The Good, the Bad and the Unready (31 page)
Read The Good, the Bad and the Unready Online
Authors: Robert Easton
Archibald Douglas, sixth earl of Angus, c.1489–1557
During Archibald’s tenure as earl of Angus, the Red faction of the
RED AND BLACK DOUGLASES
was at its zenith. On the death of his grandfather Bell
THE CAT
the young Archibald became the sixth earl and swiftly married Margaret Tudor, thus allying himself with her brother
BLUFF KING HAL
. Back in Scotland Archibald established something of a power base in Edinburgh and gained complete control over the twelve-year-old James the
ILL-BELOVED
. In 1527 Archibald became chancellor and members of the Red Douglas family held every important post in the royal household.
Archibald’s soubriquet of ‘Greysteel’ suggests he was a man who knew how to wield a sword. This was certainly the case at the battle of Ancrum Moor in 1545, when he hacked down English forces led by one Sir Ralph Evers, who had (inadvertently) desecrated the tomb of William, the first earl of Douglas and forefather of the ‘Red Douglas’ clan. For such sacrilege, Evers was flayed and his skin turned into purses for the Scottish soldiers.
Griff
see
POOR FRED
Archibald the
Grim
Archibald Douglas, third earl of Douglas, c.1328–1400
Despite his emblem of a bleeding heart, Archibald, the illegitimate son of‘the Good Sir James’ Douglas, was far from a liberal sap. Instead he was one of the ablest soldiers of his era. One historian suggests he was nicknamed ‘for his swart complexion’. The following entry from the chronicles of Jean Froissart, describing Archibald’s behaviour at a battle near Melrose, supports the idea that he was so named ‘for his terrible countenance in warfare’:
Douglas was a good knight and much feared by his enemies: when near to the English, he dismounted, and wielded before him an immense sword, whose blade was two ells [seven and half feet] long, which scarcely another could have lifted from the ground, but he found no difficulty in handling it, and gave such terrible strokes, that all on whom they fell were struck to the ground.
Manuel the
Grocer King
see
Manuel the
FORTUNATE
James the
Gross
James Douglas, seventh earl of Douglas, c.1371–1443
James the Gross was very fat and very lazy – on the face of it, a combination not conducive to the long-term success of a fifteenth-century Scottish earl. In a time of violent and premature death, however, James surprisingly lived into his seventies.
Just how ‘gross’ was James the Gross? Well, he is recorded as carrying about him ‘four stane of talch and mair’ –in other words, some sixty pounds of fat. And there are convincing hints that his morals matched his physical grossness. Many suggest that it was James who was behind the infamous ‘Black Dinner’, at which a black bull’s head was reportedly served up to the sixth
earl of Douglas and his younger brother as a portent of their murder that same night.
Guaff
see
Victor Emmanuel the
GALLANT KING
Akbar the
Guardian of Mankind
see
Akbar the
GREAT
Wilfrid the
Hairy
see
Wilfrid the
SHAGGY
Charles the
Hammer
Charles, mayor of the palace of Austrasia, c.688–741
Charles’s victory at the battle of Poitiers of 732 turned the tide of Islamic advance in Europe and paved the way for Frankish unification under his son Pepin the SHORT and grandson Charles the GREAT. The victory also won him his nickname. The
Chronicle of St Denis
states that the name ‘Martel’, or ‘the Hammer’, was conferred on Charles for having hammered (
martelé
) the Saracens. ‘[A]s a hammer of iron, of steel, and of every other metal,’ the chronicle gushes, ‘even so he dashed and smote in the battle all his enemies.’
Frederick the
Hammer of Christianity
see
Frederick the
WONDER OF THE WORLD
Thomas the
Hammer of the Monks