishopric of Dunkeld
Dunkeld Cathedral
Dunkeld Cathedral stands on the north bank of the River Tay in Dunkeld, Perth and Kinross, Scotland. Built in square-stone style of predominantly grey sandstone, the cathedral proper was begun in 1260 and completed in 1501...
in 1516, although only after a bitter struggle.
In 1517, in his more settled public position, Douglas was one of the leading members of the embassy to Francis I
Francis I of France
Francis I was King of France from 1515 until his death. During his reign, huge cultural changes took place in France and he has been called France's original Renaissance monarch...
which negotiated the Treaty of Rouen
Treaty of Rouen
The Treaty of Rouen was signed on August 26, 1517 between France and Scotland. The treaty provided the renewal of the Auld Alliance in terms of mutual military assistance and reciprocal aid...
, but his role in the volatile politics of the period, mainly centring around control over the minority
Minor (law)
In law, a minor is a person under a certain age — the age of majority — which legally demarcates childhood from adulthood; the age depends upon jurisdiction and application, but is typically 18...
of James V
James V of Scotland
James V was King of Scots from 9 September 1513 until his death, which followed the Scottish defeat at the Battle of Solway Moss...
, was deeply contentious. By late 1517 he had managed to earn the enduring hostility of the Queen Mother
Margaret Tudor
Margaret Tudor was the elder of the two surviving daughters of Henry VII of England and Elizabeth of York, and the elder sister of Henry VIII. In 1503, she married James IV, King of Scots. James died in 1513, and their son became King James V. She married secondly Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of...
, a former ally, and in subsequent years became manifestly involved in political manoeuvring against the Regent Albany. At the same time he remained ambitious for the St Andrews archbishopric which fell vacant once again in 1521. His career was cut short when he died suddenly during a brief period in exile in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
.
Douglas's literary work was composed in a highly polished Middle Scots
Middle Scots
Middle Scots was the Anglic language of Lowland Scotland in the period from 1450 to 1700. By the end of the 13th century its phonology, orthography, accidence, syntax and vocabulary had diverged markedly from Early Scots, which was virtually indistinguishable from early Northumbrian Middle English...
, often aureate in style. After the Eneados he is not known to have produced any further poetry, despite being at the height of his artistic powers when it was completed in 1513
1513 in poetry
Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature .-Events:* Gavin Douglas completed the Eneados, a complete Scots translation of Virgil's Aeneid and the first full and faithful translation into any Germanic language of a major poem from classical antiquity.*...
six weeks before the Battle of Flodden.
Early life
Gavin (Gawin or Gawane) Douglas was born c. 1474, at Tantallon CastleTantallon Castle
Tantallon Castle is a mid-14th-century fortress, located east of North Berwick, in East Lothian, Scotland. It sits atop a promontory opposite the Bass Rock, looking out onto the Firth of Forth...
, East Lothian
East Lothian
East Lothian is one of the 32 council areas of Scotland, and a lieutenancy Area. It borders the City of Edinburgh, Scottish Borders and Midlothian. Its administrative centre is Haddington, although its largest town is Musselburgh....
, the third son of Archibald, 5th Earl of Angus
Archibald Douglas, 5th Earl of Angus
Archibald Douglas, 5th Earl of Angus , was a late medieval Scottish magnate. He became known as "Bell the Cat"...
.
He was a student at St Andrews
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews, informally referred to as "St Andrews", is the oldest university in Scotland and the third oldest in the English-speaking world after Oxford and Cambridge. The university is situated in the town of St Andrews, Fife, on the east coast of Scotland. It was founded between...
, 1489–1494, and thereafter, it is supposed, at Paris. In 1496 he obtained the living of Monymusk
Monymusk
Monymusk is a planned village in the Marr area of Aberdeenshire, Scotland which was almost entirely rebuilt in 1840, although its history dates back to 1170.It is a site for fishing on the nearby River Don.-External links:* *...
, Aberdeenshire
Aberdeenshire
Aberdeenshire is one of the 32 unitary council areas in Scotland and a lieutenancy area.The present day Aberdeenshire council area does not include the City of Aberdeen, now a separate council area, from which its name derives. Together, the modern council area and the city formed historic...
, and later he became parson of Lynton (mod. East Linton
East Linton
East Linton is a town in East Lothian, Scotland, situated on the River Tyne and A199 road five miles east of Haddington, with a population of 1,774...
) and rector of Hauch (mod. Prestonkirk
Prestonkirk Parish Church
Prestonkirk Parish Church is a Church of Scotland parish church at East Linton, in the parish of Traprain, East Lothian, Scotland, UK, close to Preston Mill, Smeaton, Phantassie, and the River Tyne.-Building:...
), in East Lothian
East Lothian
East Lothian is one of the 32 council areas of Scotland, and a lieutenancy Area. It borders the City of Edinburgh, Scottish Borders and Midlothian. Its administrative centre is Haddington, although its largest town is Musselburgh....
; and about 1501 was preferred to the deanery or provostship
Provost (religion)
A provost is a senior official in a number of Christian churches.-Historical Development:The word praepositus was originally applied to any ecclesiastical ruler or dignitary...
of the collegiate church
Collegiate church
In Christianity, a collegiate church is a church where the daily office of worship is maintained by a college of canons; a non-monastic, or "secular" community of clergy, organised as a self-governing corporate body, which may be presided over by a dean or provost...
of St Giles, Edinburgh
Edinburgh
Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland, the second largest city in Scotland, and the eighth most populous in the United Kingdom. The City of Edinburgh Council governs one of Scotland's 32 local government council areas. The council area includes urban Edinburgh and a rural area...
, which he held with his parochial charges. From this date until the Battle of Flodden, in September 1513, he appears to have been occupied with his ecclesiastical duties and literary work. Indeed all the extant writings by which he has earned his place as a poet and translator belong to this period. After the disaster at Flodden he was completely absorbed in public business.
Literary career to 1513
Douglas today is remembered most for his literary legacy produced during the years 1501–1513. For most of this period he was provost of St Giles in EdinburghEdinburgh
Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland, the second largest city in Scotland, and the eighth most populous in the United Kingdom. The City of Edinburgh Council governs one of Scotland's 32 local government council areas. The council area includes urban Edinburgh and a rural area...
. No more than four of works by him are known to exist; The Palice of Honour, Conscience, his major translation the Eneados, and possibly King Hart.
Palice of Honour
The Palice of Honour, dated 1501, is a dream-allegory extending to over 2000 lines, composed in nine-lined stanzas. It is his earliest work. In its descriptions of the various courts on their way to the palace, and of the poet's adventures—first, when he incautiously slanders the court of Venus, and later when after his pardon he joins in the procession and passes to see the glories of the palace—the poem carries on the literary traditions of the courts of love, as shown especially in the "Romaunt of the Rose" and "The Hous of Fame." The poem is dedicated to James IV, not without some lesson in commendation of virtue and honour.No manuscript of the poem is extant. The earliest surviving edition (c. 1553) was printed at London by William Copland (d. 1569); an Edinburgh edition, from the press of Henry Charteris (d. 1599), followed in 1579. From certain indications in the latter and the evidence of some odd leaves discovered by David Laing
David Laing (Scottish antiquary)
David Laing was a Scottish antiquary.The son of William Laing, a bookseller in Edinburgh, where he was born, he was educated at the Canongate Grammar School. At fourteen he was apprenticed to his father. Shortly after the death of the latter in 1837, Laing was elected to the librarianship of the...
, it has been concluded that there was an earlier Edinburgh edition, which has been ascribed to Thomas Davidson
Thomas Davidson (printer)
Thomas Davidson was licensed to be the King's Printer in Scotland during the reign of James V. He was born in Birse, Aberdeenshire, a son of Thomas Davidson of Auchenlayes, close to the beginning of the 16th century. His family held lands near to Huntly and on the monastic estates of Monymusk...
, printer, and dated c. 1540.
Eneados
Douglas's most important literary achievement is the Eneados, a ScotsScots language
Scots is the Germanic language variety spoken in Lowland Scotland and parts of Ulster . It is sometimes called Lowland Scots to distinguish it from Scottish Gaelic, the Celtic language variety spoken in most of the western Highlands and in the Hebrides.Since there are no universally accepted...
translation of Virgil
Virgil
Publius Vergilius Maro, usually called Virgil or Vergil in English , was an ancient Roman poet of the Augustan period. He is known for three major works of Latin literature, the Eclogues , the Georgics, and the epic Aeneid...
's Aeneid
Aeneid
The Aeneid is a Latin epic poem, written by Virgil between 29 and 19 BC, that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Trojan who travelled to Italy, where he became the ancestor of the Romans. It is composed of roughly 10,000 lines in dactylic hexameter...
, completed in 1513
1513 in poetry
Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature .-Events:* Gavin Douglas completed the Eneados, a complete Scots translation of Virgil's Aeneid and the first full and faithful translation into any Germanic language of a major poem from classical antiquity.*...
, and the first full translation of a major poem from classical antiquity
Classical antiquity
Classical antiquity is a broad term for a long period of cultural history centered on the Mediterranean Sea, comprising the interlocking civilizations of ancient Greece and ancient Rome, collectively known as the Greco-Roman world...
into any modern Germanic language. His translation, which is faithful throughout, includes the thirteenth book by Mapheus Vegius
Maffeo Vegio
Maffeo Vegio was an Italian poet who wrote in Latin; he is regarded by many as the finest Latin poet of the fifteenth-century. Born near Lodi, he studied at the University of Pavia, and went on to write some fifty works of both prose and poetry....
. Each of the thirteen books in addition is introduced by an original verse prologue. These deal with a variety of subjects, sometimes semi-autobiographical, in a variety of styles.
Other accredited works
Two other poems are accredited to Gavin Douglas, King Hart and ConscienceConscience is a short four-stanza poem. Its subject is the "conceit" that men first clipped away the "con" from "conscience" to leave "science" and "na mair"; then they lost "sci" and had nothing but "ens": that schrew, Riches and geir.
King Hart is a poem of doubtful accreditation. Like The Palice of Honor, it is a later allegory and, as such, of high literary merit. Its subject is human life told in the allegory of King Hart (Heart) in his castle, surrounded by his five servitors (the senses), Queen, Plesance, Foresight and other courtiers. The poem runs to over 900 lines and is written in eight-lined stanzas. The text is preserved in the Maitland folio manuscript in the Pepysian library, Cambridge. It is not known to have been printed before 1786, when it appeared in Pinkerton's
John Pinkerton
John Pinkerton was a Scottish antiquarian, cartographer, author, numismatist, historian, and early advocate of Germanic racial supremacy theory....
Ancient Scottish Poems.
Political career after September 1513
Three weeks after the Battle of Flodden he, still Provost of St Giles, was admitted a burgess of Edinburgh. His father, the "Great Earl," was then the civil provostProvost (civil)
A provost is the ceremonial head of many Scottish local authorities, and under the name prévôt was a governmental position of varying importance in Ancien Regime France.-History:...
of the capital. The latter dying soon afterwards (January 1514) in Wigtownshire
Wigtownshire
Wigtownshire or the County of Wigtown is a registration county in the Southern Uplands of south west Scotland. Until 1975, the county was one of the administrative counties used for local government purposes, and is now administered as part of the council area of Dumfries and Galloway...
, where he had gone as justiciar
Justiciar
In medieval England and Ireland the Chief Justiciar was roughly equivalent to a modern Prime Minister as the monarch's chief minister. Similar positions existed on the Continent, particularly in Norman Italy. The term is the English form of the medieval Latin justiciarius or justitiarius In...
, and his son having been killed at Flodden, the succession fell to Gavin's nephew Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of Angus
Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of Angus
Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of Angus was a Scottish nobleman active during the reigns of James V and Mary, Queen of Scots...
.
The marriage of this youth to James IV
James IV of Scotland
James IV was King of Scots from 11 June 1488 to his death. He is generally regarded as the most successful of the Stewart monarchs of Scotland, but his reign ended with the disastrous defeat at the Battle of Flodden Field, where he became the last monarch from not only Scotland, but also from all...
's widow on 6 August 1514 did much to identify the Douglases with the English party in Scotland, as against the French party led by the Duke of Albany, and incidentally to determine the political career of his uncle Gavin. During the first weeks of the queen's sorrow after the battle, Gavin, with one or two colleagues of the council, acted as personal adviser, and it may be taken for granted that he supported the pretensions of the young earl. His own hopes of preferment had been strengthened by the death of many of the higher clergy at Flodden.
The first outcome of the new connection was his appointment to the Abbacy of Aberbrothwick
Abbot of Arbroath
Abbot of Arbroath was the head of the Tironensian Benedictine monastic community of Arbroath Abbey, Angus, Scotland, founded under the patronage of King William of Scotland from Kelso Abbey and dedicated to St Thomas of Canterbury. The abbot, John Gedy, was granted the mitre on 26 June 1396...
by the queen regent, before her marriage, probably in June 1514. Soon after the marriage (of Gavin's nephew) she nominated him Archbishop of St Andrews
Archbishop of St Andrews
The Bishop of St. Andrews was the ecclesiastical head of the Diocese of St Andrews and then, as Archbishop of St Andrews , the Archdiocese of St Andrews.The name St Andrews is not the town or church's original name...
, in succession to William Elphinstone
William Elphinstone
William Elphinstone was a Scottish statesman, Bishop of Aberdeen and founder of the University of Aberdeen.He was born in Glasgow, and educated at the University of Glasgow, taking the degree of M.A. in 1452. After practising for a short time as a lawyer in the church courts, he was ordained a...
, archbishop-designate. But John Hepburn, prior of St Andrews, having obtained the vote of the chapter, expelled him, and was himself in turn expelled by Andrew Forman
Andrew Forman
Andrew Forman was a Scottish diplomat and prelate who became Bishop of Moray in 1501, Archbishop of Bourges in France, in 1513, Archbishop of St Andrews in 1514 as well as the headship of several monasteries....
, Bishop of Moray
Bishop of Moray
The Bishop of Moray or Bishop of Elgin was the ecclesiastical head of the Diocese of Moray in northern Scotland, one of Scotland's 13 medieval bishoprics...
, who had been nominated by the pope. In the interval, Douglas's rights in Aberbrothwick had been transferred to James Beaton
James Beaton
Dr. James Beaton was a Scottish church leader, the uncle of Dr. David Cardinal Beaton and the Keeper of the Great Seal of Scotland....
, Archbishop of Glasgow
Archbishop of Glasgow
The Bishop of Glasgow, from 1492 Archbishop of Glasgow, was the ecclesiastical head of the Diocese of Glasgow and then, as Archbishop of Glasgow, the Archdiocese of Glasgow...
, and he was now without title or temporality. The breach between the Queen's party and Albany's had widened, and the queen's advisers had begun an intrigue with England, to the end that the royal widow and her young son should be removed to Henry
Henry VIII of England
Henry VIII was King of England from 21 April 1509 until his death. He was Lord, and later King, of Ireland, as well as continuing the nominal claim by the English monarchs to the Kingdom of France...
's court. In those deliberations Gavin Douglas took an active part, and for this reason stimulated the opposition which successfully thwarted his preferment.
Bishop of Dunkeld
In January 1515 on the death of George BrownGeorge Brown (bishop)
George Brown was a late 15th century and early 16th century Scottish churchman. He first appears on record in 1478 as the rector of the church of Tyningham, and is called a clerk of the diocese of Brechin...
, Bishop of Dunkeld
Bishop of Dunkeld
The Bishop of Dunkeld is the ecclesiastical head of the Diocese of Dunkeld, one of the largest and more important of Scotland's 13 medieval bishoprics, whose first recorded bishop is an early 12th century cleric named Cormac...
, Douglas's hopes revived. The queen nominated him to the now vacant seat, which he ultimately obtained, though not without trouble. For John Stewart, 2nd Earl of Atholl
John Stewart, 2nd Earl of Atholl
John Stewart, 2nd Earl of Atholl was the second Earl of Atholl. He fought in the Battle of Flodden Field on 9 September 1513.-Biography:He was born after 1475 to John Stewart, 1st Earl of Atholl and Eleanor Sinclair. He married Lady Janet Campbell, daughter of Archibald Campbell, 2nd Earl of Argyll...
had forced his brother, Andrew Stewart
Andrew Stewart (d. 1541)
Andrew Stewart was a 16th century Scottish noble and cleric. He was the legitimate son of John Stewart, 1st Earl of Atholl and Eleanor Sinclair, daughter of William Sinclair, Earl of Orkney. His paternal grandmother was Joan Beaufort, former queen-consort of Scotland...
, prebendary of Craig, upon the chapter, and had put him in possession of the bishop's palace. The queen appealed to the pope and was seconded by her brother of England, with the result that the pope's sanction was obtained on 18 February 1515. Some of the correspondence of Douglas and his friends incident to this transaction was intercepted. When Albany came from France and assumed the regency, these documents and the "purchase" of the bishopric from Rome contrary to statute were made the basis of an attack on Douglas, who was imprisoned in Edinburgh Castle
Edinburgh Castle
Edinburgh Castle is a fortress which dominates the skyline of the city of Edinburgh, Scotland, from its position atop the volcanic Castle Rock. Human habitation of the site is dated back as far as the 9th century BC, although the nature of early settlement is unclear...
, thereafter in St Andrews Castle
St Andrews Castle
St Andrew's Castle is a picturesque ruin located in the coastal Royal Burgh of St Andrews in Fife, Scotland. The castle sits on a rocky promontory overlooking a small beach called Castle Sands and the adjoining North Sea. There has been a castle standing at the site since the times of Bishop Roger...
(under the charge of his old opponent, Prior Hepburn), and later in Dunbar Castle
Dunbar Castle
Dunbar Castle is the remnants of one of the most mighty fortresses in Scotland, situated over the harbour of the town of Dunbar, in East Lothian.-Early history:...
, and again in Edinburgh. The pope's intervention procured his release, after nearly a year's imprisonment. The queen meanwhile had retired to England. After July 1516 Douglas appears to have been in possession of his see, and to have patched up a diplomatic peace with Albany.
On 17 May 1517 the Bishop of Dunkeld proceeded with Albany to France
Kingdom of France
The Kingdom of France was one of the most powerful states to exist in Europe during the second millennium.It originated from the Western portion of the Frankish empire, and consolidated significant power and influence over the next thousand years. Louis XIV, also known as the Sun King, developed a...
to conduct the negotiations which ended in the Treaty of Rouen
Treaty of Rouen
The Treaty of Rouen was signed on August 26, 1517 between France and Scotland. The treaty provided the renewal of the Auld Alliance in terms of mutual military assistance and reciprocal aid...
. He was back in Scotland towards the end of June. Albany's longer absence in France permitted the partyfaction of the nobles to come to a head in a plot by James Hamilton, 1st Earl of Arran
James Hamilton, 1st Earl of Arran
James Hamilton, 1st Earl of Arran and 2nd Lord Hamilton was a Scottish nobleman and first cousin of James IV of Scotland.-Biography:...
to seize the Earl of Angus, the Queen's husband. The issue of this plot was the well-known fight of Cleanse the Causeway
Cleanse the Causeway
The skirmish known as Cleanse the Causeway, or Clear the Causeway, took place in the High Street of Edinburgh, Scotland, on April 30, 1520, between rivals James Hamilton, 1st Earl of Arran, chief of Clan Hamilton, and Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of Angus, chief of Clan Douglas.The skirmish was the...
, in which Gavin Douglas's part stands out in picturesque relief. The triumph over the Hamiltons had an unsettling effect upon the Earl of Angus. He made free of the queen's rents and abducted Lord Traquair's daughter. The Queen set about to obtain a divorce, and used her influence for the return of Albany as a means of undoing her husband's power. Albany's arrival in November 1521, with a large body of French men-at-arms, compelled Angus, with the bishop and others, to flee to the Borders
Scottish Borders
The Scottish Borders is one of 32 local government council areas of Scotland. It is bordered by Dumfries and Galloway in the west, South Lanarkshire and West Lothian in the north west, City of Edinburgh, East Lothian, Midlothian to the north; and the non-metropolitan counties of Northumberland...
. From this retreat Gavin Douglas was sent by the earl to the English court, to ask for aid against the French party and against the queen, who was reported to be the mistress of the regent. Meanwhile he was deprived of his bishopric, and forced, for safety, to remain in England, where he effected nothing in the interests of his nephew. The declaration of war by England against Scotland, in answer to the recent Franco-Scottish negotiations, prevented his return. His case was further complicated by the libellous animosity of James Beaton
James Beaton
Dr. James Beaton was a Scottish church leader, the uncle of Dr. David Cardinal Beaton and the Keeper of the Great Seal of Scotland....
, Archbishop of Glasgow
Archbishop of Glasgow
The Bishop of Glasgow, from 1492 Archbishop of Glasgow, was the ecclesiastical head of the Diocese of Glasgow and then, as Archbishop of Glasgow, the Archdiocese of Glasgow...
(whose life he had saved in the "Cleanse the Causeway" incident), who was anxious to put himself forward and thwart Douglas in the election to the archbishopric of St Andrews, left vacant by the death of Forman.
Death
In 1522 Douglas was stricken by the plagueBubonic plague
Plague is a deadly infectious disease that is caused by the enterobacteria Yersinia pestis, named after the French-Swiss bacteriologist Alexandre Yersin. Primarily carried by rodents and spread to humans via fleas, the disease is notorious throughout history, due to the unrivaled scale of death...
which raged in London, and died at the house of his friend Lord Dacre
Thomas Dacre, 2nd Baron Dacre
Thomas Dacre, 2nd Baron Dacre of Gilsland, KG was the son of Humphrey Dacre, 1st Baron Dacre of Gilsland and Mabel Parr; great-aunt of queen consort Catherine Parr, the sixth and final wife of King Henry VIII of England.-Early career:He was born in Cumberland...
. During the closing years of exile he was on intimate terms with the historian Polydore Virgil, and one of his last acts was to arrange to give Polydore a corrected version of Major
John Mair
John Mair was a Scottish philosopher, much admired in his day and an acknowledged influence on all the great thinkers of the time. He was a very renowned teacher and his works much collected and frequently republished across Europe...
's account of Scottish affairs. Douglas was buried in the church of the Savoy
Savoy Palace
The Savoy Palace was considered the grandest nobleman's residence of medieval London, until it was destroyed in the Peasants' Revolt of 1381. It fronted the Strand, on the site of the present Savoy Theatre and the Savoy Hotel that memorialise its name...
, where a monumental brass (removed from its proper site after the fire in 1864) still records his death and interment.
For Douglas's career see, in addition to the public records and general histories, John Sage
John Sage (bishop)
John Sage was a Scottish nonjuring bishop and controversialist in the Jacobite interest.-Life:He was born at Creich, Fifeshire, where his ancestors had lived for seven generations. His father was a captain in the royalist forces at the time of the taking of Dundee by George Monck in 1651...
's Life in Thomas Ruddiman
Thomas Ruddiman
Thomas Ruddiman was a Scottish classical scholar.-Life:He was born at Raggal, Banffshire, where his father was a farmer, and educated at the University of Aberdeen. Through the influence of Dr Archibald Pitcairne he became an assistant in the Advocates' Library, Edinburgh...
's edition, and that by John Small
John Small (librarian)
-Life:The son of John Small and Margaret Brown his wife, he was born at Edinburgh in 1828. He was educated at the Edinburgh Academy and the university, where he graduated M.A. in 1847. In the same year, on the death of his father, who was acting librarian of the university library, he succeeded to...
in the first volume of his edition The Poetical Works of Gavin Douglas (1874).
Modern Editions
- Gavin Douglas's Translation of the Aeneid, edited by Gordon Kendal, 2 volumes, London, MHRA, 2011
- Virgil's Aeneid translated into Scottish Verse by Gavin Douglas, Bishop of Dunkeld, edited by David F.C. Coldwell, 4 Volumes, Edinburgh, Blackwood for The Scottish Text Society, 1957–64
- Gavin Douglas: A selection from his Poetry, edited by Sydney Goodsir SmithSydney Goodsir SmithSydney Goodsir Smith was a Scottish poet, artist, dramatist and novelist. He wrote poetry in literary Scots often referred to as Lallans, and was a major figure of the Scottish Renaissance....
, Edinburgh, Oliver & Boyd for The Saltire Society, 1959 - Selections from Gavin Douglas, edited by David F. C. Coldwell, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1964
- The Shorter Poems of Gavin Douglas, edited by Priscilla J Bawcutt, Edinburgh, Blackwood for The Scottish Text Society, 1967 (reprint 2003)
- The palis of honoure [by] Gawyne Dowglas, Amsterdam, Theatrum Orbis Terrarum; New York, Da Capo Press, 1969
- The Makars: the poems of Henryson, Dunbar, and Douglas, edited, introduced, and annotated by J.A. Tasioulas, Edinburgh, Canongate Books, 1999
Primary sources
Gavin Douglas (c. 1474 – September 1522) was a ScottishKingdom of Scotland
The Kingdom of Scotland was a Sovereign state in North-West Europe that existed from 843 until 1707. It occupied the northern third of the island of Great Britain and shared a land border to the south with the Kingdom of England...
bishop, makar
Makar
A makar is a term from Scottish literature for a poet or bard, often thought of as royal court poet, although the term can be more generally applied. The word functions in a manner similar to the Greek term which means both maker and poet...
and translator. Although he had an important political career, it is for his poetry that he is now chiefly remembered. His principal pioneering achievement was the Eneados
Eneados
The Eneados is a Middle Scots translation of Virgil's Aeneid, completed by Gavin Douglas in 1513. It is the first complete translation of any major work of classical antiquity into an Anglic language...
, a full and faithful vernacular translation of the Aeneid
Aeneid
The Aeneid is a Latin epic poem, written by Virgil between 29 and 19 BC, that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Trojan who travelled to Italy, where he became the ancestor of the Romans. It is composed of roughly 10,000 lines in dactylic hexameter...
of Virgil and the first successful example of its kind in the British Isles. Other extant poetry includes his Palice of Honour and possibly King Hart.
Douglas was educated at St Salvator's College, St Andrews
St Salvator's College, St Andrews
St Salvator's College of the University of St Andrews was founded in 1450 by Bishop James Kennedy on North Street, St Andrews. Several of these original medieval buildings survive, including the college chapel, tower, tenement building and the Hebdomodar's building...
and was a friend and correspondent of many of the internationally renowned men of his age, including Polydore Vergil
Polydore Vergil
Polydore Vergil was an Italian historian, otherwise known as PV Castellensis. He is better known as the contemporary historian during the early Tudor dynasty. He was hired by King Henry VIII of England, who wanted to distance himself from his father Henry VII as much as possible, to document...
, John Major
John Mair
John Mair was a Scottish philosopher, much admired in his day and an acknowledged influence on all the great thinkers of the time. He was a very renowned teacher and his works much collected and frequently republished across Europe...
, Cardinal Wolsey and Henry, 3rd Lord Sinclair
Lord Sinclair
Lord Sinclair is a title in the Peerage of Scotland. It was created in 1449 for William Sinclair, 3rd Earl of Orkney. In 1470, Lord Orkney surrendered the earldom in return for the earldom of Caithness. In 1477, Lord Caithness wished to disinherit his eldest son from his first marriage to Lady...
. Because of his powerful family connections and role in high public life, he is the best-documented of the early Scottish makars. Indeed, of poets in the British Isles before him, only the biography of Chaucer is as well documented or understood. All his literary work was composed before his fortieth year while he was provost of St Giles
St. Giles' Cathedral
St Giles' Cathedral, more properly termed the High Kirk of Edinburgh, is the principal place of worship of the Church of Scotland in Edinburgh. Its distinctive crown steeple is a prominent feature of the city skyline, at about a third of the way down the Royal Mile which runs from the Castle to...
in Edinburgh.
After the Battle of Flodden, Douglas became heavily involved in affairs of state, seeking a dominant role as one of the Lords of Council and bidding to attain one or more of the many see
Episcopal See
An episcopal see is, in the original sense, the official seat of a bishop. This seat, which is also referred to as the bishop's cathedra, is placed in the bishop's principal church, which is therefore called the bishop's cathedral...
s, including the archbishopric of St Andrews
St Andrew's Cathedral, St Andrews
The Cathedral of St Andrew is a historical church in St Andrews, Fife, Scotland, which was the seat of the Bishops of St Andrews from its foundation in 1158 until it fell into disuse after the Reformation. It is currently a ruined monument in the custody of Historic Scotland...
, left vacant in the destructive aftermath of the Scottish defeat. He finally attained to the bishopric of Dunkeld
Dunkeld Cathedral
Dunkeld Cathedral stands on the north bank of the River Tay in Dunkeld, Perth and Kinross, Scotland. Built in square-stone style of predominantly grey sandstone, the cathedral proper was begun in 1260 and completed in 1501...
in 1516, although only after a bitter struggle.
In 1517, in his more settled public position, Douglas was one of the leading members of the embassy to Francis I
Francis I of France
Francis I was King of France from 1515 until his death. During his reign, huge cultural changes took place in France and he has been called France's original Renaissance monarch...
which negotiated the Treaty of Rouen
Treaty of Rouen
The Treaty of Rouen was signed on August 26, 1517 between France and Scotland. The treaty provided the renewal of the Auld Alliance in terms of mutual military assistance and reciprocal aid...
, but his role in the volatile politics of the period, mainly centring around control over the minority
Minor (law)
In law, a minor is a person under a certain age — the age of majority — which legally demarcates childhood from adulthood; the age depends upon jurisdiction and application, but is typically 18...
of James V
James V of Scotland
James V was King of Scots from 9 September 1513 until his death, which followed the Scottish defeat at the Battle of Solway Moss...
, was deeply contentious. By late 1517 he had managed to earn the enduring hostility of the Queen Mother
Margaret Tudor
Margaret Tudor was the elder of the two surviving daughters of Henry VII of England and Elizabeth of York, and the elder sister of Henry VIII. In 1503, she married James IV, King of Scots. James died in 1513, and their son became King James V. She married secondly Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of...
, a former ally, and in subsequent years became manifestly involved in political manoeuvring against the Regent Albany. At the same time he remained ambitious for the St Andrews archbishopric which fell vacant once again in 1521. His career was cut short when he died suddenly during a brief period in exile in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
.
Douglas's literary work was composed in a highly polished Middle Scots
Middle Scots
Middle Scots was the Anglic language of Lowland Scotland in the period from 1450 to 1700. By the end of the 13th century its phonology, orthography, accidence, syntax and vocabulary had diverged markedly from Early Scots, which was virtually indistinguishable from early Northumbrian Middle English...
, often aureate in style. After the Eneados he is not known to have produced any further poetry, despite being at the height of his artistic powers when it was completed in 1513
1513 in poetry
Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature .-Events:* Gavin Douglas completed the Eneados, a complete Scots translation of Virgil's Aeneid and the first full and faithful translation into any Germanic language of a major poem from classical antiquity.*...
six weeks before the Battle of Flodden.
Early life
Gavin (Gawin or Gawane) Douglas was born c. 1474, at Tantallon CastleTantallon Castle
Tantallon Castle is a mid-14th-century fortress, located east of North Berwick, in East Lothian, Scotland. It sits atop a promontory opposite the Bass Rock, looking out onto the Firth of Forth...
, East Lothian
East Lothian
East Lothian is one of the 32 council areas of Scotland, and a lieutenancy Area. It borders the City of Edinburgh, Scottish Borders and Midlothian. Its administrative centre is Haddington, although its largest town is Musselburgh....
, the third son of Archibald, 5th Earl of Angus
Archibald Douglas, 5th Earl of Angus
Archibald Douglas, 5th Earl of Angus , was a late medieval Scottish magnate. He became known as "Bell the Cat"...
.
He was a student at St Andrews
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews, informally referred to as "St Andrews", is the oldest university in Scotland and the third oldest in the English-speaking world after Oxford and Cambridge. The university is situated in the town of St Andrews, Fife, on the east coast of Scotland. It was founded between...
, 1489–1494, and thereafter, it is supposed, at Paris. In 1496 he obtained the living of Monymusk
Monymusk
Monymusk is a planned village in the Marr area of Aberdeenshire, Scotland which was almost entirely rebuilt in 1840, although its history dates back to 1170.It is a site for fishing on the nearby River Don.-External links:* *...
, Aberdeenshire
Aberdeenshire
Aberdeenshire is one of the 32 unitary council areas in Scotland and a lieutenancy area.The present day Aberdeenshire council area does not include the City of Aberdeen, now a separate council area, from which its name derives. Together, the modern council area and the city formed historic...
, and later he became parson of Lynton (mod. East Linton
East Linton
East Linton is a town in East Lothian, Scotland, situated on the River Tyne and A199 road five miles east of Haddington, with a population of 1,774...
) and rector of Hauch (mod. Prestonkirk
Prestonkirk Parish Church
Prestonkirk Parish Church is a Church of Scotland parish church at East Linton, in the parish of Traprain, East Lothian, Scotland, UK, close to Preston Mill, Smeaton, Phantassie, and the River Tyne.-Building:...
), in East Lothian
East Lothian
East Lothian is one of the 32 council areas of Scotland, and a lieutenancy Area. It borders the City of Edinburgh, Scottish Borders and Midlothian. Its administrative centre is Haddington, although its largest town is Musselburgh....
; and about 1501 was preferred to the deanery or provostship
Provost (religion)
A provost is a senior official in a number of Christian churches.-Historical Development:The word praepositus was originally applied to any ecclesiastical ruler or dignitary...
of the collegiate church
Collegiate church
In Christianity, a collegiate church is a church where the daily office of worship is maintained by a college of canons; a non-monastic, or "secular" community of clergy, organised as a self-governing corporate body, which may be presided over by a dean or provost...
of St Giles, Edinburgh
Edinburgh
Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland, the second largest city in Scotland, and the eighth most populous in the United Kingdom. The City of Edinburgh Council governs one of Scotland's 32 local government council areas. The council area includes urban Edinburgh and a rural area...
, which he held with his parochial charges. From this date until the Battle of Flodden, in September 1513, he appears to have been occupied with his ecclesiastical duties and literary work. Indeed all the extant writings by which he has earned his place as a poet and translator belong to this period. After the disaster at Flodden he was completely absorbed in public business.
Literary career to 1513
Douglas today is remembered most for his literary legacy produced during the years 1501–1513. For most of this period he was provost of St Giles in EdinburghEdinburgh
Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland, the second largest city in Scotland, and the eighth most populous in the United Kingdom. The City of Edinburgh Council governs one of Scotland's 32 local government council areas. The council area includes urban Edinburgh and a rural area...
. No more than four of works by him are known to exist; The Palice of Honour, Conscience, his major translation the Eneados, and possibly King Hart.
Palice of Honour
The Palice of Honour, dated 1501, is a dream-allegory extending to over 2000 lines, composed in nine-lined stanzas. It is his earliest work. In its descriptions of the various courts on their way to the palace, and of the poet's adventures—first, when he incautiously slanders the court of Venus, and later when after his pardon he joins in the procession and passes to see the glories of the palace—the poem carries on the literary traditions of the courts of love, as shown especially in the "Romaunt of the Rose" and "The Hous of Fame." The poem is dedicated to James IV, not without some lesson in commendation of virtue and honour.No manuscript of the poem is extant. The earliest surviving edition (c. 1553) was printed at London by William Copland (d. 1569); an Edinburgh edition, from the press of Henry Charteris (d. 1599), followed in 1579. From certain indications in the latter and the evidence of some odd leaves discovered by David Laing
David Laing (Scottish antiquary)
David Laing was a Scottish antiquary.The son of William Laing, a bookseller in Edinburgh, where he was born, he was educated at the Canongate Grammar School. At fourteen he was apprenticed to his father. Shortly after the death of the latter in 1837, Laing was elected to the librarianship of the...
, it has been concluded that there was an earlier Edinburgh edition, which has been ascribed to Thomas Davidson
Thomas Davidson (printer)
Thomas Davidson was licensed to be the King's Printer in Scotland during the reign of James V. He was born in Birse, Aberdeenshire, a son of Thomas Davidson of Auchenlayes, close to the beginning of the 16th century. His family held lands near to Huntly and on the monastic estates of Monymusk...
, printer, and dated c. 1540.
Eneados
Douglas's most important literary achievement is the Eneados, a ScotsScots language
Scots is the Germanic language variety spoken in Lowland Scotland and parts of Ulster . It is sometimes called Lowland Scots to distinguish it from Scottish Gaelic, the Celtic language variety spoken in most of the western Highlands and in the Hebrides.Since there are no universally accepted...
translation of Virgil
Virgil
Publius Vergilius Maro, usually called Virgil or Vergil in English , was an ancient Roman poet of the Augustan period. He is known for three major works of Latin literature, the Eclogues , the Georgics, and the epic Aeneid...
's Aeneid
Aeneid
The Aeneid is a Latin epic poem, written by Virgil between 29 and 19 BC, that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Trojan who travelled to Italy, where he became the ancestor of the Romans. It is composed of roughly 10,000 lines in dactylic hexameter...
, completed in 1513
1513 in poetry
Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature .-Events:* Gavin Douglas completed the Eneados, a complete Scots translation of Virgil's Aeneid and the first full and faithful translation into any Germanic language of a major poem from classical antiquity.*...
, and the first full translation of a major poem from classical antiquity
Classical antiquity
Classical antiquity is a broad term for a long period of cultural history centered on the Mediterranean Sea, comprising the interlocking civilizations of ancient Greece and ancient Rome, collectively known as the Greco-Roman world...
into any modern Germanic language. His translation, which is faithful throughout, includes the thirteenth book by Mapheus Vegius
Maffeo Vegio
Maffeo Vegio was an Italian poet who wrote in Latin; he is regarded by many as the finest Latin poet of the fifteenth-century. Born near Lodi, he studied at the University of Pavia, and went on to write some fifty works of both prose and poetry....
. Each of the thirteen books in addition is introduced by an original verse prologue. These deal with a variety of subjects, sometimes semi-autobiographical, in a variety of styles.
Other accredited works
Two other poems are accredited to Gavin Douglas, King Hart and ConscienceConscience is a short four-stanza poem. Its subject is the "conceit" that men first clipped away the "con" from "conscience" to leave "science" and "na mair"; then they lost "sci" and had nothing but "ens": that schrew, Riches and geir.
King Hart is a poem of doubtful accreditation. Like The Palice of Honor, it is a later allegory and, as such, of high literary merit. Its subject is human life told in the allegory of King Hart (Heart) in his castle, surrounded by his five servitors (the senses), Queen, Plesance, Foresight and other courtiers. The poem runs to over 900 lines and is written in eight-lined stanzas. The text is preserved in the Maitland folio manuscript in the Pepysian library, Cambridge. It is not known to have been printed before 1786, when it appeared in Pinkerton's
John Pinkerton
John Pinkerton was a Scottish antiquarian, cartographer, author, numismatist, historian, and early advocate of Germanic racial supremacy theory....
Ancient Scottish Poems.
Political career after September 1513
Three weeks after the Battle of Flodden he, still Provost of St Giles, was admitted a burgess of Edinburgh. His father, the "Great Earl," was then the civil provostProvost (civil)
A provost is the ceremonial head of many Scottish local authorities, and under the name prévôt was a governmental position of varying importance in Ancien Regime France.-History:...
of the capital. The latter dying soon afterwards (January 1514) in Wigtownshire
Wigtownshire
Wigtownshire or the County of Wigtown is a registration county in the Southern Uplands of south west Scotland. Until 1975, the county was one of the administrative counties used for local government purposes, and is now administered as part of the council area of Dumfries and Galloway...
, where he had gone as justiciar
Justiciar
In medieval England and Ireland the Chief Justiciar was roughly equivalent to a modern Prime Minister as the monarch's chief minister. Similar positions existed on the Continent, particularly in Norman Italy. The term is the English form of the medieval Latin justiciarius or justitiarius In...
, and his son having been killed at Flodden, the succession fell to Gavin's nephew Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of Angus
Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of Angus
Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of Angus was a Scottish nobleman active during the reigns of James V and Mary, Queen of Scots...
.
The marriage of this youth to James IV
James IV of Scotland
James IV was King of Scots from 11 June 1488 to his death. He is generally regarded as the most successful of the Stewart monarchs of Scotland, but his reign ended with the disastrous defeat at the Battle of Flodden Field, where he became the last monarch from not only Scotland, but also from all...
's widow on 6 August 1514 did much to identify the Douglases with the English party in Scotland, as against the French party led by the Duke of Albany, and incidentally to determine the political career of his uncle Gavin. During the first weeks of the queen's sorrow after the battle, Gavin, with one or two colleagues of the council, acted as personal adviser, and it may be taken for granted that he supported the pretensions of the young earl. His own hopes of preferment had been strengthened by the death of many of the higher clergy at Flodden.
The first outcome of the new connection was his appointment to the Abbacy of Aberbrothwick
Abbot of Arbroath
Abbot of Arbroath was the head of the Tironensian Benedictine monastic community of Arbroath Abbey, Angus, Scotland, founded under the patronage of King William of Scotland from Kelso Abbey and dedicated to St Thomas of Canterbury. The abbot, John Gedy, was granted the mitre on 26 June 1396...
by the queen regent, before her marriage, probably in June 1514. Soon after the marriage (of Gavin's nephew) she nominated him Archbishop of St Andrews
Archbishop of St Andrews
The Bishop of St. Andrews was the ecclesiastical head of the Diocese of St Andrews and then, as Archbishop of St Andrews , the Archdiocese of St Andrews.The name St Andrews is not the town or church's original name...
, in succession to William Elphinstone
William Elphinstone
William Elphinstone was a Scottish statesman, Bishop of Aberdeen and founder of the University of Aberdeen.He was born in Glasgow, and educated at the University of Glasgow, taking the degree of M.A. in 1452. After practising for a short time as a lawyer in the church courts, he was ordained a...
, archbishop-designate. But John Hepburn, prior of St Andrews, having obtained the vote of the chapter, expelled him, and was himself in turn expelled by Andrew Forman
Andrew Forman
Andrew Forman was a Scottish diplomat and prelate who became Bishop of Moray in 1501, Archbishop of Bourges in France, in 1513, Archbishop of St Andrews in 1514 as well as the headship of several monasteries....
, Bishop of Moray
Bishop of Moray
The Bishop of Moray or Bishop of Elgin was the ecclesiastical head of the Diocese of Moray in northern Scotland, one of Scotland's 13 medieval bishoprics...
, who had been nominated by the pope. In the interval, Douglas's rights in Aberbrothwick had been transferred to James Beaton
James Beaton
Dr. James Beaton was a Scottish church leader, the uncle of Dr. David Cardinal Beaton and the Keeper of the Great Seal of Scotland....
, Archbishop of Glasgow
Archbishop of Glasgow
The Bishop of Glasgow, from 1492 Archbishop of Glasgow, was the ecclesiastical head of the Diocese of Glasgow and then, as Archbishop of Glasgow, the Archdiocese of Glasgow...
, and he was now without title or temporality. The breach between the Queen's party and Albany's had widened, and the queen's advisers had begun an intrigue with England, to the end that the royal widow and her young son should be removed to Henry
Henry VIII of England
Henry VIII was King of England from 21 April 1509 until his death. He was Lord, and later King, of Ireland, as well as continuing the nominal claim by the English monarchs to the Kingdom of France...
's court. In those deliberations Gavin Douglas took an active part, and for this reason stimulated the opposition which successfully thwarted his preferment.
Bishop of Dunkeld
In January 1515 on the death of George BrownGeorge Brown (bishop)
George Brown was a late 15th century and early 16th century Scottish churchman. He first appears on record in 1478 as the rector of the church of Tyningham, and is called a clerk of the diocese of Brechin...
, Bishop of Dunkeld
Bishop of Dunkeld
The Bishop of Dunkeld is the ecclesiastical head of the Diocese of Dunkeld, one of the largest and more important of Scotland's 13 medieval bishoprics, whose first recorded bishop is an early 12th century cleric named Cormac...
, Douglas's hopes revived. The queen nominated him to the now vacant seat, which he ultimately obtained, though not without trouble. For John Stewart, 2nd Earl of Atholl
John Stewart, 2nd Earl of Atholl
John Stewart, 2nd Earl of Atholl was the second Earl of Atholl. He fought in the Battle of Flodden Field on 9 September 1513.-Biography:He was born after 1475 to John Stewart, 1st Earl of Atholl and Eleanor Sinclair. He married Lady Janet Campbell, daughter of Archibald Campbell, 2nd Earl of Argyll...
had forced his brother, Andrew Stewart
Andrew Stewart (d. 1541)
Andrew Stewart was a 16th century Scottish noble and cleric. He was the legitimate son of John Stewart, 1st Earl of Atholl and Eleanor Sinclair, daughter of William Sinclair, Earl of Orkney. His paternal grandmother was Joan Beaufort, former queen-consort of Scotland...
, prebendary of Craig, upon the chapter, and had put him in possession of the bishop's palace. The queen appealed to the pope and was seconded by her brother of England, with the result that the pope's sanction was obtained on 18 February 1515. Some of the correspondence of Douglas and his friends incident to this transaction was intercepted. When Albany came from France and assumed the regency, these documents and the "purchase" of the bishopric from Rome contrary to statute were made the basis of an attack on Douglas, who was imprisoned in Edinburgh Castle
Edinburgh Castle
Edinburgh Castle is a fortress which dominates the skyline of the city of Edinburgh, Scotland, from its position atop the volcanic Castle Rock. Human habitation of the site is dated back as far as the 9th century BC, although the nature of early settlement is unclear...
, thereafter in St Andrews Castle
St Andrews Castle
St Andrew's Castle is a picturesque ruin located in the coastal Royal Burgh of St Andrews in Fife, Scotland. The castle sits on a rocky promontory overlooking a small beach called Castle Sands and the adjoining North Sea. There has been a castle standing at the site since the times of Bishop Roger...
(under the charge of his old opponent, Prior Hepburn), and later in Dunbar Castle
Dunbar Castle
Dunbar Castle is the remnants of one of the most mighty fortresses in Scotland, situated over the harbour of the town of Dunbar, in East Lothian.-Early history:...
, and again in Edinburgh. The pope's intervention procured his release, after nearly a year's imprisonment. The queen meanwhile had retired to England. After July 1516 Douglas appears to have been in possession of his see, and to have patched up a diplomatic peace with Albany.
On 17 May 1517 the Bishop of Dunkeld proceeded with Albany to France
Kingdom of France
The Kingdom of France was one of the most powerful states to exist in Europe during the second millennium.It originated from the Western portion of the Frankish empire, and consolidated significant power and influence over the next thousand years. Louis XIV, also known as the Sun King, developed a...
to conduct the negotiations which ended in the Treaty of Rouen
Treaty of Rouen
The Treaty of Rouen was signed on August 26, 1517 between France and Scotland. The treaty provided the renewal of the Auld Alliance in terms of mutual military assistance and reciprocal aid...
. He was back in Scotland towards the end of June. Albany's longer absence in France permitted the partyfaction of the nobles to come to a head in a plot by James Hamilton, 1st Earl of Arran
James Hamilton, 1st Earl of Arran
James Hamilton, 1st Earl of Arran and 2nd Lord Hamilton was a Scottish nobleman and first cousin of James IV of Scotland.-Biography:...
to seize the Earl of Angus, the Queen's husband. The issue of this plot was the well-known fight of Cleanse the Causeway
Cleanse the Causeway
The skirmish known as Cleanse the Causeway, or Clear the Causeway, took place in the High Street of Edinburgh, Scotland, on April 30, 1520, between rivals James Hamilton, 1st Earl of Arran, chief of Clan Hamilton, and Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of Angus, chief of Clan Douglas.The skirmish was the...
, in which Gavin Douglas's part stands out in picturesque relief. The triumph over the Hamiltons had an unsettling effect upon the Earl of Angus. He made free of the queen's rents and abducted Lord Traquair's daughter. The Queen set about to obtain a divorce, and used her influence for the return of Albany as a means of undoing her husband's power. Albany's arrival in November 1521, with a large body of French men-at-arms, compelled Angus, with the bishop and others, to flee to the Borders
Scottish Borders
The Scottish Borders is one of 32 local government council areas of Scotland. It is bordered by Dumfries and Galloway in the west, South Lanarkshire and West Lothian in the north west, City of Edinburgh, East Lothian, Midlothian to the north; and the non-metropolitan counties of Northumberland...
. From this retreat Gavin Douglas was sent by the earl to the English court, to ask for aid against the French party and against the queen, who was reported to be the mistress of the regent. Meanwhile he was deprived of his bishopric, and forced, for safety, to remain in England, where he effected nothing in the interests of his nephew. The declaration of war by England against Scotland, in answer to the recent Franco-Scottish negotiations, prevented his return. His case was further complicated by the libellous animosity of James Beaton
James Beaton
Dr. James Beaton was a Scottish church leader, the uncle of Dr. David Cardinal Beaton and the Keeper of the Great Seal of Scotland....
, Archbishop of Glasgow
Archbishop of Glasgow
The Bishop of Glasgow, from 1492 Archbishop of Glasgow, was the ecclesiastical head of the Diocese of Glasgow and then, as Archbishop of Glasgow, the Archdiocese of Glasgow...
(whose life he had saved in the "Cleanse the Causeway" incident), who was anxious to put himself forward and thwart Douglas in the election to the archbishopric of St Andrews, left vacant by the death of Forman.
Death
In 1522 Douglas was stricken by the plagueBubonic plague
Plague is a deadly infectious disease that is caused by the enterobacteria Yersinia pestis, named after the French-Swiss bacteriologist Alexandre Yersin. Primarily carried by rodents and spread to humans via fleas, the disease is notorious throughout history, due to the unrivaled scale of death...
which raged in London, and died at the house of his friend Lord Dacre
Thomas Dacre, 2nd Baron Dacre
Thomas Dacre, 2nd Baron Dacre of Gilsland, KG was the son of Humphrey Dacre, 1st Baron Dacre of Gilsland and Mabel Parr; great-aunt of queen consort Catherine Parr, the sixth and final wife of King Henry VIII of England.-Early career:He was born in Cumberland...
. During the closing years of exile he was on intimate terms with the historian Polydore Virgil, and one of his last acts was to arrange to give Polydore a corrected version of Major
John Mair
John Mair was a Scottish philosopher, much admired in his day and an acknowledged influence on all the great thinkers of the time. He was a very renowned teacher and his works much collected and frequently republished across Europe...
's account of Scottish affairs. Douglas was buried in the church of the Savoy
Savoy Palace
The Savoy Palace was considered the grandest nobleman's residence of medieval London, until it was destroyed in the Peasants' Revolt of 1381. It fronted the Strand, on the site of the present Savoy Theatre and the Savoy Hotel that memorialise its name...
, where a monumental brass (removed from its proper site after the fire in 1864) still records his death and interment.
For Douglas's career see, in addition to the public records and general histories, John Sage
John Sage (bishop)
John Sage was a Scottish nonjuring bishop and controversialist in the Jacobite interest.-Life:He was born at Creich, Fifeshire, where his ancestors had lived for seven generations. His father was a captain in the royalist forces at the time of the taking of Dundee by George Monck in 1651...
's Life in Thomas Ruddiman
Thomas Ruddiman
Thomas Ruddiman was a Scottish classical scholar.-Life:He was born at Raggal, Banffshire, where his father was a farmer, and educated at the University of Aberdeen. Through the influence of Dr Archibald Pitcairne he became an assistant in the Advocates' Library, Edinburgh...
's edition, and that by John Small
John Small (librarian)
-Life:The son of John Small and Margaret Brown his wife, he was born at Edinburgh in 1828. He was educated at the Edinburgh Academy and the university, where he graduated M.A. in 1847. In the same year, on the death of his father, who was acting librarian of the university library, he succeeded to...
in the first volume of his edition The Poetical Works of Gavin Douglas (1874).
Modern Editions
- Gavin Douglas's Translation of the Aeneid, edited by Gordon Kendal, 2 volumes, London, MHRA, 2011
- Virgil's Aeneid translated into Scottish Verse by Gavin Douglas, Bishop of Dunkeld, edited by David F.C. Coldwell, 4 Volumes, Edinburgh, Blackwood for The Scottish Text Society, 1957–64
- Gavin Douglas: A selection from his Poetry, edited by Sydney Goodsir SmithSydney Goodsir SmithSydney Goodsir Smith was a Scottish poet, artist, dramatist and novelist. He wrote poetry in literary Scots often referred to as Lallans, and was a major figure of the Scottish Renaissance....
, Edinburgh, Oliver & Boyd for The Saltire Society, 1959 - Selections from Gavin Douglas, edited by David F. C. Coldwell, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1964
- The Shorter Poems of Gavin Douglas, edited by Priscilla J Bawcutt, Edinburgh, Blackwood for The Scottish Text Society, 1967 (reprint 2003)
- The palis of honoure [by] Gawyne Dowglas, Amsterdam, Theatrum Orbis Terrarum; New York, Da Capo Press, 1969
- The Makars: the poems of Henryson, Dunbar, and Douglas, edited, introduced, and annotated by J.A. Tasioulas, Edinburgh, Canongate Books, 1999
Primary sources
- Ellis, Henry, ed., Original Letters Illustrative of English History, 3rd Series, vol.1, Richard Bentley, London (1846) pp.293-303, letters from Douglas to Cardinal Wolsey
- Maxwell, Sir Herbert. A History of the House of Douglas. II Vols. Freemantle. London, 1902
- Nicholson, Ranald. Scotland, the Later Middle Ages. Oliver and Boyd. Edinburgh 1978
