Portal:Scotland/Selected articles

John Michael Wright (May 1617 – July 1694) was an English or Scottish (he signed as both at times) portrait painter in the Baroque style. Wright trained in Edinburgh under the Scots painter George Jamesone, and acquired a considerable reputation as an artist and scholar during a long sojourn in Rome. There he was admitted to the Accademia di San Luca and was associated with some of the leading artists of his generation. He was engaged by Archduke Leopold Wilhelm of Austria, the governor of the Spanish Netherlands, to acquire artworks in Oliver Cromwell's England in 1655. He took up permanent residence in England from 1656 and served as court painter before and after the English Restoration. A convert to Roman Catholicism, he was a favourite of the restored Stuart court, a client of both Charles II and James II, and was a witness to many of the political manoeuvrings of the era. In the final years of the Stuart monarchy he returned to Rome as part of an embassy to Pope Innocent XI.

Wright is currently rated as one of the leading indigenous British painters of his generation, largely for the distinctive realism in his portraiture. Perhaps due to the unusually cosmopolitan nature of his experience, he was favoured by patrons at the highest level of society in an age in which foreign artists were usually preferred. Wright's paintings of royalty and aristocracy are included amongst the collections of many leading galleries today. (Full article...)

Portrait by John de Critz, 1605

Anne of Denmark (Danish: Anna; 12 December 1574 – 2 March 1619) was the wife of King James VI and I; as such, she was Queen of Scotland from their marriage on 20 August 1589 and Queen of England and Ireland from the union of the Scottish and English crowns on 24 March 1603 until her death in 1619.

The second daughter of King Frederick II of Denmark and Sophie of Mecklenburg-Güstrow, Anne married James at age 14. They had three children who survived infancy: Henry Frederick, Prince of Wales, who predeceased his parents; Princess Elizabeth, who became Queen of Bohemia; and James's future successor, Charles I. Anne demonstrated an independent streak and a willingness to use factional Scottish politics in her conflicts with James over the custody of Prince Henry and his treatment of her friend Beatrix Ruthven. Anne appears to have loved James at first, but the couple gradually drifted and eventually lived apart, though mutual respect and a degree of affection survived. (Full article...)

The Scotland national football team represents Scotland in men's international football and is controlled by the Scottish Football Association. It competes in the three major professional tournaments: the FIFA World Cup, UEFA Nations League and the UEFA European Championship. Scotland, as a country of the United Kingdom, is not a member of the International Olympic Committee, and therefore the national team does not compete in the Olympic Games. The majority of Scotland's home matches are played at the national stadium, Hampden Park.

Scotland is the joint oldest national football team in the world, alongside England, whom they played in the world's first international football match in 1872. Scotland has a long-standing rivalry with England, whom they played annually from 1872 until 1989. The teams have met only eight times since then, most recently in a group match during Euro 2020 in June 2021. (Full article...)

Portrait c. 1963

Alexander Frederick Douglas-Home, Baron Home of the Hirsel, KT, PC (/ˈhjuːm/; 2 July 1903 – 9 October 1995), styled as Lord Dunglass between 1918 and 1951 and being The 14th Earl of Home from 1951 until 1963, was a British Conservative politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1963 to 1964. He is notable for being the last Prime Minister to hold office while being a member of the House of Lords, before renouncing his peerage and taking up a seat in the House of Commons for the remainder of his premiership. His reputation, however, rests more on his two stints as Foreign Secretary than on his brief premiership.

Within six years of first entering the House of Commons in 1931, Douglas-Home (then called by the courtesy title Lord Dunglass) became a parliamentary aide to Neville Chamberlain, witnessing at first hand Chamberlain's efforts as Prime Minister to preserve peace through appeasement in the two years before the outbreak of the Second World War. In 1940 Dunglass was diagnosed with spinal tuberculosis and was immobilised for two years. By the later stages of the war he had recovered enough to resume his political career, but he lost his seat in the general election of 1945. He regained it in 1950, but the following year he left the Commons when, on the death of his father, he inherited the earldom of Home and thereby became a member of the House of Lords. Under the premierships of Winston Churchill, Anthony Eden and Harold Macmillan he was appointed to a series of increasingly senior posts, including Leader of the House of Lords and Foreign Secretary. In the latter post, which he held from 1960 to 1963, he supported United States resolve in the Cuban Missile Crisis and in August 1963 was the United Kingdom's signatory to the Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. (Full article...)

Áedán mac Gabráin (pronounced [ˈaiðaːn mak ˈɡavɾaːnʲ] in Old Irish; Irish: Aodhán mac Gabhráin), also written as Aedan, was a king of Dál Riata from c. 574 until c. 609 AD. The kingdom of Dál Riata was situated in modern Argyll and Bute, Scotland, and parts of County Antrim, Ireland. Genealogies record that Áedán was a son of Gabrán mac Domangairt.

He was a contemporary of Saint Columba, and much that is recorded of his life and career comes from hagiography such as Adomnán of Iona's Life of Saint Columba. Áedán appears as a character in Old Irish and Middle Irish language works of prose and verse, some now lost. (Full article...)

Ramillies at anchor during the First World War, painted in dazzle camouflage

HMS Ramillies (pennant number: 07) was one of five Revenge-class super-dreadnought battleships built for the Royal Navy during the First World War. They were developments of the Queen Elizabeth-class battleships, with reductions in size and speed to offset increases in the armour protection whilst retaining the same main battery of eight 15-inch (381 mm) guns. Completed in late 1917, Ramillies saw no combat during the war as both the British and the German fleets had adopted a more cautious strategy by this time owing to the increasing threat of naval mines and submarines.

Ramillies spent the 1920s and 1930s alternating between the Atlantic Fleet and the Mediterranean Fleet. Whilst serving in the Mediterranean and Black Seas in the early 1920s, the ship went to Turkey twice in response to crises arising from the Greco-Turkish War, including the Great Fire of Smyrna in 1922. She also saw limited involvement during the Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War. The ship's interwar career was otherwise uneventful. With the outbreak of the Second World War in September 1939, Ramillies was initially assigned to escort duties in the North Atlantic. In May 1940, she was transferred to the Mediterranean Fleet as war with Italy loomed. After the Italians entered the war in June, Ramillies bombarded Italian ports in North Africa, escorted convoys to Malta, and supported the Taranto raid in November. (Full article...)

Cromwell at Dunbar, by Andrew Carrick Gow

The Anglo-Scottish war (1650–1652), also known as the Third Civil War, was the final conflict in the Wars of the Three Kingdoms, a series of armed conflicts and political machinations between shifting alliances of religious and political factions in England, Scotland and Ireland.

The 1650 English invasion was a pre-emptive military incursion by the English Commonwealth's New Model Army, intended to allay the risk of Charles II invading England with a Scottish army. The First and Second English Civil Wars, in which English Royalists, loyal to Charles I, fought Parliamentarians for control of the country, took place between 1642 and 1648. When the Royalists were defeated for the second time the English government, exasperated by the duplicity of Charles I during negotiations, set up a High Court of Justice which found the King guilty of treason and executed him on 30 January 1649. At the time, England and Scotland were separate independent kingdoms, joined politically through a personal union; Charles I was, separately, both the king of Scotland, and the king of England. The Scots had fought in support of the English Parliamentarians in the First English Civil War, but sent an army in support of Charles I into England during the Second. The Parliament of Scotland, which had not been consulted before the execution, declared his son, Charles II, King of Britain. (Full article...)

The Second War of Scottish Independence broke out in 1332 when Edward Balliol led an English-backed invasion of Scotland. Balliol, the son of a former Scottish king, was attempting to make good his claim to the Scottish throne. He was opposed by Scots loyal to the occupant of the throne, eight-year-old David II. At the Battle of Dupplin Moor Balliol's force defeated a Scottish army ten times their size and Balliol was crowned king. Within three months David's partisans had regrouped and forced Balliol out of Scotland. He appealed to the English king, Edward III, who invaded Scotland in 1333 and besieged the important trading town of Berwick. A large Scottish army attempted to relieve it but was heavily defeated at the Battle of Halidon Hill. Balliol established his authority over most of Scotland, ceded to England the eight counties of south-east Scotland and did homage to Edward for the rest of the country as a fief.

As allies of Scotland via the Auld Alliance, the French were unhappy about an English expansion into Scotland and so covertly supported and financed David's loyalists. Balliol's allies fell out among themselves and he lost control of most of Scotland again by late 1334. In early 1335 the French attempted to broker a peace. However, the Scots were unable to agree a position and Edward prevaricated while building a large army. He invaded in July and again overran most of Scotland. Tensions with France increased. Further French-sponsored peace talks failed in 1336 and in May 1337 the French king, Philip VI, engineered a clear break between France and England, starting the Hundred Years' War. The Anglo-Scottish war became a subsidiary theatre of this larger Anglo-French war. Edward sent what troops he could spare to Scotland, in spite of which the English slowly lost ground in Scotland as they were forced to focus on the French theatre. Achieving his majority David returned to Scotland from France in 1341 and by 1342 the English had been cleared from north of the border. (Full article...)

Argus in harbour in 1918, painted in dazzle camouflage

HMS Argus was a British aircraft carrier that served in the Royal Navy from 1918 to 1944. She was converted from an ocean liner that was under construction when the First World War began and became the first example of the standard pattern of aircraft carrier, with a full-length flight deck that allowed wheeled aircraft to take off and land. After commissioning, the ship was involved for several years in the development of the optimum design for other aircraft carriers. Argus also evaluated various types of arresting gear, general procedures needed to operate a number of aircraft in concert and fleet tactics. The ship was too top-heavy as originally built, and had to be modified to improve her stability in the mid-1920s. She spent one brief deployment on the China Station in the late 1920s before being placed in reserve for budgetary reasons.

Argus was recommissioned and partially modernised shortly before the Second World War and served as a training ship for deck-landing practice until June 1940. The following month she made the first of her many ferry trips to the Western Mediterranean to fly off fighters to Malta; she was largely occupied in this task for the next two years. The ship also delivered aircraft to Murmansk, Russia, Takoradi in the Gold Coast, and Reykjavík, Iceland. By 1942, the Royal Navy was very short of aircraft carriers, and Argus was pressed into front-line service despite her lack of speed and armament. In June, she participated in Operation Harpoon, providing air cover for the Malta-bound convoy. In November, the ship provided air cover during Operation Torch, the invasion of French North Africa, and was slightly damaged by a bomb. After returning to the UK for repairs, Argus was used again for deck-landing practice until late September 1944. In December, she became an accommodation ship, and was listed for disposal in mid-1946. The ship was sold in late 1946 and scrapped the following year. (Full article...)

Wark in 2006

John Wark (born 4 August 1957) is a Scottish former footballer who spent most of his playing time with Ipswich Town. He won a record four Player of the Year awards before becoming one of the four inaugural members of the club's Hall of Fame. Wark had long spells at the club, which bookended his career, and a third, brief interlude dividing his briefer periods at Liverpool and Middlesbrough. A versatile player, Wark played most of his professional games as a midfielder, although he sometimes played as a central defender and on occasion as a striker.

Born in Glasgow, Wark represented Scotland in international football, winning 29 caps and scoring seven goals. This included selection for Scotland in the 1982 FIFA World Cup in which he made three appearances and scored twice. (Full article...)

The Battle of Inverkeithing was fought on 20 July 1651 between an English army under John Lambert and a Scottish army led by James Holborne as part of an English invasion of Scotland. The battle was fought near the isthmus of the Ferry Peninsula, to the south of Inverkeithing, after which it is named.

An English Parliamentary regime had tried and executed Charles I, who was king of both Scotland and England in a personal union, in January 1649. The Scots recognised his son, also Charles, as king of Britain and set about recruiting an army. An English army, under Oliver Cromwell, invaded Scotland in July 1650. The Scottish army, commanded by David Leslie, refused battle until 3 September when it was heavily defeated at the Battle of Dunbar. The English occupied Edinburgh and the Scots withdrew to the choke point of Stirling. For nearly a year all attempts to storm or bypass Stirling, or to draw the Scots out into another battle, failed. On 17 July 1651 1,600 English soldiers crossed the Firth of Forth at its narrowest point in specially constructed flat-bottomed boats and landed at North Queensferry on the Ferry Peninsula. The Scots sent forces to pen the English in and the English reinforced their landing. On 20 July the Scots moved against the English and in a short engagement were routed. (Full article...)

Portrait of Lady Grange by Sir John Baptiste de Medina c. 1710

Rachel Chiesley (baptised 4 February 1679 – 12 May 1745), usually known as Lady Grange, was the wife of Lord Grange, a Scottish lawyer with Jacobite sympathies. After 25 years of marriage and nine children, the Granges separated acrimoniously. When Lady Grange produced letters that she claimed were evidence of his treasonable plottings against the Hanoverian government in London, her husband had her kidnapped in 1732. She was incarcerated in various remote locations on the western seaboard of Scotland, including the Monach Isles, Skye and St Kilda.

Lady Grange's father was convicted of murder and she is known to have had a violent temper; initially her absence seems to have caused little comment. News of her plight eventually reached her home town of Edinburgh and an unsuccessful rescue attempt was undertaken by her lawyer, Thomas Hope of Rankeillor. She died in captivity, after being in effect imprisoned for over 13 years. Her life has been remembered in poetry, prose and plays. (Full article...)

Cromwell at Dunbar, 1886, by Andrew Carrick Gow

The Battle of Dunbar was fought between the English New Model Army, under Oliver Cromwell, and a Scottish army commanded by David Leslie on 3 September 1650 near Dunbar, Scotland. The battle resulted in a decisive victory for the English. It was the first major battle of the 1650 invasion of Scotland, which was triggered by Scotland's acceptance of Charles II as king of Britain after the beheading of his father, Charles I on 30 January 1649.

After Charles I's execution, the English Rump Parliament established a republican Commonwealth in England. When their erstwhile ally, Scotland, recognised Charles II as king of all of Britain on 1 May 1650 and began recruiting an army to support him, the English dispatched the New Model Army, under the command of Cromwell. The army crossed into Scotland on 22 July, with a force of over 16,000 men. The Scots withdrew to Edinburgh, stripping the land of provisions. Cromwell attempted to draw the Scots out into a set piece battle, but they resisted, and Cromwell was unable to break through their defensive line. At the end of August, with his army weakened through disease and lack of food, Cromwell withdrew to the port of Dunbar. The Scottish army followed and took up an unassailable position on Doon Hill, overlooking the town. On 2 September, the Scots advanced towards Dunbar and the English took up positions outside the town. The English army was greatly weakened by sickness and lack of food, while many of the Scots' most experienced men had been dismissed in religious purges. (Full article...)

No. 49 Gordon Highlander, seen here in 1964 after preservation.

The Great North of Scotland Railway (GNSR) was one of the two smallest of the five major Scottish railway companies prior to the 1923 Grouping, operating in the north-east of the country. Formed in 1845, it carried its first passengers the 39 miles (63 km) from Kittybrewster, in Aberdeen, to Huntly on 20 September 1854. By 1867 it owned 226+1⁄4 route miles (364.1 km) of line and operated over a further 61 miles (98 km).

The early expansion was followed by a period of forced economy, but in the 1880s the railway was refurbished, express services began to run and by the end of that decade there was a suburban service in Aberdeen. The railway operated its main line between Aberdeen and Keith and two routes west to Elgin, connections could be made at both Keith and Elgin for Highland Railway services to Inverness. There were other junctions with the Highland Railway at Boat of Garten and Portessie, and at Aberdeen connections for journeys south over the Caledonian and North British Railways. Its eventual area encompassed the three Scottish counties of Aberdeenshire, Banffshire and Moray, with short lengths of line in Inverness-shire and Kincardineshire. (Full article...)

David I or Dauíd mac Maíl Choluim (Modern: Daibhidh I mac [Mhaoil] Chaluim; c. 1084 – 24 May 1153) was a 12th-century ruler who was Prince of the Cumbrians from 1113 to 1124 and later King of Scotland from 1124 to 1153. The youngest son of Malcolm III and Margaret of Wessex, David spent most of his childhood in Scotland, but was exiled to England temporarily in 1093. Perhaps after 1100, he became a dependent at the court of King Henry I. There he was influenced by the Anglo-French culture of the court.

When David's brother Alexander I died in 1124, David chose, with the backing of Henry I, to take the Kingdom of Scotland (Alba) for himself. He was forced to engage in warfare against his rival and nephew, Máel Coluim mac Alaxandair. Subduing the latter seems to have taken David ten years, a struggle that involved the destruction of Óengus, Mormaer of Moray. David's victory allowed expansion of control over more distant regions theoretically part of his Kingdom. After the death of his former patron Henry I, David supported the claims of Henry's daughter and his own niece, Empress Matilda, to the throne of England. In the process, he came into conflict with King Stephen and was able to expand his power in northern England, despite his defeat at the Battle of the Standard in 1138. David I is a saint of the Catholic Church, with his feast day celebrated on 24 May. (Full article...)

Architecture of Scotland in the Industrial Revolution includes all building in Scotland between the mid-eighteenth century and the end of the nineteenth century. During this period, the country underwent an economic and social transformation as a result of industrialisation, which was reflected in new architectural forms, techniques and scale of building. In the second half of the eighteenth century, Edinburgh was the focus of a classically inspired building boom that reflected the growing wealth and confidence of the capital. Housing often took the form of horizontally divided tenement flats. Some of the leading European architects during this period were Scottish, including Robert Adam and William Chambers.

While urban centres were rebuilt in local materials, including Aberdeen in granite and Glasgow in red sandstone, the homes of the rural poor remained basic, particularly in the Highlands. In the cities they were confined to the sprawl of suburban tenements like those of the Gorbals in Glasgow. One response to growing population was the creation of planned new towns, like those at Inverary and New Lanark. The nineteenth century also was the revival of the Scots Baronial style, pioneered at Walter Scott's Abbotsford House and confirmed in popularity by Queen Victoria's residence at Balmoral Castle. There was also a revival of Gothic styles in church architecture. Neo-classicism continued to be a major movement in the works of architects including William Henry Playfair and Alexander "Greek" Thomson. The later part of the century also saw some of the most important architectural products of new engineering, including the iconic Forth Bridge. (Full article...)

The Jocky Wilson Cup (officially the PartyPoker.com Jocky Wilson Cup for sponsorship) was a professional darts team tournament that took place at the Braehead Arena in Glasgow, Scotland, on 5 December 2009. This one-off tournament, which was named after Jocky Wilson, a two-time world darts champion, was the last of the eight non-ranking Professional Darts Corporation (PDC) events of the 2009 season. The tournament was contested by two nations of two players each. The winning nation was the first country to earn four points over a five-match series – four singles fixtures and one doubles game.

Phil Taylor and James Wade of England won the competition and whitewashed their opponents Gary Anderson and Robert Thornton of Scotland 6–0. Wade won the first game against Anderson 6–4; Taylor beat Thornton 6–0 in the second. Wade and Taylor defeated their opponents in the doubles match 6–2 for the overall victory and won their final two singles matches 6–4 over their Scottish opponents. (Full article...)

Inside Ibrox looking towards the Family Stand

Ibrox Stadium is a football stadium on the south side of the River Clyde in the Ibrox area of Glasgow, Scotland. The home of Rangers Football Club, Ibrox is the third largest football stadium in Scotland, with an all-seated capacity of 50,817.

Opened as Ibrox Park in 1899, it suffered a disaster in 1902 when a wooden terrace collapsed. Vast earthen terraces were built in its place, and a main stand, now a listed building, in 1928. A British record crowd of 118,567 gathered in January 1939 for a league match with Celtic. After another disaster in 1971, the stadium was largely rebuilt. The vast bowl-shaped terracing was removed and replaced by three rectangular, all-seated stands by 1981. After renovations were completed in 1997, the ground was renamed Ibrox Stadium. (Full article...)

The Calendar (New Style) Act 1750 (24 Geo. II c.23), also known as Chesterfield's Act or (in American usage) the British Calendar Act of 1751, is an Act of the Parliament of Great Britain. Its purpose was for Great Britain and the British Empire to adopt the Gregorian calendar (in effect). The Act also rectified other dating anomalies, such as changing the start of the legal year from 25 March to 1 January.

The Act elided eleven days from September 1752. It ordered that religious feast days be held on their traditional dates—for example, Christmas Day remained on 25 December. (Easter is a moveable feast: the Act specifies how its date should be calculated.) It ordered that civil and market days be moved forward in the calendar by eleven days—for example the quarter days on which rent was due, salaries paid and new labour contracts agreed—so that no-one should gain or lose by the change and that markets match the agricultural season; it is for this reason that the UK tax year ends on 5 April, being eleven days on from the original quarter-day of 25 March. (Full article...)

Scotland in the modern era, from the end of the Jacobite risings and beginnings of industrialisation in the 18th century to the present day, has played a major part in the economic, military and political history of the United Kingdom, British Empire and Europe, while recurring issues over the status of Scotland, its status and identity have dominated political debate.

Scotland made a major contribution to the intellectual life of Europe, particularly in the Enlightenment, producing major figures including the economist Adam Smith, philosophers Francis Hutcheson and David Hume, and scientists William Cullen, Joseph Black and James Hutton. In the 19th century major figures included James Watt, James Clerk Maxwell, Lord Kelvin and Sir Walter Scott. Scotland's economic contribution to the Empire and the industrial revolution included its banking system and the development of cotton, coal mining, shipbuilding and an extensive railway network. Industrialisation and changes to agriculture and society led to depopulation and clearances of the largely rural highlands, migration to the towns and mass emigration, where Scots made a major contribution to the development of countries including the US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. (Full article...)

Gilli's name and title as it appears on folio 4r of AM 162 B epsilon (Njáls saga): "Gilla jarl".

Gilli was an eleventh-century Hebridean chieftain whose career coincided with an era of Orcadian overlordship in the Kingdom of the Isles. According to mediaeval saga-tradition, Gilli was a brother-in-law of Sigurðr Hlǫðvisson, Earl of Orkney, having married the latter's sister Hvarflǫð. Traditionally regarded as one of the most powerful Orcadian earls, Sigurðr appears to have extended his authority into the Isles in the late tenth century. Gilli apparently acted as Sigurðr's viceroy or tributary earl in the region. The time frame of Gilli's apparent authority in the Isles is uncertain, and may date as early as the reign of Guðrøðr Haraldsson, King of the Isles, or as late as the period following the death of this man's eventual successor, Rǫgnvaldr Guðrøðarson, King of the Isles. Gilli's name is probably Gaelic in origin, and he seems to have seated himself on either Coll or Colonsay, islands in the Inner Hebrides. It is possible that Gilli is identical to Gilla Ciaráin mac Glún Iairn, an Uí Ímair dynast who was slain at the Battle of Clontarf in 1014. If not, another possibility is that he was the father of a certain Conamal/Conmáel who was killed in 980. (Full article...)

Squire's Hill, north Belfast, the area of the murders

The 1971 Scottish soldiers' killings took place in Northern Ireland during The Troubles. On 10 March 1971, the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) shot dead three off-duty British soldiers of the 1st Battalion, Royal Highland Fusiliers. The soldiers were from Scotland and two were teenage brothers. They were lured from a pub in Belfast where they had been drinking, driven to a remote location and shot by the roadside. Three British soldiers had been killed before this, but all had been killed during rioting.

The deaths led to public mourning and protests against the IRA. Pressure to act spurred a political crisis for the Northern Ireland Government, which led to the resignation of James Chichester-Clark as Prime Minister of Northern Ireland. The British Army raised the minimum age needed to serve in Northern Ireland to 18 in response to this incident. In 2010, a memorial was dedicated to the three soldiers near the site of their deaths. (Full article...)

Thurso (pronounced /ˈθɜːrsoʊ/; Scots: Thursa, Scottish Gaelic: Inbhir Theòrsa [ˈiɲɪɾʲ ˈhjɔːrˠs̪ə]) is a town and former burgh on the north coast of the Highland council area of Scotland. Situated in the historical County of Caithness, it is the northernmost town on the island of Great Britain. From a latitudal standpoint, Thurso is located further north than the southernmost point of Norway and in addition lies more than 500 miles (800 km) north of London.

It lies at the junction of the north–south A9 road and the west–east A836 road, connected to Bridge of Forss in the west and Castletown in the east. The 34-mile (55 km) River Thurso flows through the town and into Thurso Bay and the Pentland Firth. The river estuary serves as a small harbour. At the 2011 Census, Thurso had a population of 7,933. The larger Thurso civil parish including the town and the surrounding countryside had a population of 9,112. (Full article...)

Speirs in his Bradford City kit in 1911

James Hamilton Speirs MM (22 March 1886 – 20 August 1917) was a Scottish footballer who represented his country on one occasion, scored the winning goal in the 1911 FA Cup Final, and received the Military Medal during the First World War.

Born in Glasgow, he worked as a clerk while playing youth football for Annandale. He started his adult football career with local junior team Maryhill, where he played for less than a season, before he moved to Rangers in 1905. He spent three years with the club, but won only the Glasgow Merchants' Charity Cup, before he joined a third Glasgow side Clyde. After one season, he left Clyde and Scotland, and joined Bradford City for their second season in the First Division. His greatest success came in his second season with Bradford, when he was the club's captain and goalscorer in their FA Cup Final victory of 1911, in a team featuring eight Scottish-born players. (Full article...)

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Orkney (/ˈɔːrkni/; Scots: Orkney; Old Norse: Orkneyjar; Norn: Orknøjar), also known as the Orkney Islands, is an archipelago in the Northern Isles of Scotland, situated off the north coast of the island of Great Britain. Orkney is 10 miles (16 km) north of the coast of Caithness and has about 70 islands, of which 20 are inhabited. The largest island, the Mainland, has an area of 523 square kilometres (202 sq mi), making it the sixth-largest Scottish island and the tenth-largest island in the British Isles. Orkney’s largest settlement, and also its administrative centre, is Kirkwall.

Orkney is one of the 32 council areas of Scotland, as well as a constituency of the Scottish Parliament, a lieutenancy area, and an historic county. The local council is Orkney Islands Council, one of only three councils in Scotland with a majority of elected members who are independents. (Full article...)

The recorded history of Scotland begins with the arrival of the Roman Empire in the 1st century, when the province of Britannia reached as far north as the Antonine Wall. North of this was Caledonia, inhabited by the Picti, whose uprisings forced Rome's legions back to Hadrian's Wall. As Rome finally withdrew from Britain, Gaelic raiders called the Scoti began colonising Western Scotland and Wales. Before Roman times, prehistoric Scotland entered the Neolithic Era about 4000 BC, the Bronze Age about 2000 BC, and the Iron Age around 700 BC.

The Gaelic kingdom of Dál Riata was founded on the west coast of Scotland in the 6th century. In the following century, Irish missionaries introduced the previously pagan Picts to Celtic Christianity. Following England's Gregorian mission, the Pictish king Nechtan chose to abolish most Celtic practices in favour of the Roman rite, restricting Gaelic influence on his kingdom and avoiding war with Anglian Northumbria. Towards the end of the 8th century, the Viking invasions began, forcing the Picts and Gaels to cease their historic hostility to each other and to unite in the 9th century, forming the Kingdom of Scotland. (Full article...)

Alexander Patrick Greysteil Hore-Ruthven, 2nd Earl of Gowrie, PC, FRSL (26 November 1939 – 24 September 2021), usually known as Grey Gowrie or Lord Gowrie, was an Irish-born British hereditary peer, politician, and businessman. Lord Gowrie was also the hereditary Clan Chief of Clan Ruthven in Scotland. He was educated at Eton and Oxford, and held posts in academia for a period, in the US and London, including time working with poet Robert Lowell and at Harvard University.

Gowrie was a Conservative Party politician for some years, including a period in the British Cabinet. He held ministerial posts under Margaret Thatcher, in the areas of employment and Northern Ireland, and was Minister of State for the Arts, as well as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, with responsibility for Civil Service reform. Offered a promotion to full Secretary of State, with responsibility for education across the UK, he turned it down. Previously an arts dealer, he moved to Sotheby's for a reputed salary of around £150,000, chairing parts of the art auction business. He later chaired the Arts Council of England (1994–1998). (Full article...)

Glass Swords is the debut studio album by Scottish producer Russell Whyte under his alias of Rustie, released by Warp in 2011. The album was produced and recorded between 2008 and 2010 by Whyte, partially in his father's home in Glasgow, Scotland and partly in his own home in London, England. The album contains vocal work from Whyte as well as London based producer Nightwave.

Glass Swords is a musically diverse album that critics found hard to classify as anything specific other than electronic music. The track "Ultra Thizz" was released as a single in September 2011 before the album's release in October of the same year. Re-worked versions of the songs "Surph" and "After Light" were released as singles in 2012 with new vocalists. The album received critical acclaim and was listed as one of the best albums of 2011 by The Guardian, The Wire and Mixmag and shortlisted for the Scottish Album of the Year Award in 2012. (Full article...)

A mezzotint portrait of Ferguson by William Ward, after Sir William Beechey, published 1818

James Ferguson FRSE (25 May 1735 – 6 September 1820) was a Scottish advocate and Tory politician and the third Laird of Pitfour, a large estate in the Buchan area of north east Scotland, which is known as the 'Blenheim of the North'.

Ferguson studied law in Edinburgh, qualifying in 1757 to gain membership of the Faculty of Advocates. He then undertook a tour of Europe throughout 1758 before following in his father's footsteps by joining the Scottish legal profession. Later in life his interests turned to politics and he became a Scottish Tory politician. (Full article...)

Prehistoric art in Scotland is visual art created or found within the modern borders of Scotland, before the departure of the Romans from southern and central Britain in the early fifth century CE, which is usually seen as the beginning of the early historic or Medieval era. There is no clear definition of prehistoric art among scholars and objects that may involve creativity often lack a context that would allow them to be understood.

The earliest examples of portable art from what is now Scotland are highly decorated carved stone balls from the Neolithic period, which share patterns with Irish and Scottish stone carvings. Other items from this period include elaborate carved maceheads and figurines from Links of Noltland, including the Westray Wife, which is the earliest known depiction of a human face from Scotland. (Full article...)