John of Islay, Earl of Ross
Encyclopedia
John of Islay (1434–1503) was a late medieval
Scottish
magnate. He was Earl of Ross
and last Lord of the Isles
as well as being Mac Domhnaill, chief of Clan Donald
.
John was born to Alexander of Islay, Earl of Ross and Lord of the Isles
, and Elizabeth, daughter of Alexander Seton the lord of Gordon and Huntly
. He succeeded to his father's territories in 1449 while a still a minor.
His wife, Elizabeth Livingstone, accused him of trying to murder her while she was pregnant. He started his rule as a lion and ended as a sheep, having in the process alienated almost everyone, including the closest members of his family.
Early in his life he was forced to marry a woman he did not love for a promise that was never kept. John's marriage to Elizabeth had been determined by the usual calculations of profit and position, as were those of other important people of the time. There was one important difference with the alliance of John and Elizabeth: he came from a great landed family, she did not. Elizabeth was the daughter of Sir James Livingstone, a powerful politician during the minority of James II
, but in a conservative, land-based society, a figure of no lasting significance. John, with a large and hungry following at his heels, rich as he was, always needed more land. Sir James' power was purely personal, and his daughter would not normally have been considered as a suitable match for the Lord of the Isles. It seems he was persuaded to marry her after certain unspecified promises from the king. After Livingstone fell from power in the early 1450s James refused to honour these promises. Instead of growing to love or at least respect Elizabeth, John came to loath her.
Soon after his disgrace Sir James took refuge with his son-in-law. John at once rose in revolt, taking the royal castles of Inverness
, Urquhart
and Ruthven, perhaps less to show his support for the Livingstones than to remind the king of his broken word.(speculation)
, the most powerful noble in southern Scotland. We can probably date to this time the famous bond between Ross and Douglas, men who were hardly natural allies. There is absolutely no evidence that Ross, Douglas or the Alexander Lindsay, 4th Earl of Crawford
, the other party to the bond, planned to depose the king, though this has not prevented some historians from making such a claim. If this had been the intention James would presumably taken much more direct action, rather than simply invite Douglas to Stirling
in February 1452 to discuss the matter, and Douglas would hardly have put himself in the power of the king, even with a safe conduct. As it was James tried to persuade the earl to break the bond and, when he refused, murdered him in a fit of royal anger. If the bond had been so treasonable, the arrest and trial of Douglas would have served his ends much more effectively than this crude crime of passion.
John showed little concern for the fate of his ally, especially as James effectively turned a blind eye to the occupation of the northern castles. His relations with the crown continued to improve and he did nothing to prevent the final destruction of the house of Douglas in 1455, even obtaining title to some of their border estates. The sudden and unexpected death of James in 1460 brought an early change of direction. Soon after the accession of James III
, John received a proposal that was to lead to his eventual ruin.
had chased the Lancastrian Henry VI
from the country. Henry took refuge in Scotland, where he was well-received. Edward at once sent the exiled earl of Douglas, the brother of the man murdered at Stirling, on a diplomatic mission to the Isles. At his court in the castle of Ardtornish
John agreed to send his plenipotentiaries to London
. This was a dangerous move, for while John's predecessors had contacts with the English, they had never committed themselves too far. Moreover, the English had never made any real attempt to assist the Lordship when it was in difficulties with the crown of Scotland. It should have been perfectly clear that Edward was trying to create a diversion. Sadly for the Lord of the Isles, it was not.
In February 1462 John's representatives concluded an agreement once referred to as the Treaty of Westminster-Ardtornish
, that envisaged nothing less than the conquest and partition of Scotland. John agreed to pay homage to Edward in return for his help in obtaining all of Scotland north of the Forth. The treaty is a remarkably vague document considering the risks John was prepared to take. It says absolutely nothing about the nature, scale and timing of English support. But for Edward it was a brilliant diplomatic coup. He achieved maximum results at minimum expense, laying out only as much bait as necessary to create a political disturbance in northern Scotland.
Even before the agreement was concluded the Islemen took to arms, advancing eastwards under the command of Angus Og
, John's illegitimate son. Once again Inverness was captured and the people of the north instructed to deny the authority of James III. Beyond this we know nothing from the sparse contemporary sources, not even how this rebellion was brought under control. It most certainly had the effect Edward desired; for the Scottish government, faced with rebellion in the north, and fearful of attack in the south, dropped the politically embarrassing Lancastrian connection. John, presumably now aware how worthless the Westminster agreement truly was, backed down, declaring his seizure of the Inverness customs had been illegal. No further action was taken against him-for the present.
, and anxious for good relations with Scotland, finally revealed the full terms of the Westminster treaty. John was summoned before parliament to answer for his treasons, and when he failed to appear was declared forfeit. With no allies, either at home or abroad, John had little choice but to make his peace with the king in the summer of 1476. Considering the full extent of his treason, far greater than that which had destroyed the Border Douglases, he was treated with comparative leniency. He lost the earldom of Ross-outwith the Isle of Skye-as well as Knapdale
and Kintyre
, but retained control of the Hebrides
. The designation of Lord of the Isles, moreover, was from this point forward to be granted by the crown, rather than self-assumed.
But John had lost much more than land: he lost prestige and standing among his own kin. The Lordship had always depended on territorial expansion to give life to its warrior values; but now that it was contracting all of the latent tensions came forth, finding expression in the person of Angus Óg. Angus, according to Hugh Macdonald, ejected John both from the leadership of the clan and from his own home, forcing him to seek shelter under an old boat. Afterwards John managed to gain some support. His fleet of galleys met those of Angus sometime in the early 1480s-we cannot be more precise than that-off the coast of Mull
to the north-west of the present town of Tobermory, an area ever afterwards to be known as Bloody Bay. The Battle of Bloody Bay
was a complete victory for Angus, who continued to dominate the affairs of Clan Donald up to his murder in 1490.
The Annals of the Four Masters
record the murder of his son, John Oge, by Diarmait MacCairbre
in 1490.
With the death of Angus he came back out of the shadows, but he appears to have been firmly under the tutelage of his nephew, Alexander of Lochalsh. Alexander tried to re-establish control over the earldom of Ross, but was defeated by the Mackenzies, a leading local family, at the Battle of Park. In 1493 James IV brought the Lordship of the Isles to an end. John was taken to the Lowlands, destined to live out what was left of his life as a pensioner of the king, finally drifting out of history, apparently unlamented even by his own kin. He died not in Paisley
in 1498 but Dundee
in 1503. At his own request, he is said to have been laid to rest in the tomb of Robert II
, his royal ancestor; however Robert was buried at Scone not Paisley, where the tomb of Robert III
is located.
In 1540 James V
in suppressing further disorders in the west reserved the style Lord of the Isles to the Crown (so far as he could do so), where it remains to the present day, if meaning nothing more than the destruction of the ancient Norse-Gaelic lordship. The office itself has been extinct since the 15th century.
Scotland in the Late Middle Ages
Scotland in the late Middle Ages established its independence from England under figures including William Wallace in the late 13th century and Robert Bruce in the 14th century...
Scottish
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...
magnate. He was Earl of Ross
Earl of Ross
The Mormaer or Earl of Ross was the leader of a medieval Gaelic lordship in northern Scotland, roughly between the River Oykel and the River Beauly.-Origins and transfers:...
and last Lord of the Isles
Lord of the Isles
The designation Lord of the Isles is today a title of Scottish nobility with historical roots that go back beyond the Kingdom of Scotland. It emerged from a series of hybrid Viking/Gaelic rulers of the west coast and islands of Scotland in the Middle Ages, who wielded sea-power with fleets of...
as well as being Mac Domhnaill, chief of Clan Donald
Clan Donald
Clan Donald is one of the largest Scottish clans. There are numerous branches to the clan. Several of these have chiefs recognised by the Lord Lyon King of Arms; these are: Clan Macdonald of Sleat, Clan Macdonald of Clanranald, Clan MacDonell of Glengarry, Clan MacDonald of Keppoch, and Clan...
.
John was born to Alexander of Islay, Earl of Ross and Lord of the Isles
Alexander of Islay, Earl of Ross
Alexander of Islay or Alexander MacDonald was a medieval Scottish nobleman, who succeeded his father Domhnall of Islay as Lord of the Isles and rose to the rank of Earl of Ross...
, and Elizabeth, daughter of Alexander Seton the lord of Gordon and Huntly
Huntly
-Places:* Huntly, Aberdeenshire, a small town in Scotland, UK* Huntly, New Zealand, a small town south of Auckland** Huntly power station, a major coal-fired electricity plant in the same town, often referred to simply as 'Huntly'* Huntly, Victoria, Australia...
. He succeeded to his father's territories in 1449 while a still a minor.
Marriage and Land
It is difficult to know what to make of John of the Isles, the man who was destined to preside over the ruin of a great inheritance. He appears to have had an odd assortment of qualities, sometimes assertive and arrogant, other times weak and submissive. Hugh Macdonald, the seventeenth century historian of Clan Donald, says that he was; a meek, modest man...and a scholar more fit to be a churchman than to command so many irregular tribes of people"His wife, Elizabeth Livingstone, accused him of trying to murder her while she was pregnant. He started his rule as a lion and ended as a sheep, having in the process alienated almost everyone, including the closest members of his family.
Early in his life he was forced to marry a woman he did not love for a promise that was never kept. John's marriage to Elizabeth had been determined by the usual calculations of profit and position, as were those of other important people of the time. There was one important difference with the alliance of John and Elizabeth: he came from a great landed family, she did not. Elizabeth was the daughter of Sir James Livingstone, a powerful politician during the minority of James II
James II of Scotland
James II reigned as King of Scots from 1437 to his death.He was the son of James I, King of Scots, and Joan Beaufort...
, but in a conservative, land-based society, a figure of no lasting significance. John, with a large and hungry following at his heels, rich as he was, always needed more land. Sir James' power was purely personal, and his daughter would not normally have been considered as a suitable match for the Lord of the Isles. It seems he was persuaded to marry her after certain unspecified promises from the king. After Livingstone fell from power in the early 1450s James refused to honour these promises. Instead of growing to love or at least respect Elizabeth, John came to loath her.
Soon after his disgrace Sir James took refuge with his son-in-law. John at once rose in revolt, taking the royal castles of Inverness
Inverness Castle
Inverness Castle sits on a cliff overlooking the River Ness, in Inverness, Scotland. The red sand stone structure evident today was built in 1836 by architect William Burn. It is built on the site of an 11th century defensive structure. Today, it houses Inverness Sheriff Court. There has been a...
, Urquhart
Clan Urquhart
Urquhart is a Highland Scottish clan. They traditionally occupied the lands in the district and town of Cromarty, a former Royal Burgh with an excellent natural harbour on the tip of The Black Isle. Chiefs of the Clan were Barons and hereditary Sheriffs of the county for hundreds of years...
and Ruthven, perhaps less to show his support for the Livingstones than to remind the king of his broken word.(speculation)
Treaties and Allies
This revolt of the Lord of the Isles came at a dangerous time for the king, who was involved in a serious dispute with the eighth Earl of DouglasWilliam Douglas, 8th Earl of Douglas
William Douglas, 8th Earl of Douglas, 2nd Earl of Avondale was a Scottish nobleman. He was the eldest son of James Douglas, 7th Earl of Douglas and Beatrice Sinclair....
, the most powerful noble in southern Scotland. We can probably date to this time the famous bond between Ross and Douglas, men who were hardly natural allies. There is absolutely no evidence that Ross, Douglas or the Alexander Lindsay, 4th Earl of Crawford
Alexander Lindsay, 4th Earl of Crawford
Alexander Lindsay, 4th Earl of Crawford acceded 1446, died September 1453.Father: David Lindsay, 3rd Earl of Crawford Mother: Marjory OgilvieMarried Margaret Dunbar and had 3 children, Elizabeth, David 5th Earl born 1440 and Alexander the 7th Earl....
, the other party to the bond, planned to depose the king, though this has not prevented some historians from making such a claim. If this had been the intention James would presumably taken much more direct action, rather than simply invite Douglas to Stirling
Stirling
Stirling is a city and former ancient burgh in Scotland, and is at the heart of the wider Stirling council area. The city is clustered around a large fortress and medieval old-town beside the River Forth...
in February 1452 to discuss the matter, and Douglas would hardly have put himself in the power of the king, even with a safe conduct. As it was James tried to persuade the earl to break the bond and, when he refused, murdered him in a fit of royal anger. If the bond had been so treasonable, the arrest and trial of Douglas would have served his ends much more effectively than this crude crime of passion.
John showed little concern for the fate of his ally, especially as James effectively turned a blind eye to the occupation of the northern castles. His relations with the crown continued to improve and he did nothing to prevent the final destruction of the house of Douglas in 1455, even obtaining title to some of their border estates. The sudden and unexpected death of James in 1460 brought an early change of direction. Soon after the accession of James III
James III of Scotland
James III was King of Scots from 1460 to 1488. James was an unpopular and ineffective monarch owing to an unwillingness to administer justice fairly, a policy of pursuing alliance with the Kingdom of England, and a disastrous relationship with nearly all his extended family.His reputation as the...
, John received a proposal that was to lead to his eventual ruin.
Ardtornish and Westminster
So far John had done rather well. He had defied the king and survived. He extended his power and influence from Inverness to the English border. Had he died at this point he might be well remembered in the annals of Clan Donald. But he now took a fatal step, the consequences of which were to betray the essential weakness of his character. In England the Yorkists under Edward IVEdward IV of England
Edward IV was King of England from 4 March 1461 until 3 October 1470, and again from 11 April 1471 until his death. He was the first Yorkist King of England...
had chased the Lancastrian Henry VI
Henry VI of England
Henry VI was King of England from 1422 to 1461 and again from 1470 to 1471, and disputed King of France from 1422 to 1453. Until 1437, his realm was governed by regents. Contemporaneous accounts described him as peaceful and pious, not suited for the violent dynastic civil wars, known as the Wars...
from the country. Henry took refuge in Scotland, where he was well-received. Edward at once sent the exiled earl of Douglas, the brother of the man murdered at Stirling, on a diplomatic mission to the Isles. At his court in the castle of Ardtornish
Ardtornish Castle
Ardtornish Castle is situated in the grounds of the Ardtornish estate in Morvern, on the west coast of Scotland. It stands at the seaward end of a promontory which extends in a southerly direction into the Sound of Mull, approximately a mile south-east of the village of Lochaline, Highland...
John agreed to send his plenipotentiaries to 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...
. This was a dangerous move, for while John's predecessors had contacts with the English, they had never committed themselves too far. Moreover, the English had never made any real attempt to assist the Lordship when it was in difficulties with the crown of Scotland. It should have been perfectly clear that Edward was trying to create a diversion. Sadly for the Lord of the Isles, it was not.
In February 1462 John's representatives concluded an agreement once referred to as the Treaty of Westminster-Ardtornish
Treaty of Westminster (1461)
The Treaty of Westminster was signed on February 13, 1461 between the Lord of the Isles and the Earl of Ross. The agreement proposed that Scotland be divided between King Edward IV of England and James Douglas, 9th Earl of Douglas...
, that envisaged nothing less than the conquest and partition of Scotland. John agreed to pay homage to Edward in return for his help in obtaining all of Scotland north of the Forth. The treaty is a remarkably vague document considering the risks John was prepared to take. It says absolutely nothing about the nature, scale and timing of English support. But for Edward it was a brilliant diplomatic coup. He achieved maximum results at minimum expense, laying out only as much bait as necessary to create a political disturbance in northern Scotland.
Even before the agreement was concluded the Islemen took to arms, advancing eastwards under the command of Angus Og
Aonghas Óg
Aonghas Óg was a Scottish nobleman who was the last independent Lord of the Isles.-Biography:He was the bastard son of John of Islay, Earl of Ross . Aonghas became a rebel against both his father and against the Scottish crown...
, John's illegitimate son. Once again Inverness was captured and the people of the north instructed to deny the authority of James III. Beyond this we know nothing from the sparse contemporary sources, not even how this rebellion was brought under control. It most certainly had the effect Edward desired; for the Scottish government, faced with rebellion in the north, and fearful of attack in the south, dropped the politically embarrassing Lancastrian connection. John, presumably now aware how worthless the Westminster agreement truly was, backed down, declaring his seizure of the Inverness customs had been illegal. No further action was taken against him-for the present.
Angus Óg and Bloody Bay
In the mid 1470s Edward, preparing for a war with FranceFrance
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
, and anxious for good relations with Scotland, finally revealed the full terms of the Westminster treaty. John was summoned before parliament to answer for his treasons, and when he failed to appear was declared forfeit. With no allies, either at home or abroad, John had little choice but to make his peace with the king in the summer of 1476. Considering the full extent of his treason, far greater than that which had destroyed the Border Douglases, he was treated with comparative leniency. He lost the earldom of Ross-outwith the Isle of Skye-as well as Knapdale
Knapdale
Knapdale forms a rural district of Argyll and Bute in the Scottish Highlands, adjoining Kintyre to the south, and divided from the rest of Argyll to the north by the Crinan Canal. It includes two parishes, North Knapdale and South Knapdale....
and Kintyre
Kintyre
Kintyre is a peninsula in western Scotland, in the southwest of Argyll and Bute. The region stretches approximately 30 miles , from the Mull of Kintyre in the south, to East Loch Tarbert in the north...
, but retained control of the Hebrides
Hebrides
The Hebrides comprise a widespread and diverse archipelago off the west coast of Scotland. There are two main groups: the Inner and Outer Hebrides. These islands have a long history of occupation dating back to the Mesolithic and the culture of the residents has been affected by the successive...
. The designation of Lord of the Isles, moreover, was from this point forward to be granted by the crown, rather than self-assumed.
But John had lost much more than land: he lost prestige and standing among his own kin. The Lordship had always depended on territorial expansion to give life to its warrior values; but now that it was contracting all of the latent tensions came forth, finding expression in the person of Angus Óg. Angus, according to Hugh Macdonald, ejected John both from the leadership of the clan and from his own home, forcing him to seek shelter under an old boat. Afterwards John managed to gain some support. His fleet of galleys met those of Angus sometime in the early 1480s-we cannot be more precise than that-off the coast of Mull
Isle of Mull
The Isle of Mull or simply Mull is the second largest island of the Inner Hebrides, off the west coast of Scotland in the council area of Argyll and Bute....
to the north-west of the present town of Tobermory, an area ever afterwards to be known as Bloody Bay. The Battle of Bloody Bay
Battle of Bloody Bay
The Battle of Bloody Bay, or Blàr Bàgh na Fala in Scottish Gaelic, was a naval battle fought near Tobermory, Scotland. It was fought on the coast of Mull two miles north of Tobermory, between John of Islay, Earl of Ross, the Lord of the Isles and chief of Clan Donald; and his son, Angus Og Macdonald...
was a complete victory for Angus, who continued to dominate the affairs of Clan Donald up to his murder in 1490.
Twilight
What happened to John after Bloody Bay is uncertain; but he seems to have slipped quietly into temporary and obscure retirement.The Annals of the Four Masters
Annals of the Four Masters
The Annals of the Kingdom of Ireland or the Annals of the Four Masters are a chronicle of medieval Irish history...
record the murder of his son, John Oge, by Diarmait MacCairbre
Diarmait MacCairbre
Diarmait MacCairbre, Irish musician, executed 1490.According to the Annals of the Four Masters, in 1490:John Oge, the son of John More of Ilay , was treacherously slain by Diarmait Mac Cairbre, an Ultonian harper, who was one of his own servants; but Mac Carbry was quartered for this...
in 1490.
With the death of Angus he came back out of the shadows, but he appears to have been firmly under the tutelage of his nephew, Alexander of Lochalsh. Alexander tried to re-establish control over the earldom of Ross, but was defeated by the Mackenzies, a leading local family, at the Battle of Park. In 1493 James IV brought the Lordship of the Isles to an end. John was taken to the Lowlands, destined to live out what was left of his life as a pensioner of the king, finally drifting out of history, apparently unlamented even by his own kin. He died not in Paisley
Paisley
Paisley is the largest town in the historic county of Renfrewshire in the west central Lowlands of Scotland and serves as the administrative centre for the Renfrewshire council area...
in 1498 but Dundee
Dundee
Dundee is the fourth-largest city in Scotland and the 39th most populous settlement in the United Kingdom. It lies within the eastern central Lowlands on the north bank of the Firth of Tay, which feeds into the North Sea...
in 1503. At his own request, he is said to have been laid to rest in the tomb of Robert II
Robert II of Scotland
Robert II became King of Scots in 1371 as the first monarch of the House of Stewart. He was the son of Walter Stewart, hereditary High Steward of Scotland and of Marjorie Bruce, daughter of Robert I and of his first wife Isabella of Mar...
, his royal ancestor; however Robert was buried at Scone not Paisley, where the tomb of Robert III
Robert III of Scotland
Robert III was King of Scots from 1390 to his death. His given name was John Stewart, and he was known primarily as the Earl of Carrick before ascending the throne at age 53...
is located.
In 1540 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...
in suppressing further disorders in the west reserved the style Lord of the Isles to the Crown (so far as he could do so), where it remains to the present day, if meaning nothing more than the destruction of the ancient Norse-Gaelic lordship. The office itself has been extinct since the 15th century.