Tapestry of the Boar

by Nigel Tranter

Genres: Historical Fiction

Synopsis

During the reign of Malcolm IV, King of the Scots, Hugh de Swinton and his fellow mosstroopers helped keep the rampaging Galloway rebels at bay. But it was for his expertise in the killing of wild boars, as protector of the Swintons' sheep flocks, that young Hugh was brought to Malcolm's attention. But Malcolm was a pious man much concerned with the well-being of his people. And he handpicked Hugh de Swinton to mastermind a very special project close to his heart: to establish Scotland's first real hospital for the sick and poor, at Soutra in Lauderdale. Action, chivalry and romance in the 12th century: the story of Hugh de Swinton and his thrilling life that encompassed fighting, farming and the foundation of Scotland's first hospital.

Release date: September 13, 2012

Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton

Print pages: 320

Sample

Hugh de Swinton dismounted from his horse and handed the reins to his illegitimate half-brother, foster-brother, friend and associate – he would never call him servant – Duncan, and ran lithely up the steep, stepped slope of the motte or mound within the strong palisade of timber, to the keep or tower-house of Swinton which crowned that artificial hillock. This was not his home, but he knew it well, for it was his uncle’s seat, there in the wide Merse, or March, which separated the rest of Scotland from Northumbria across Tweed. The summons to him had been urgent.

The gatehouse before the keep was open, and the duty guard, grinning to him, waved him in, towards the tower door, reached by a little outside flight of steps and a bridge-like gangway, the door being above ground at first-floor level; for all here was for defence, so near the former border with England whence raiding had been so apt to come. The keep itself, although also built of timber, was thickly coated with clay, and whitewashed, the hardened clay being to prevent fire-arrows from setting the wood alight. Five storeys high it towered.

Past the porter in his tiny cave-like chamber within the doorway, and getting another smiling salute, Hugh raced two at a time up the narrow stairway. He had long legs and energy at twenty years, and could have run three at a time, only the tight twisting of the turnpike stair made that impossible, for this also was a defensive feature, constructed thus so that it could be held by one man with a sword, however many sought to climb, himself two-thirds hidden behind the central pillar. Swinton Castle, as were so many in that borderland, was like that, had to be to have survived.

On the next floor up a door stood open, for although a fire smouldered on the great hall hearth within, it was almost early summer and not cold. Hugh entered.

Three men sat there, not at the high dais-table at the far end of the chamber, on its platform, but on settles near the fire, beakers of ale in hand, one elderly-seeming, one in later middle years and one young, little older than Hugh.

“You have taken your time, lad,” his uncle, Sir Ernulf de Swinton said.

“I was hawking on the Blackadder haughs beyond Kimmerghame, sir. I came so soon as your man reached me. In all haste.”

“Aye, well. There is need for haste apparently, see you. The prince requires all landed men to assemble at Roxburgh this very day. Short notice, but William mac Henry mac David is like that, ever in haste.”

“Roxburgh? Today! Assemble in arms?”

“No, no. Not in arms – yet! That may come. This is for a council, it seems. I do not think that the prince will require your advice and guidance,” and Sir Ernulf favoured his two nephews with one raised eyebrow. “But his courier says all landed men. So you had better go with your father. I cannot so much as sit a horse, old bones forbidding. But it will be good for you, forby, to learn how these matters go, the debating and contentions of men, your seniors and betters – aye, and their follies! Eh, Pate?”

His brother, Cospatrick de Swinton, Sheriff of the Merse, nicknamed Pate, shrugged. “These two need to learn nothing about contention and debate, Ulf – they never cease at it!” But he smiled at his sons. “I agree that they should go, however. Time that they took some weight from the shoulders of their ageing father!”

Both young men gazed at the lusty and forthright man, their sire, whose greying hair was the only sign of his years, and exchanged looks.

“Ageing!” Alan said. “If that is ageing, then I am still in my bairn’s cot! I, who have indeed come of age, myself!” He was rather proud of this distinction, so recently won, especially in front of his brother. “Show us the signs of it, Father, and we may believe you.” Then he bit his lip, glancing at his uncle, who was indeed ageing, although only in his early sixties. Had he been tactless? Alan, just one year older than Hugh, was dark, almost swarthy, slight of build but good-looking with it, taking after their late mother; whereas Hugh was taller, more powerfully made, like their father, fresh-featured, and his mane of long hair so fair as to be like white gold – indeed he was known locally as Hugh the Fair. He forbore to comment.

Sir Ernulf said, “It is eighteen miles to Roxburgh Castle, three hours’ riding.”

“I must go back to Swinton Parva first,” Hugh declared. “I cannot appear before Prince William clad so, for the hawking.”

“Think you that the prince will even see you in that throng? Or, yes, he may see your hair, lad, and stare! But your clothing is of no account. He is not one for caring for gear, leaving that to his brother. No, go you straight to Roxburgh.”

“May I ask the reason for this council? In such haste.”

“We do not know, were not told. Only that it was urgent, needful. All landed men. With so many away with the King in France, as are my own sons, William will be seeking all that can be raised.”

“It can scarcely be good news,” the father added.

“No. I will be waiting to hear from you, at the earliest.”

That clearly was as good as their dismissal.

The sheriff rose, nodding. “Probably the morrow, then, Ulf. Come, you two.”

Gulping down the last of their ale, the two young men sketched bows to their uncle, the head of the line, Swinton of that Ilk, and the late King David’s friend, and followed their father out.

Their ride thereafter although lengthy was not difficult, the Merse being good country for horsemen, rolling pastureland, cattle-dotted, with no great heights and passes to negotiate, the rivers draining it swift-running and creating few bogs, with fords aplenty, even a bridge or two, much of it Church land now. Swinton lay all but in the centre of it, midway between the great Priory of Coldinghame and the splendid Abbey of Kelshaugh, or Kelso as most pronounced it, and between Berwick-upon-Tweed with its Dominican and Cistercian friaries and the holy burgh-toun of the Kaimes. That this vast tract of fine country, the largest plain in all Scotland, should be so largely under the sway of Holy Church was a sore point with many, even the faithfully inclined, Swinton itself having to pay St Cuthbert’s dues, as they were called. The Swinton family did not complain, for it was all the good King David’s doing, of hallowed memory, and he had been Sir Ernulf’s friend. Yet they had been settled at Swinton for four generations before David, for his own good reasons, made the churchmen supreme in the Merse. Not all the other landholders there were as accepting, patient, understanding.

The trio, with their suitable half-dozen of escort, including Hugh’s foster-brother Duncan, rode west by south, good going by drove-roads which led to the great Kelshaugh cattle-markets, where again Holy Church gained its tithe of the takings. They went by Swintonhill and Leitholm, where they forded the Leit Water. As an enquiring boy Hugh had asked why this was not called the Greyadder, for the name Leit, or liath, in the Celtic tongue, meant grey, and they had in the Merse the Whiteadder, or White Water, and the Blackadder – to be told not to ask daft questions. Then on by Eccles, which meant church, so anciently there must have been a religious shrine here, and there was now a large convent of nuns. Further, at the Eden Water, which Hugh had once assumed to be something to do with the Garden of Eden, especially as he had had another uncle named Adam, and had again been accused of being silly, they forded at Edenholm or Ednam – and had to pay for the privilege of crossing, again to Holy Church. For this small but important fording-place on the great drove-road had its especial importance above others such. Here King David had, thirty-two years before, established the first parish in Scotland, in his notable concept of limiting the too-great power of the lords, barons and landed men who could often invalidate the royal decrees, by instead putting power, temporal power, into the hands of the Church, as a counter-weight. He devised the idea of dividing all his kingdom into parishes, in addition to its baronies and lordships, and having a parish kirk within each, as centre for the common folk – and Edenholm was the first of them all. It was for these, not only out of his genuine piety, that the King had built all those magnificent abbeys, Kelshaugh, Jedburgh, Dryburgh, Melrose and the rest, to be not only monuments to the faith but seminaries, colleges, for the training of the host of priests needed to staff and serve all the new parish kirks. It all had started here in the Merse – whatever the Merse barons and lairds thought of it. Yet the King had been well beloved, as well as respected and obeyed, the finest monarch Scotland had had since MacBeth. The same could hardly yet be said of his grandson Malcolm.

After Edenholm, they left the drove-road, to follow up the south bank of the Eden Water, due westwards now, to avoid Kelshaugh, so as to come down to the great River Tweed above the abbey-town, near Roxburgh itself – this not the palace-castle but its large township upstream. For there was no ford at the castle, again deliberately for defence. Reaching the river, they splashed over its artificial shallows on a causeway of underwater stones, and not alone now, for two other groups of visiting magnates were crossing also, one none other than the great Cospatrick, Earl of March himself, from Ersildoune, a distant kinsman of the Swintons, after whose mutual ancestor Sheriff Cospatrick was named. The Swinton brothers fell suitably and modestly to the rear.

Downriver the enlarged party trotted for over a mile. Roxburgh Castle was extraordinarily and dramatically sited on a narrow peninsula where that other great river, the Teviot, joined Tweed, to form a lengthy and narrow arrowhead of steep rocky ground protected by deep, rushing water on all sides except for the access at the west end, this guarded by a deep fosse or water-filled ditch, with drawbridge. The resultant stronghold, stone-built, this one, not timber and clay, was necessarily long-strung-out, a succession of towers and keeps and a hallhouse within enclosing curtain walls topped by battlemented wall-walks, a strange principal seat for a monarchy, and within a few miles of the border with England, while the rest of the kingdom stretched northwards for nearly three hundred miles. Yet so it had been chosen by David mac Malcolm, partly as a gesture to indicate that he was no longer at war with the old enemy of England, but also to emphasise the Scots claims to Northumbria and Cumbria, ceded by English King Stephen. Previous Scots monarchs, David’s own brothers, Alexander and Edgar, had seated themselves at Edinburgh, and their father, Malcolm Canmore, at Dunfermline and Stirling; but David, after his long exile in England as hostage, had settled on this Roxburgh on the edge of the Merse; and his grandson now on the throne, Malcolm the Fourth, the Maiden, did the same.

The visitors had to dismount and leave their horses, amongst scores of others, on the grassy riverside haughs, for there was no room for all these beasts within the castle itself. It ill became the mighty Earl Cospatrick, who claimed more royal blood than the King himself, to have to climb on foot up the brae and walk into the castle, but there was no option. Under the two gatehouse arches and below the portcullises, they strode, sentries on the watch. Across three courtyards of this elongated fortress, past two keeps, they came to a larger but lower building of only two storeys, the doorway guarded by servitors in the royal livery. Brushing these aside, the Earl of March pushed inside into an already crowded great hall, which dwarfed the one of Swinton needless to say. More servants were, with difficulty, moving amongst the noisy throng, seeking to dispense viands and drink. Up at the far end, on the raised dais, only a small group sat at table, six men, two of them clerics, although the one in the middle could only just be called a man, tall for his age and heavily built as he was, Brawny Will as his grandfather David had called him, Prince of Strathclyde and, in name at least, Earl of Northumbria.

Shouldering his way through the crush with no apologies, the Earl Cospatrick headed for that dais; but although his namesake, the sheriff, and his sons moved after him, it was only to a fairly frontal position. They gladly accepted some refreshment after their eighteen-mile ride.

The talk around them was patchy, incoherent and interspersed with greetings. But they gathered that there was serious trouble in the air, sundry great names being bandied about, Fergus of Galloway’s in particular. The Sheriff of the Merse left his sons, to go and converse with intimates.

Whether or not Prince William and his advisers had been awaiting the arrival of the Earl Cospatrick they did not know, but it seemed likely, for soon after the latter’s arrival at the dais-table, a horn was blown for quiet and the prince beat on the board with his tankard.

“My lords spiritual and temporal, barons and gentles,” the youth said in a loud and jerky voice, but notably confident for his seventeen years, “I have ill tidings for you. There is shameful revolt in the land – treason to our lord the King. And by those who should lead in their loyalty, I say. Six earls have raised the standard of rebellion against my royal brother, at St John’s Town of Perth, the Earls of Strathearn, Atholl, Angus, Mar, Moray and Fife. And we have just heard that this revolt has been joined by Earl Fergus of Galloway.”

At the prince’s pause there was a hush, as the significance of that statement sank in. For all these named earls were of the ancient Celtic polity, indeed the descendants of former mormaors or sub-kings of Alba, under the Ard Righ, the High King. Whereas most of those present at Roxburgh were only partly Celtic by blood, with a strong admixture of Norman and Flemish, brought up from England by David on his return to take up the throne thirty-six years before. Most had adopted Scottish names, usually those of the lands they had been allotted, or had married the heiresses to – such indeed as de Swinton; although these last did have more of the Celtic in them, and royal blood also, however far back.

Prince William went on. “In my brother’s unfortunate absence in France, these have taken their opportunity to . . .”

He got no further on account of the growls arising from the gathering. King Malcolm’s decision to go to the assistance of King Henry the Second of England, his far-out cousin, in his efforts to win back control of the Plantagenet lands in France, and with a Scots army, was highly unpopular.

William banged the table. “Hear me! I have already sent off couriers, to take ship to the Rhône and Toulouse, where we understand King Malcolm is at present, to urge his return with all speed, and with his force. But this will take time. Meanwhile we must act, in his name.”

Again there was the growling, but of agreement this time, largely indicative of the great north-south division of Scotland between the Lowlands and the Highlands, for of course almost all those present were from south of Forth and Clyde, the Lowlands, whereas those earls named as rebelling were all from the north – that is except Fergus of Galloway. He was the odd man out, although he was of sufficiently Celtic ancestry. But he was comparatively near at hand, whilst the others were far off. And Galloway was a very large earldom and its men renowned warriors.

Edward, Bishop of Aberdeen, the Chancellor or chief minister of the realm, one of the two clerics flanking the prince, rose to speak; but almost contemptuously the Earl Cospatrick waved him down and spoke first, eloquent in more than his words, and representing the hostility of so many there to the power to which the ecclesiastics had been deliberately promoted in the kingdom.

“The upstart Fergus must be dealt with, and at once,” he declared. “The others can wait – they are distantly placed. He is not. He should never have been granted Galloway. It belonged to my house! We all must arm, and march. And swiftly, before there can be any coming together with these northern earls, any warfare of two fronts. Assembly must be called, at once, in fullest possible numbers, for those Galloway men can fight! Give me three days, four, and I will bring one thousand!”

Grinning his approval at the engendered shouts of acclamation from all over the hall, with men vying with each other to name numbers also, not only the great ones seeking to outbid, Prince William, seeing the Chancellor still on his feet, thumped the table for quiet.

“Good!” he cried. “Good! We need all.” He turned. “You, my lord Bishop, wish to speak?”

“Yes, Highness. I say that in this sorry situation, while assault should be made to teach my lord of Galloway where his loyalty should be, our backs must be protected while it is done. As my lord Earl has indicated. A line should be formed, and held, at the narrows of the Forth, at Stirling, to face north, to deter these rebelling earls. There they must cross, if they march south.” The Chancellor, a plump, round-faced man but with shrewd eyes, paused. “Holy Church can help in this, I judge, as in so much. My lord Bishop of St Andrews, the Primate, can have many men at his command. And the College of Bishops can, I am sure, proffer a sufficiency of moneys to hire many more to arms. We might even outdo my lord Earl’s thousand!”

The hint of mockery in his bow towards Cospatrick told its own story, and roused varying reactions from the company, with many murmurings. The uneasy balance between Church and state was emphasised.

“I think that I may confirm my lord Chancellor’s affirmation,” the other cleric on the dais, Herbert, Bishop of Glasgow, said smoothly, an elderly prelate, richly robed and of a remote bearing.

Beside him a man of a very different sort jumped up. “That is well enough. But I say that Galloway is what we have to decide on here. We will require every man; I know, who sits on Fergus’s doorstep!” Robert de Bruce, second Lord of Annandale, a big, burly character, red of face and hot of temper, exclaimed. “If you march against Galloway by Nithsdale and Annandale, I will have five hundred awaiting you. Five hundred, I say!”

That set the tone of the further proceedings, with the Chancellor summoning clerks to set down on paper the numbers promised by all the magnates, barons, knights and landed men, a lengthy process and less orderly than might have been advantageous. In Sir Ernulf’s and his own names, the sheriff offered one hundred – which was stretching matters, with his nephews already away with the King in France, and seventy men with them.

While all this was going on, the senior lords were discussing timing, places and tactics. From the first it was accepted that while the prince would be nominally in charge, the Earl Cospatrick, the only one of that rank, other than Fergus of Galloway himself, south of Forth and Clyde, should actually command the forces in the field, experienced in border warfare as he was. They would assemble at Melrose, more central and spacious for their purpose, and convenient for the earl, at Ersildoune, in five days’ time, and march up Tweed right to that river’s source on Tweedsmuir, then over the watershed and down Annandale beyond, to assail Galloway from the north; that is, unless they heard that Fergus had moved in the interim, in which case they would have to adjust their plans.

Thereafter more feeding was provided in one of the keeps. Many, with further to go, would be staying overnight at the castle; but the Swintons decided that they could make it back to Kimmerghame by early dark. The young men would be busy, on the morrow, riding round, summoning and gathering their Merse mosstrooping tenantry, while their father went to acquaint Sir Ernulf with the position and gain his authority to assemble maximum numbers of the Swinton men.

Excited at the prospects, Hugh and Alan discussed it all at considerable length as they rode home, their father, somewhat cynical as became a sheriff and judge, less voluble; and declaring that the situation was as good as made for his namesake the earl, who had long wanted the Galloway lordship added to his own. After all, his forebear and their own, Maldred, brother of King Duncan whom MacBeth had slain, had been Earl of Northumberland and Cumberland on marrying their heiress thereof, granddaughter of King Ethelred the Unready, of England; whereas Fergus was a mere incomer from somewhere in the north-west, who had married a daughter of the Norman Henry the First, son of the Conqueror, and whom King David had found useful and promoted because he had founded Dundrennan Abbey and Whithorn Priory. The ways of monarchs could seem curious to lesser men.

They mustered one hundred and three men from Swinton and Simprim and their outlying properties, some fairly old for the business but nowise prepared to be left out, Sir Ernulf grieving that his incapacity prevented him from taking part. All were mounted, for a Merseman lacking a horse was as good as crippled – even though all too often they were apt to use the said steeds for raiding other folk’s cattle.

On the fourth day, then, they set off for war, in high spirits and fine style, most of them, although the sheriff was only moderately sanguine, as by nature. They were not going directly to the rallying-place at Melrose, for they had received a message from the Earl Cospatrick requesting them to join his array at Ersildoune on the River Leader, before it joined Tweed; why was not stated. The sheriff had his own notions as to the reason.

This time they went, in column, due westwards, by Charterhall and Greenlaw and the wide moorlands of Gordon, to descend to the valley of the Purves Water at the Earlstoun of Ersildoune, thirty miles no less, through the Merse. Here was a sizeable township, cradled in a hollow below the White Hill thereof, a quite lofty summit and representing the very western boundary of the Merse with Lauderdale. As expected, they found the town overflowing with the assembling horsemen, not all the townsfolk appreciative, idle mosstroopers not always the most welcome visitors for well-doing residents, and their horses excessively hungry for carefully stored forage. Leaving their party down at the River Leader’s bank beside the small Learmonth tower of Ersildoune itself, the sheriff and his sons made their way up to the much larger castle of the earl, on a spur of the White Hill, crowded inevitably.

Cospatrick made them welcome, more heartily than was his usual perhaps, for although his namesake was his sheriff and distant kinsman, the earl was not of an effusive nature. But, as was rather anticipated, he was glad to have the Swinton five score to add to his total, for it seemed that he had had difficulty in raising the promised one thousand men, and his array required this topping-up. His son, of course, the Lord Waldeve, had six hundred away with him in France with King Malcolm. But a suitable front had to be maintained.

In the absence of the said Waldeve, they found that the earl had chosen his second son Patrick Home to be second-in-command of this force – which could have given offence to the sheriff who in fact ranked senior not only in years. But presumably this young man, only a year older than Alan de Swinton, was to be given experience in his leadership of men, as was no doubt desirable. Moreover, he had brought a major contribution of Home manpower, for the Homes of that Ilk were a powerful Merse clan, and Patrick had married the heiress a year or so before, and taken the name of Home. The sheriff accepted the situation.

A noisy, boisterous evening was passed by the castle guests, to rival that of their followers in the township. They would march at sun-up, for Melrose.

Trotting down Lauderdale, then, the ever-enquiring Hugh, riding now beside Learmonth of Ersildoune and wondering why the vale was not called Leaderdale, gained no satisfactory answer; but he did learn that his companion, although a loyal vassal of the earl, rather resented his superior’s appropriation of the style of Ersildoune. After all, the Learmonths had held the admittedly minor barony of that name long before the first Cospatrick – this was the fourth – was given overlordship of the Merse and built his great castle nearby. He was Ersildoune, not the earl, even though he could bring only a score of men to this host.

It was only five miles down to the Tweed at Melrose. They found the level haughlands north of the great abbey thronged with men, tents and pavilions sprouting up everywhere, long horse-lines dividing the various units. There was no real township here, only the abbey’s monastic quarters and the lay workers’ hutments, the local community being sited some distance off, two miles eastwards, at a steep bend of the Tweed, and known as Old Melrose, meaning the great headland.

Finding the necessary quite extensive space for their large company – even though it was still not quite the promised one thousand – the earl gave orders for his pavilion to be pitched, his banner hoisted over it, and went in search of the prince, his gentry with him. There was no difficulty in locating Brawny Will’s tent, with the black boar on silver of the royal standard flapping above it, ancient symbol of the Celtic High Kings.

The prince had been informed of their arrival, and was thankful to see them for, despite all the noisy estimating of numbers that other day at Roxburgh, not quite as many as expected had turned up, indeed only some eighteen hundred so far. So the earl’s contingent, the largest single force there, was welcomed. The monarchy was dependent almost entirely on the levies of its lords and barons, there being no national standing army, and the royal guard, a modest array anyway, was mainly away with King Malcolm in France.

A few more small groups came in before dusk. They would march in the morning.

The Abbot of Melrose provided what approximated to a banquet for the prince and the army’s leaders that evening, his monks and lay brothers doing their best for the mass of the soldiery, Holy Church having its uses on occasion. The provision was sufficient for quite a few of the participants to achieve drunkenness, Prince William included. There was much boasting over what they would do to Fergus of Galloway in due course.

Next day there was the usual problem of marching a mixed force. Being largely Mersemen, this was mainly a horsed army; but there were some hundreds of foot from the higher lands of upper Lauderdale, Teviotdale, Selkirk, the Gala Water and even Lothian, all but despised by the mosstroopers, and these of course went much more slowly than the horsemen and could not cover more than one-third of the distances daily. This dichotomy always provided headaches for commanders, so that there were in fact usually two armies, horse and foot, with different priorities, even routes to follow, and little love lost between them. And, also, the lords and lairds of the foot were themselves mounted and apt to ride with the horsed leadership, so that the bands of pikemen and spearmen were often less than well controlled, as the inhabitants of the countryside passed through tended to discover.

With mainly mere drove-roads to follow, and these fairly narrow usually, an army on the march could be strung out over miles, and as such vulnerable to assault by ambush from an enemy in place beforehand. So scouting parties were always out well in advance and on the flanks. In this case, however, there was little likelihood of any attempt to halt them, for they were a long way from Galloway, and Fergus, even if he knew that they were coming against him, would scarcely come all this way to challenge them; and if he was intending to march northwards to join or meet the other rebel earls, he almost certainly would go by the western side of Scotland, by the shires of Dumfries, Ayr and Renfrew to the Clyde and into the Highlands from there.

The royal route, then, was up Tweed, by Faldonside and Yair, to Caddonfoot and Elibank, to Traquair and eventually Peebles, where, twenty-five miles on their way, they halted for the night. How far the foot had got none knew. There was no convenient abbey at Peebles to provide catering, but there was a little-used and small royal castle, and the quite large church and monastic establishment of St Mungo, and these had to serve. Actually they had passed, only a mile or so to the east, at Eshiels, the major hospice of St Leonards of the Knights of St Lazarus; but this was for the care and treatment of lepers, so its services had to be shunned. The churchmen were always better provided with food and drink than anybody else, probably because they worked harder, and this was accepted by the laity as a suitable contribution, after all the tithes, tiends, tolls and dues Holy Church collected from them; and not only the lairds and barons, for ordinary travellers were beholden to the clerics for the wayside hospices which, dotting the countryside, made long journeying possible.

The following day’s riding took them, still up Tweed, past its junctions with the Manor and Lyne Waters, to Drumelzier, where the great river took its major turn southwards, coming down from its source on high Tweedsmuir, wild upland country now, and all but impassable for any army in winter snows. Even in this early May it was bleak and difficult going up there, and with some twenty miles covered they camped at Oliver Castle, the remote small forta