Scotland's History
Television
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A History Of Scotland
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Central to the Scotland's History project is a new 10-part television series of hour-long episodes, charting the country's story from its earliest sense of identity through to the modern day and the advent of devolution.
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Co-produced with the Open University and shot in high definition (HD), the series uses dramatic photography to capture the best of Scotland's varied and breathtaking landscapes, iconic landmarks, monuments and historic architecture, picking up on the richness of the country's heritage and its major characters and influences as it takes series presenter Neil Oliver on a journey of discovery into Scotland's past.
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A history of Scotland will be broadcast in two parts and follow a chronological order with each episode tackling a key theme.
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The first five parts, which will start their transmission on ±«Óãtv One Scotland on Sunday 9 November at 9.00pm, take the story up to the Union of the Crowns in 1603.
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The second part, which will go out late next year, takes the story from the Covenanting movement through the Treaty of the Union and on to modern times.
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Stunning photography is combined with an impassioned presentation by archaeologist Neil Oliver and a powerful new music score by Glasgow-based composer Paul Leonard-Morgan, who has written music for network series such as Galapagos, Silent Witness and Spooks.
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It also features state-of-the-art graphic maps, bringing the bigger story into sharp relief, as well as amazing aerials across sweeping vistas.
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The first tranche has been filmed across much of Scotland over a seven-month period, but the series has been in development for more than two years.
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Series producer Richard Downes says: "This is an interesting time to have a series about Scotland's history. Within the last 10 to 15 years, there has been a surge of interest in the academic community, shedding new light on Scottish history and challenging perceptions and the 'mythology' of popular history.
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"Given this academic base, it is a terrific time to put Scotland's history in a new fresh perspective, to get beyond the myths.
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"At the same time, changes in the political landscape have also put renewed focus on Scotland, its people and culture, its identity and its place within Britain and beyond these shores.
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"This is reflected in the series in that we are looking at the history of Scotland from a modern perspective and a wider context of Scotland from its crucial part in the creation of Britain to its contribution to wider world."
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Dr Ian Donnachie, Reader in History at The Open University and academic advisor for the series, says the university is delighted to be associated with A History Of Scotland.
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"The series reflects not only our long-term commitment to public history, including two courses on Scottish history run collaboratively with Dundee University, but also a wider academic programme embracing historical studies, heritage, archaeology, environment and law.
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"The programmes help explain many of the big issues in Scotland's past. We have also co-produced audio walks that take participants on some fascinating journeys to major historical sites which are available on www.open2.net.
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"Reaching a UK-wide audience is probably a first in Scottish history and will do much to enhance understanding of Scotland's past and the challenges the country faces in the future."
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Episode One: The Last Of The Free - AD 84 - AD 943
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As the first millennium dawned, there was no Scotland and no clear motivation for the disparate tribes in the northern third of Britain to unite.
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A History Of Scotland begins with the first stirrings of identity as the tribes of a place the Romans called Caledonia first banded together to confront the legions of the Empire.
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Although the Romans were victorious in the epic battle of Mons Graupius, they eventually withdrew to the South after they failed, as Neil Oliver notes, "to tame the elusive warriors of North Britain."
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These were a people as one Roman historian would write: "the most distant dwellers upon earth, the last of the free!"
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For three centuries the Romans kept these tribes at bay, in their northern stronghold, until the Empire itself began to collapse. From this emerged a people with a new name, the Picts.
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The last British tribe to paint their bodies, Pictish society is now recognised by archaeologists as skilled and well-organised.
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But the Picts were not alone. The Last Of The Free charts their sometime allegiances and wars with the Gaels in the West.
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With the growing dominance of the Gaels came a new religion, Christianity, which slowly prised the Picts away from their pagan beliefs.
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Art flourished on both sides from the book of Kells, created by the monks of Iona, to intricate Pictish carvings.
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Yet as the native culture flourished, there were brutal challenges to be met including an invader from the sea, the Vikings, who threatened to conquer all of Britain.
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As the natives fought back, heroic warrior chiefs would come to the fore but what was their relationship to the notion of Scotland?
And what of this nation of Scotland itself?
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As The Last Of The Free highlights, there is a document which marks the arrival of a firmer sense of a Scotland.
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This document, The Chronicle of the Kings of Alba, a list of the 12 Kings of the House of Alpin, also charts a critical transition around the period 878 to 889 when all references to Pictland, which did not include the West and the Isles, disappear.
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It is held in the Bibliotheque National in Paris, part of a parcel of documents believed to have been brought back to France from London by a courtier in the 17th century.
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Within it is the first reference from Scottish sources to a land called Albaniam, the Latin version of the Gaelic for Scotland.
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Says Neil Oliver: "This is a brand new name for the kingdom. In this single word, Scotland is created. This is Scotland's birth certificate!"
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Episode Two: Hammers Of The Scots 1214-1305
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The growth of Scottish patriotism is charted in this second episode, exploring how war with England saw the kingdom of Alba transformed by necessity into the newly emerging nation of Scotland.
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The tale begins with the brutality of Scotland's Alexander II, who did not flinch from doing whatever he had to do to secure his kingship.
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Yet for all his brutality, as presenter Neil Oliver notes: "Alexander II had given the Scots a united kingdom with a border, a sense of who they were."
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As tragedy hit his successors, within a decade all this was swept away. King Edward of England had the upper hand and he wanted to subsume Scotland as he had done Wales.
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But the prospect of fighting Edward's wars tipped the Scots over the edge. They fought back with one man at the helm of a popular uprising, William Wallace.
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Episode Three: Bishop Makes King - 1306-1332
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In this episode, Robert the Bruce, aided by Scotland's bishops, harnesses the power of Scottish patriotism to win full-blown independence and freedom from external interference.
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With Wallace dead and the Scottish king John Balliol broken and irrelevant in a foreign land, chess enthusiast Edward Longshanks believed this was "endgame" and Scotland was dead.
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After his cruelty in war, he played it softly, taking oaths of loyalty from the country's leading nobles.
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And then it was the turn of the bishops, but that was his first mistake. Unlike England's bishopry, these men had no subservience to a king but instead a direct line to the Pope.
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While they literally paid lip service and kissed the English king's ring, these men were to be the driving force in the re-birth of Scotland's crown and independence.
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But first they needed a new Scottish king; someone worthy of the title, but not so worthy he could not contemplate something which looked dangerously like usurpation of the throne.
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They chose Robert Bruce, a man who began by murdering his "opposition" in a church. Despite being absolved by the bishops, his campaign did not have a fortuitous start with his brothers executed and his family imprisoned by the English.
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After contemplating in a cave on the West Coast, probably not with a spider for company, the tide began to turn for Bruce.
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His enemy Longshanks died to be replaced by an ineffectual son. Then Bruce laid waste his enemies in Scotland. But he needed to become secure, to become legend... then there was Bannockburn.
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Episode Four: Language Is Power 1411- 1503
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It's a common perception that Scotland has always had a split identity, divided between Highland and Lowland, but is this true?
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This episode, Language Is Power looks at a split that had its origins in a feud between two families, the Macdonalds and the Stewarts.
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As the 15th century began, the Macdonalds were well placed. They had backed Bruce and the rewards had flowed, lands, wealth and power.
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As presenter Neil Oliver says: "Power over the islands, power over the sea."
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And with this power and stability came a flourishing of the arts with Finlaggan the heart of the Lordship of the Isles and Iona its soul.
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The teenage King of Scotland James Stewart had been captured by the English and Alexander, Lord of the Isles, had little to fear.
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Although devalued and humiliated, James was still worth a king's ransom which the Scots eventually handed over when he was 30.
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And on his return, he was a man in a hurry to impress and to do it on a grand European scale.
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While James built a palace, Alexander eyed the mainland and the scene was set for internecine rivalry between the two camps, which would continue for generations.
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But despite the bitterness and brutality, generations of Stewarts clung to their crown and the use of Gaelic at court receded. Scots became the dominant tongue.
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Episode Five: Project Britain - 1543 -1603
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This episode focuses on a tale of two widely contrasting visions of Britain - the vision of Mary, Queen of Scots, and her son James.
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Mary was the child, who had grown up among the French royal household, groomed to one day be its Queen as well as Queen of Scotland and perhaps through her bloodline, Queen of England, potentially at the helm of a vast Catholic empire.
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But her husband, the Dauphin of France, died young and as Neil explains: "The glittering future, that Mary had been brought up to believe in, started to slip away..."
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And so eventually this Catholic Queen, still tilting towards a bigger, grander prize, came to Scotland, a land which had been greatly touched by the advent of the new Protestant thinking.
Her unwise choice of husbands yielded a son and Protestant heir but also led to her abdication and then her flight into Elizabeth's custody.
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Aware of his mother's imprisonment down south, young James grew up a prisoner of another sort, within the confines of a castle with limited company including a tutor George Buchanan.
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Buchanan tried to instil - often with the backing of physical violence - a new sense of kingship into his young charge; a kingship with a sense of the limits of royal authority.
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But the young James escaped from his shackles and he was having none of it. And he too coveted the English throne.
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As Neil Oliver says at the outset of the episode Project Britain: "The ambition of an unconquered nation and its royal family will be the driving force that unites two ancient enemies and sets them on the road to the Great Britain we know today..."
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Schools Television
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In November 2008, ±«Óãtv Scotland Learning broadcasts two new series on ±«Óãtv Two Scotland, for the primary schools audience.
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The See You See Me strand offers primary audiences two quiz-based programmes about the Romans in Scotland.
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They start on 7 November at 11.40am and will challenge children to pit their wits against presenter Grant O'Rourke, as he gives 60 second answers to questions such as "What did the Romans do for fun in Caledonia?"
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Grant's unfair advantage is that Fraser Hunter, the Principal Curator, Iron Age and Roman Collections from the National Museum of Scotland, has supplied him with a lot of top answers!
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Four short films, about the work of the re-enactment group the Antonine Guard, wrap around the quizzes.
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For upper primary, the Around Scotland strand, which starts on 17 November at 11.40am, presents a contemporary drama in three episodes.
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It tells the story of love-struck teenager Jamie who offers his non-existent historical research skills to the beautiful Chelsea.
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As Jamie and his mates stumble around Stirling looking for evidence of heroic Victorians, they discover instead the stories of real Victorians living through hard times.
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