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Jewell, Helen M.
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Women in Dark Age and Early Medieval Europe c.500–1200.
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‘A Nursery of Saints’: St Margaret of Scotland Reconsidered
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 17 June 2022
Extract
Writing of the early and impressionable years spent by Ailred in the household of king David of Scotland, Knowles, in a felicitous phrase, remarked that the Scottish court had been ‘something of a nursery of saints’ during the previous half-century. The conduct, character and traditions of that spiritual kindergarten he associated with ‘that âme d’élite’, the ‘exquisite St Margaret’, and the contrast between the Scotland of king David and that of his father Malcolm Canmore, the proliferation of religious vocations and works of practical piety which followed the marriage of Malcolm and Margaret, make his claim self-evident. Within the royal circle if the careers of David and Edith/Matilda, and in the next generation of Waldef and Ailred, supply conspicuous testimony they do not stand alone. For Ailred, writing C1153/4, Malcolm’s oldest surviving son Edgar was homo… dulcís et amabilis, cognato suo regi Edwardo [the Confessor] per omnia similis, while his successor Alexander ‘the fierce’, was ‘humble and loving to clerks and monks’. Litteratus, according to Ailred, his active interest in the conduct of church life, and his piety reflect the interests and example of his mother. As earl he was the only layman present at the opening of St Cuthbert’s tomb in 1104, while his father, allegedly, was present at the foundation of the new cathedral at Durham in C1093.
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References
1 Knowles, MO p 242.
2 Ibid pp 170, 242.
3 [ Ailred, , Genealogia Regum Anglorum, ed] Twysden, R., [Historiae Anglicanae Scriptores Decem], cols 347-70 (London 1652)Google Scholar col 367.
4 Ibid col 368.
5 [Symeon of Durham], H[istoria] R[egum], sa 1104: ‘praesente Alexandra comite, postea Scottorum rege’. Alexander is the only named layman present, and although the HR account continues ‘et multis aliis’ the full account given in chapter 18 of the anonymous Historia Translationum Sancti Cuthberti makes it clear that these, numbering forty, included no laymen—see [Symeonis Dunelmensis Opera et Collectanea, ed Hodgson] Hinde, I, SS 51 (1867) p 195. For additional comment on Alexander’s presence, which is not mentioned by any Scottish source, see Fflorence of] W[orcester, Chronicon], sa 1104.
6 See HR sa 1093, where the date is given as 11 August. This account records the initiative of the bishop of Durham and names Malcolm III and prior Turgot as those responsible for laying the first foundation stones. Symeon’s H[istoria] D[unclmensis] E[cclesiae], however, under the same date, makes no mention whatsoever of Malcolm; see also Ritchie p 59; the family devotion to St Cuthbert is clearly demonstrated by Edgar (king 1095-1107) who terms him ‘my lord’ in one of his writs, and if his early generosity to Durham was later scaled down it remained substantial—see Duncan, [A. A. M.], [Scotland, the Making of the Kingdom] (Edinburgh 1975) pp 125–8Google Scholar; for the foundation of Coldingham see MRHS pp 55–6.
7 See Pinkerton, [J.], [Lives of the Scottish Saints], revised and enlarged Metcalfe, W. M., 2 vols (Paisley 1889) 2 pp 189–92.Google Scholar
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9 For some discussion of Waldef see [Derek] Baker, , [‘Legend and reality: the case of] Waldef [of Melrose’], SCH 12 (1975) pp 59–82Google Scholar, and Baker, , ‘Patronage in the early twelfth-century church: Walter Espec, Kirkham and Rievaulx’, Traditio, Knsis, Renovatio aus theologischer Sicht, ed Jaspert, B. and Mohr, R. (Marburg 1976) pp 92–100.Google Scholar
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11 In 1226.
12 Potthast 2 p 999, no 11753 (Reg Dunf no 281).
13 Potthast 2 p 987, no 11632a, 24 April 1245.
14 Potthast 2 p 1037, no 12252, 13 August 1246 (Reg Dunf no 285).
15 Potthast 2 p 1142, no 13800 (Reg Dunf no 290).
16 Potthast 2 p 1142, no 13807 (Reg Dunf no 291).
17 Duncan p 558, for the succession of Alexander III see pp 552-60.
18 21 April 1245.
19 Duncan p 558.
20 See Powicke, [F. M.], Henry III and the Lord Edward, 2 vols (Oxford 1948) 2 pp 163–7Google Scholar; Powicke, , The Thirteenth Century (Oxford 1954) pp 102–5Google Scholar; A House of Kings, ed E. Carpenter (London 1964) pp 170-85. See also 13. Harvey, , Westminster Abbey and its estates in the middle ages (Oxford 1877).Google Scholar
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23 Ibid p 122, referring to the mortuary roll of Vitalis of Savigny.
24 Alexander III’s bull of canonisation was issued on 7 February 1161, without recourse to a general council, see Barlow pp 130-3; for an admirable overall account of the development of the cult ibid pp 112-33.
25 Ibid p 130. Barlow remarks of the chapter headed ‘De sancto Edwardo rege confessore et virgine’ that ‘this must be a later addition, for the text ignores the king’s sanctity, virginity and miracles’.
26 Ibid p xxxv.
27 In the preface addressed to abbot Laurence of Westminster, Vita S. Edwardi regis, PL 115 (1854) cols 737-90 (at cols 739-40); also printed in Twysden pp 369-410; see also Barlow pp xxxv-vii, 130.
28 Ibid pp 1, 113-15: ‘the company which assembled in 1102… had come together for mixed reasons and without much confidence. It could not have been a very splendid or public ceremony’. Compare the sceptical reaction of those not present at the initial inspection of St Cuthbert’s remains two years later.
29 See Barlow’s comments pp 114-15, 119-23.
30 Southern, [R. W.], [St Anselm and his Biographer] (Cambridge 1963) pp 188–90Google Scholar: ‘It was not, as is sometimes thought, a grand plan of national appeasement that led Henry to seek a marriage with Matilda. In his early policy he was markedly hostile to the English and an alliance with a princess of the old stock would not in itself have appealed to him. The English could not harm him, but the Norman baronage presented difficulties of alarming proportions. In these circumstances a marriage with the sister of the king of Scotland probably offered the best means of protecting his rear’. Compare Barlow p 121. It need hardly be said that the advancement of Edith/Matilda should not be considered apart from the subsequent favour shown to her sister Mary and brothers Alexander and David.
31 See, for example, [William of Malmesbury], G[esta] R[egum], bk 5, cap 418; ASC sa 1100; [ Eadmer, ], H[istoria] N[ovorum in Anglia], trans Bosanquet, G. (London 1964) bk 3, p 126.Google Scholar
32 Southern pp 182-3; on Wilton see also Barlow pp 91-101.
33 HN p 127.
34 Ibid, see Southern pp 182-93.
35 Southern pp 191-3.
36 GR bk 5. cap 418.
37 Ibid; see Barlow pp 121-2. For the Aldgate account of the seizing of her body by the monks of Westminster, so that it should not be buried at the Augustinian priory, see The Cartulary of Holy Trinity Aldgate, ed G. Hodgett, London Record Society 16 (1928) p 997.
38 Haec iussa et haec vota ego libens amplector; amplectens, multum veneror; venerans, vobis congratulor, quae a Rege Angelorum constituta Regina Anglorum, vitam matris Reginae, quae semper ad regnum anhelabat Angelorum, non solum audire, sed etiam litteris impressam desiderata iugiter inspicere; ut quae faciem matris parum noveraris, virtutum eius notitiam plenius habeatis, Pinkerton 2 p 159. An English translation of the Life is included in E[arly] S[ources of] S[cottish] H[istory], trans A. O. Anderson, 2 vols (Edinburgh 1922) 2 pp 59-60.
39 Ritchie, [R. L. G.], [The Normans in Scotland] (Edinburgh 1954) p 396.Google Scholar
40 Vita [S. Margaritae Regime Scotiae], cap 2; Pinkerton 2 pp 160-5. Chapters are given in conformity with Hinde 1 p 235: Pinkerton’s tabulation differs.
41 Ritchie p 397.
42 Ibid p 396.
43 See Barlow pp 112-33.
44 ESSH 2 p 64; ex solo… patre frater Edmundi Regis; cuius filio Margarita exorta, claritate meritorum ciaram perornat seriem progenitorum, Pinkerton 2 p 162.
45 sa 1100.
46 Knowles MO p 170; see the comments of [Bruce] Webster, [Scotland from the eleventh century to 1603] (London 1975) pp 40-2.
47 Knowles MO p 499.
48 Donaldson, , [The] Scottish Church [from Queen Margaret to the Reformation] (London 1954) p 5.Google Scholar
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50 Barrow, [G. W. S.], [The Kingdom of the Scots] (London 1973) p 196Google Scholar. Chapter 6 (pp 188-211), ‘Benedictines, Tironensians and Cistercians’, is a revised version of ‘From Queen Margaret to David I: Bentdictines and Tironensians’, Innes Review 11 (1960).
51 Burleigh p 43.
52 Who’s Who in Scottish History, ed Gordon Donaldson and Robert S. Morpeth (Oxford 1973) p 5.
53 Ibid, quoting Eric Linklater, The Lion and the Unicorn (London 1935) p 36.
54 GR bk 5 cap 400.
55 Webster p 40.
56 For example, Webster pp 40-1: ‘it gives a fairly detailed statement of the reforms which she wished to introduce into the Scottish church, which had obviously fallen out of line with the rest of Christendom in a number of ways. It is interesting that Turgot is very concerned with points of observance and ritual… and only in passing with what we often take to be the great contemporary issues’.
57 Burleigh p 37.
58 Ibid p 44.
59 Ibid p 43.
60 MacEwen, [A. R.], [A History of the Church in Scotland] (London 1913) p 160.Google Scholar
61 Donaldson, , [Scotland:] Church and Nation [through sixteen centuries] (London 1960) pp 18–19Google Scholar. Compare Donaldson, Scottish Church, pp 5-6; A Source Book of Scottish History, ed W. Croft Dickinson, Gordon Donaldson and Isabel A. Milne, 1 (2 ed 1958) pp 57-8; Donaldson, Kings p 14.
62 See above n 50.
63 ‘It would not be entirely untrue to say of Ethelbert, the heathen king of Kent, that his programme had at the best been a limited one, and that he did nothing, apart from bringing a few Benedictine monks to Canterbury, to foster and endow new institutions’, Barrow pp 195-6.
64 For example, pp 165, 193, 196, 211. Compare Donaldson, Kings p 14 ‘for it was the English Margaret who impressed so many of her views and aims on her sons and descendants’.
65 MRHS p 5.
66 Ibid p 4.
67 Barrow p 190.
68 Ibid p 192.
69 Ibid p 193, MRHS p 5.
70 The Life simply records—postquam ergo culmen ascenderai honoris; mox in loco ubi eius nuptiae fuerant celebratae, aeternum sui nominis et religiositatis ercxit monumentum… nobilem ibi ecclesiam in Sanctae Trinitatis aedificavit honorem (Pinkerton 2 p 163, ESSH 2 pp 64-5): Dunfermline is not mentioned by name.
71 Vita cap 7, Pinkerton 2 p 166, ESSH 2 p 68.
72 ASC D. ASC E places it under 1074; FW and HR give 1073: see Ritchie pp 46-7.
73 Webster p 42.
74 For some account of the relations between the English and Scottish courts see Ritchie pp 29-60, Southern pp 182-5.
75 For the inclusion of Margaret of Denmark (died 1486), the wife of James III, in the catalogue of Scottish saints see A. P. Forbes, A Calendar of Scottish Saints (Edinburgh 1872) p 391.
76 ASB June 2 p 324A; compare p 316F—ex membraneo Codice Valcellensis in Hannonia monasterii, nunc nostro.
77 Paris/Rome 1867.
78 Pinkerton 2 pp 135-82.
79 Hinde 1 pp 234-54; see ibid pp lvii-lx.
80 BL Cotton Tiberius D 3, Hinde 1 p lvii.
81 BL Cotton Tiberius E 1, Hinde 1 p lviii.
82 Pinkerton 2 pp 199-209.
83 Hinde 1 p lviii.
84 For a resumé of the discussion of the authorship of Turgot see Hinde I pp lviii-lx, Ritchie pp 395-9. Though Selden’s ascription of the Historia Regum to Turgot is now generally discredited there remain considerable problems in connection with the text and its ascription to Symeon of Durham. The new edition of the works of Symeon being prepared by Mr Bernard Meehan should clarify these and other matters.
85 Vita, prologue: Excellenter honorabili et honorabiliter excellenti, Reginae Anglorum Mathilda…
86 Interea filius eius, qui post patrem Regni gubernacula iam nunc in praesenti tenet…, Vita cap 13; Pinkerton 2 p 180, ESSH 2 p 84.
87 Vita cap 13; Pinkerton 2 p 179; ESSH 2 p 82.
88 Ritchie p 396.
89 Ibid pp 395-9.
90 Vita cap 8; Pinkerton 2 p l68; ESSH 2 p 70. Compare Pinkerton 2 pp 201-2.
91 Vita cap 8; Pinkerton 2 p 168; ESSH 2 p 70.
92 Vita cap 9; Pinkerton 2 pp 173-4; ESSH 2 p 77.
93 Pinkerton 2 p 207.
94 Vita cap 13; Pinkerton 2 p 179; ESSH 2 p 82.
95 Duncan p 124. For Edgar’s ‘investiture’ see p 125.
96 Ritchie p 236.
97 See Ritchie pp 52-3, 58.
98 Levison, W., ‘Conspectus Codicum Hagiographicum’, MGH SRM 7 (1918) pp 527–706Google Scholar, at p 600, no 283.
99 Duncan pp 119 seq.
100 Donaldson, Scottish Church p 5.
101 Donaldson, Church and Nation p 15.
102 Burleigh p 43; see also Ritchie p 10.
103 Ritchie p 390.
104 See Ritchie pp 380-92.
105 Dvornik, [F.], [The Making of Central and Eastern Europe] (London 1949) p 149.Google Scholar
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107 Ibid
108 On Adalbert see Dvornik pp 95-135, and, for an assessment of his work in Hungary, pp 151–6.
109 Ibid p 156: Stephen I (1000-38).
110 Sec Dvornik p 156; Register bk 2 no 13, MGH Ep Set 1, ed E. Caspar (1920) p 144.
111 See Dvornik pp 159-60, 165. Dvornik’s comment on ‘the slow but steady progress of Hungary’s ecclesiastical status’—in contrast to the claims made in the Legend of St Stephen—is underlined by recent work in Hungary on the establishment of a parochial system, its emphasis on the role of the local families in early ecclesiastical government and administration, and the consequent qualification of the role assigned to Stephen. Compare In memoriam Sancti Stephanic Hungariae Apostolici Protoregis (937-1038), ed E. Lukinich (Budapest 1938).
112 Dvornik pp 155-6.
113 Margaret’s date of birth is variously given—see Ritchie p 8 n 2, ‘it is generally accepted that she was born in 1046’; ODCC gives c1045; the fifth revised edition of The Book of Saints (London 1966) c1050.
114 Burleigh p 43; Compare Ritchie pp 8-11.
115 Barlow, , [The] English Church [1000-1066: a Constitutional History] (London 1963) pp 51, 52.Google Scholar
116 Ibid p 52.
117 Ibid pp 52, 55. This is not of course to place in question the Confessor’s concern for the young Hungarians, and the much later comment of Orderic Vitalis that he brought them up ‘benignly as though they were his own offspring’ is entirely acceptable. There is, however, no direct evidence for Ritchie’s assumed French education for Margaret (p 10)—though her attempt to recruit Theobald of Étampes to the Scottish court is interesting in this connection (see below n 131)—nor, for all her alleged inclinations towards a regular life, is there any evidence for her association, or her sister Christina’s association, with any English community before the Conquest.
118 GR bk 5 cap 400.
119 Knowles MO pp 165-71; Barlow, English Church pp 226-31 and passim; Nicholl, [Donald], [Thurston, Archbishop of York (1114-1140)] (York 1964) pp 1–40.Google Scholar
120 See MRHS pp 1-4, 46-54.
121 See Ritchie pp 21-38; Duncan pp 117-20,
122 See Barrow pp 190-1; MRHS pp 4-5.
123 Vita cap 9; Pinkerton 2 pp 173, 205; ESSH 2 pp 76-7.
124 See Barrow pp 192-3.
125 See Bethell, Denis, ‘Two Letters of Pope Paschal II to Scotland’, SCHR 49 (1970) pp 33–45Google Scholar; Barrow pp 191-2; Duncan pp 129-30.
126 MRHS pp 5, 58; compare Barrow pp 195-6.
127 Quoted Barrow p 194.
128 MRHS pp 5, 58; Barrow p 194.
129 Barrow pp 196-8.
130 MRHS pp 5, 58; Barrow p 195. Though perhaps some connection may be sought between Estrild and Ligiva and the ‘feminae… natu nobiles, et sobriis moribus probabiles’ of the Life: Vita cap 4; Pinkerton 2 p 164; ESSH 2 p 65.
131 Foreville, R. and Leclercq, J., ‘Un débat sur le sacerdoce des moines au XIIe siècle’, SA 41 (Analecta Monastica 4 series) (1957) pp 8–118Google Scholar, at pp 9-14; Foreville, R., ‘L’École de Caen au XIe siècle, et les origines normandes de l’université d’Oxford’, Etudes Médiévales offertes à M, le Doyen Augustin Fliche (Paris 1953) pp 90–100Google Scholar; Poole, A. L., Domesday Book to Magna Carta (Oxford 1951) p 237Google Scholar; Ritchie pp 71, 74.
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133 MacEwen p 155.
134 See Ritchie pp 393-4.
135 Ibid p 393.
136 GR bk 5 cap 400.
137 See Duncan pp 125-6; Ritchie pp 60-6, 87.
138 Who’s Who in Scottish History p 4; MRHS p 47.
139 MRHS pp 5 n 2, 58.
140 See Ritchie p 170; Barrow pp 169, 191-2, 198. But see Donaldson, , [‘Scottish bishops] sees [before the reign of David I]’, Proceedings of lhe Society of Antiquaries of Scotland 87 (1952-3).Google Scholar
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142 See above p 119.
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144 MRHS pp 5, 97.
145 Ibid p 91.
146 Who’s Who in Scottish History pp 7-8.
147 See Nicholl pp 78-84, 93, 97-107.
148 See Barrow pp 165-211 passim.
149 See Baker, ‘Waldef’.
150 See Duncan p 126; Ritchie pp 65-6; ESSH 2 pp 89-91; GR bk 5 cap 400.
151 See Ritchie pp 139-151; Barrow p 173; Baker, ‘Waldef pp 73-5.
152 See Ritchie pp 166-75; Duncan pp 134-5; Barrow pp 173-9.
153 See Barrow pp 174-7, 199-210.
154 For a vivid account of Edith, and en passant references to Margaret, see Ritchie pp 109 seq. Edith’s claims to sanctity are dismissed in ASB, April 3, p 730.
155 Vita cap 11, Pinkerton 2 p 176; ESSH 2 p 80. A new edition and translation of the Life is in preparation.
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