Union of the Crowns
Encyclopedia
The Union of the Crowns (March 1603) was the accession
of James VI, King of Scots, to the throne of England
, and the consequential unification of Scotland
and England under one monarch. The Union of Crowns followed the death of James' unmarried and childless first cousin
twice removed, Queen Elizabeth I of England
—the last monarch of the Tudor dynasty
.
The Union was a personal
or dynastic union
, with the Crowns
remaining both distinct and separate—despite James's best efforts to create a new "imperial" throne of "Great Britain
". England and Scotland continued to be sovereign state
s, despite sharing a monarch
, until the Acts of Union
in 1707 during the reign of the last Stuart monarch
, Queen Anne
.
In August 1503, James IV
, King of Scots, married Margaret Tudor
, eldest daughter of Henry VII of England
, and the spirit of the new age was celebrated by the poet William Dunbar
in The Thistle and the Rose. The marriage was the outcome of the Treaty of Perpetual Peace
, concluded the previous year, which, in theory, ended centuries of Anglo-Scottish rivalry. The marriage merged the Stuarts
with England's Tudor
line of succession, despite the improbability of a Scottish prince acceding the English throne at the time. However, many on the English side were concerned by the dynastic implications of matrimony, including some Privy Councillors
. In countering these fears Henry VII is reputed to have said:
The peace did not last in "perpetuity", it was disturbed in 1513 when Henry VIII
King of England & Lord of Ireland, who succeeded his father four years before, declared war on France. In response France invoked the terms of the Auld Alliance
, her ancient bond with Scotland. James duly invaded northern England leading to the Battle of Flodden.
In the decades that followed, England's relations with Scotland were turbulent. By the middle of Henry's reign, the problems of the royal succession, which seemed so unimportant in 1503, acquired ever bigger dimensions, when the question of Tudor fertility — or the lack thereof — entered directly into the political arena. The line of Margaret Tudor was excluded from the English succession, though, during the reign of Elizabeth I
concerns were once again raised. In the last decade of her reign it was clear to all that James VI of Scots
, great-grandson of James IV and Margaret Tudor, was the only generally acceptable heir.
From 1601, in the last years of Elizabeth I's life, certain English politicians, notably her chief minister Sir Robert Cecil
, maintained a secret correspondence with James
in order to prepare in advance for a smooth succession. Cecil advised James not to press the matter of the succession upon the queen but simply to treat her with kindness and respect. The approach proved effective: "I trust that you will not doubt," Elizabeth wrote to James, "but that your last letters are so acceptably taken as my thanks cannot be lacking for the same, but yield them you in grateful sort." In March 1603, with the queen clearly dying, Cecil sent James a draft proclamation of his accession to the English throne. Strategic fortresses were put on alert, and London placed under guard. Elizabeth died in the early hours of 24 March. Within eight hours, James was proclaimed king in London, the news received without protest or disturbance.
On 5 April 1603, James left Edinburgh for London, promising to return every three years (a promise he failed to keep, returning only once, in 1617, fourteen years after his initial departure), and progressed slowly from town to town, in order to arrive in the capital after Elizabeth's funeral. Local lords received James with lavish hospitality along the route; and James's new subjects flocked to see him, relieved above all that the succession had triggered neither unrest nor invasion. As James entered London, he was mobbed. The crowds of people, one observer reported, were so great that "they covered the beauty of the fields; and so greedy were they to behold the King that they injured and hurt one another." James's English coronation took place on 25 July, with elaborate allegories provided by dramatic poets such as Thomas Dekker and Ben Jonson
, though the festivities had to be restricted because of an outbreak of the plague. Nevertheless, all London turned out for the occasion: "The streets seemed paved with men," wrote Dekker. "Stalls instead of rich wares were set out with children, open casements filled up with women".
Whatever residual fears many in England may have felt at the prospect of being ruled by a Scot, James's arrival aroused a mood of high expectation. The twilight years of Elizabeth had been a disappointment; and for a nation troubled for so many years by the question of succession, the new king was a family man who already had male heirs in the wing. But James's honeymoon was of very short duration; and his initial political actions were to do much to create the rather negative tone which was to turn a successful Scottish king into a disappointing English one. The greatest and most obvious of these was the question of his exact status and title. James intended to be King of Great Britain
and Ireland. His first obstacle along this imperial road was the attitude of the English Parliament.
In his first speech to his southern assembly in March 1603 James gave a clear statement of the royal manifesto;
Parliament may very well have rejected polygamy; but the marriage, if marriage it was, between the realms of England and Scotland was to be at best morganatic. James's ambitions were greeted with very little enthusiasm, as one by one MPs rushed to defend the ancient name and realm of England. All sorts of legal objections were raised: all laws would have to be renewed and all treaties renegotiated. For James, whose experience of parliaments was limited to the stage-managed and semi-feudal Scottish variety, the self-assurance — and obduracy — of the English version, which had long experience of upsetting monarchs, was an obvious shock. He decided to side-step the whole issue by unilaterally assuming the title of King of Great Britain
by a Proclamation concerning the Kings Majesties Stile on 20 October 1604 announcing that he did "assume to Our selfe by the cleerenesse of our Right, The Name and Stile of KING OF GREAT BRITTAINE, FRANCE, AND IRELAND, DEFENDER OF THE FAITH, &c." . This only deepened the offence. Even in Scotland there was little real enthusiasm for the project, though the two parliaments were eventually prodded into taking the whole matter 'under consideration'. Consider it they did for several years, never drawing the desired conclusion.
, a kingdom in name, but — since 1601 — a subject nation in practice. John Russell, lawyer and writer, an initial enthusiast for 'the happie and blissed Unioun betuixt the tua ancienne realmes of Scotland and Ingland' was later to warn James:
These fears were echoed by the Scottish Parliament, learning from its English cousin that the King's word was not law after all. MPs, in much the same way as those in England, were telling the king that they were 'confident' that his plans for an incorporating union would not prejudice the ancient laws and liberties of Scotland; for any such hurt would mean that 'it culd no more be a frie monarchie.'
Scottish fears can scarcely have been allayed when the king, now aware of the depths of English hostility, attempted to reassure his new subjects that the new union would be much like that between England and Wales
, and that if Scotland should refuse 'he would compel their assents, having a stronger party there than the opposite party of the mutineers'. In June 1604 the two national parliaments, with obvious lack of enthusiasm, passed acts appointing commissioners to explore the possibility of 'a more perfect union'. One cannot but sympathise with these men whose remit was to achieve the impossible — a new state that would still preserve the laws, honours, dignities, offices and liberties of each of the component kingdoms. James, in a more sober and wiser mood, closed the final session of his first parliament with a rebuke to his opponents in the House of Commons — 'Here all things suspected...He merits to be buried in the bottom of the sea that shall but think of separation, where God had made such a Union.'
, George Chapman
and John Marston
. In enthusing over the good life to be had in the colony of Virginia
it is observed;
But the Scots were too happy to pay out these libels, with interest. The age-old French slander that the English had tails like monkeys was once again in circulation, joining many more original anti-English satires, so much so that in 1609 the king had an act passed, promising the direst penalties against the writers of "pasquillis, libellis, rymis, cockalanis, comedies and sicklyk occasiones whereby they slander and maligne and revile the estait and countrey of England..."
Against this cultural and political background the gentlemen of the parliamentary commission had little real prospect of making any progress along the road to a close and intimate union. As early as October 1605, well before the commissioners reported, the Venetian
ambassador noted 'the question of the Union will, I am assured, be dropped; for His Majesty is now well aware that nothing can be effected, both sides displaying such obstinacy that an accommodation is impossible; and so his Majesty is resolved to abandon the question for the present, in hope that time may consume the ill-humours.' It did, but over a far longer period than James can ever have imagined.
superimposed upon a St. Andrew's Saltire
sought to create their own 'Scotch' design which saw the reverse superimposition take place. (This design was used in Scotland until 1707.) For years afterwards vessels of both nations continued to fly their respective 'flags', the royal proclamation notwithstanding. Ironically, the Union Flag
only entered into common use under Cromwell's Protectorate
.
fell to the crown. A new Plantation
was started, made up of Protestant settlers from Scotland and England, mostly from the Border country
(the "middle shires" between the Firth of Clyde
and the Mersey Estuary), with a minority from Bristol
and London
. Over the years the settlers, surrounded by the hostile Catholic Irish, gradually cast off their separate English and Scottish roots, becoming British
in the process, as a means of emphasising their 'otherness' from their Gaelic neighbours (Marshall, T., p. 31). It was the one corner of the United Kingdom where Britishness became truly meaningful as a political and cultural identity in its own right, as opposed to a gloss on older and deeper national associations.
Though, over time, Britishness also took some root in England and Scotland – especially in the days of Empire
– by and large people were English or Scottish first, and British second. In Northern Ireland the Protestant communities were to be British first, second and last. It was James's most enduring – and troublesome – legacy.
and Castile
might be compared, as does the temporary union of Sweden
and Poland (see Polish-Swedish union
). Unions of this kind can be made to work, but they take time to bed down. In the end the union of Scotland and England was to be successful but it was never a marriage of equals. James promised that he would return to his ancient kingdom every three years. In the end he came back only once — in 1617 — and even then his English councillors pleaded with him to remain in London. Scotland, up to the full parliamentary Union of 1707, may have retained its institutional independence, but it lost control of vital areas of policy, most notably foreign relations, which remained the prerogative of the crown. This meant, in practice, that policy matters were inevitably tied to English rather than Scottish interests. A case in point was the Dutch Wars of Charles II
, which took Scotland to war with its strongest trading partner, though no Scottish interest was served and none threatened. The failure of Scotland's attempts to establish overseas trading colonies, firstly in Nova Scotia
then later in the Isthmus of Panama
, (under the ill-fated Darien scheme
), were also in part due to the priority given to English interests over those of Scotland by the sovereign. James's imperial crown over time diminished in size and scope, so much so that in 1616 he was to admit openly in the Star Chamber
that his intention 'was always to effect union by uniting Scotland to England, and not England to Scotland.' Years later Queen Anne
, the first true British monarch, was to describe the Scots as 'a strange people' and told her first parliament that she knew her heart 'to be entirely English.' It was to be George III — a scion of the German House of Hanover
— who recaptured something of the old spirit of King James of 1603 when he declared his pride 'in the name of Briton.'
Coronation
A coronation is a ceremony marking the formal investiture of a monarch and/or their consort with regal power, usually involving the placement of a crown upon their head and the presentation of other items of regalia...
of James VI, King of Scots, to the throne of England
Kingdom of England
The Kingdom of England was, from 927 to 1707, a sovereign state to the northwest of continental Europe. At its height, the Kingdom of England spanned the southern two-thirds of the island of Great Britain and several smaller outlying islands; what today comprises the legal jurisdiction of England...
, and the consequential unification of Scotland
Scotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
and England under one monarch. The Union of Crowns followed the death of James' unmarried and childless first cousin
Cousin
In kinship terminology, a cousin is a relative with whom one shares one or more common ancestors. The term is rarely used when referring to a relative in one's immediate family where there is a more specific term . The term "blood relative" can be used synonymously and establishes the existence of...
twice removed, Queen Elizabeth I of England
Elizabeth I of England
Elizabeth I was queen regnant of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death. Sometimes called The Virgin Queen, Gloriana, or Good Queen Bess, Elizabeth was the fifth and last monarch of the Tudor dynasty...
—the last monarch of the Tudor dynasty
Tudor dynasty
The Tudor dynasty or House of Tudor was a European royal house of Welsh origin that ruled the Kingdom of England and its realms, including the Lordship of Ireland, later the Kingdom of Ireland, from 1485 until 1603. Its first monarch was Henry Tudor, a descendant through his mother of a legitimised...
.
The Union was a personal
Personal union
A personal union is the combination by which two or more different states have the same monarch while their boundaries, their laws and their interests remain distinct. It should not be confused with a federation which is internationally considered a single state...
or dynastic union
Dynastic union
A dynastic union is the combination by which two different states are governed by the same dynasty, while their boundaries, their laws and their interests remain distinct...
, with the Crowns
The Crown
The Crown is a corporation sole that in the Commonwealth realms and any provincial or state sub-divisions thereof represents the legal embodiment of governance, whether executive, legislative, or judicial...
remaining both distinct and separate—despite James's best efforts to create a new "imperial" throne of "Great Britain
Great Britain
Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...
". England and Scotland continued to be sovereign state
Sovereign state
A sovereign state, or simply, state, is a state with a defined territory on which it exercises internal and external sovereignty, a permanent population, a government, and the capacity to enter into relations with other sovereign states. It is also normally understood to be a state which is neither...
s, despite sharing a monarch
Monarch
A monarch is the person who heads a monarchy. This is a form of government in which a state or polity is ruled or controlled by an individual who typically inherits the throne by birth and occasionally rules for life or until abdication...
, until the Acts of Union
Acts of Union 1707
The Acts of Union were two Parliamentary Acts - the Union with Scotland Act passed in 1706 by the Parliament of England, and the Union with England Act passed in 1707 by the Parliament of Scotland - which put into effect the terms of the Treaty of Union that had been agreed on 22 July 1706,...
in 1707 during the reign of the last Stuart monarch
House of Stuart
The House of Stuart is a European royal house. Founded by Robert II of Scotland, the Stewarts first became monarchs of the Kingdom of Scotland during the late 14th century, and subsequently held the position of the Kings of Great Britain and Ireland...
, Queen Anne
Anne of Great Britain
Anne ascended the thrones of England, Scotland and Ireland on 8 March 1702. On 1 May 1707, under the Act of Union, two of her realms, England and Scotland, were united as a single sovereign state, the Kingdom of Great Britain.Anne's Catholic father, James II and VII, was deposed during the...
.
Early unification
James IV of Scotland
James IV was King of Scots from 11 June 1488 to his death. He is generally regarded as the most successful of the Stewart monarchs of Scotland, but his reign ended with the disastrous defeat at the Battle of Flodden Field, where he became the last monarch from not only Scotland, but also from all...
, King of Scots, married Margaret Tudor
Margaret Tudor
Margaret Tudor was the elder of the two surviving daughters of Henry VII of England and Elizabeth of York, and the elder sister of Henry VIII. In 1503, she married James IV, King of Scots. James died in 1513, and their son became King James V. She married secondly Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of...
, eldest daughter of Henry VII of England
Henry VII of England
Henry VII was King of England and Lord of Ireland from his seizing the crown on 22 August 1485 until his death on 21 April 1509, as the first monarch of the House of Tudor....
, and the spirit of the new age was celebrated by the poet William Dunbar
William Dunbar
William Dunbar was a Scottish poet. He was probably a native of East Lothian, as assumed from a satirical reference in the Flyting of Dunbar and Kennedie , where, too, it is hinted that he was a member of the noble house of Dunbar....
in The Thistle and the Rose. The marriage was the outcome of the Treaty of Perpetual Peace
Treaty of Perpetual Peace (1502)
The Treaty of Perpetual Peace was signed by James IV of Scotland and Henry VII of England in 1502. It agreed to end the intermittent warfare between Scotland and England which had been waged over the previous two hundred years and although it failed in this respect, as the hostility continued...
, concluded the previous year, which, in theory, ended centuries of Anglo-Scottish rivalry. The marriage merged the Stuarts
House of Stuart
The House of Stuart is a European royal house. Founded by Robert II of Scotland, the Stewarts first became monarchs of the Kingdom of Scotland during the late 14th century, and subsequently held the position of the Kings of Great Britain and Ireland...
with England's Tudor
Tudor dynasty
The Tudor dynasty or House of Tudor was a European royal house of Welsh origin that ruled the Kingdom of England and its realms, including the Lordship of Ireland, later the Kingdom of Ireland, from 1485 until 1603. Its first monarch was Henry Tudor, a descendant through his mother of a legitimised...
line of succession, despite the improbability of a Scottish prince acceding the English throne at the time. However, many on the English side were concerned by the dynastic implications of matrimony, including some Privy Councillors
Privy Council of England
The Privy Council of England, also known as His Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council, was a body of advisers to the sovereign of the Kingdom of England...
. In countering these fears Henry VII is reputed to have said:
The peace did not last in "perpetuity", it was disturbed in 1513 when Henry VIII
Henry VIII of England
Henry VIII was King of England from 21 April 1509 until his death. He was Lord, and later King, of Ireland, as well as continuing the nominal claim by the English monarchs to the Kingdom of France...
King of England & Lord of Ireland, who succeeded his father four years before, declared war on France. In response France invoked the terms of the Auld Alliance
Auld Alliance
The Auld Alliance was an alliance between the kingdoms of Scotland and France. It played a significant role in the relations between Scotland, France and England from its beginning in 1295 until the 1560 Treaty of Edinburgh. The alliance was renewed by all the French and Scottish monarchs of that...
, her ancient bond with Scotland. James duly invaded northern England leading to the Battle of Flodden.
In the decades that followed, England's relations with Scotland were turbulent. By the middle of Henry's reign, the problems of the royal succession, which seemed so unimportant in 1503, acquired ever bigger dimensions, when the question of Tudor fertility — or the lack thereof — entered directly into the political arena. The line of Margaret Tudor was excluded from the English succession, though, during the reign of Elizabeth I
Elizabeth I of England
Elizabeth I was queen regnant of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death. Sometimes called The Virgin Queen, Gloriana, or Good Queen Bess, Elizabeth was the fifth and last monarch of the Tudor dynasty...
concerns were once again raised. In the last decade of her reign it was clear to all that James VI of Scots
James I of England
James VI and I was King of Scots as James VI from 24 July 1567 and King of England and Ireland as James I from the union of the English and Scottish crowns on 24 March 1603...
, great-grandson of James IV and Margaret Tudor, was the only generally acceptable heir.
Accession of James VI
Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury
Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury, KG, PC was an English administrator and politician.-Life:He was the son of William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley and Mildred Cooke...
, maintained a secret correspondence with James
Secret correspondence of James VI
The secret correspondence of James VI of Scotland was communication between the Scottish King and administrators of Elizabeth I of England between May 1601 and the Queen's death in March 1603. In this period it was settled that James VI would succeed Elizabeth as James I of England, but the...
in order to prepare in advance for a smooth succession. Cecil advised James not to press the matter of the succession upon the queen but simply to treat her with kindness and respect. The approach proved effective: "I trust that you will not doubt," Elizabeth wrote to James, "but that your last letters are so acceptably taken as my thanks cannot be lacking for the same, but yield them you in grateful sort." In March 1603, with the queen clearly dying, Cecil sent James a draft proclamation of his accession to the English throne. Strategic fortresses were put on alert, and London placed under guard. Elizabeth died in the early hours of 24 March. Within eight hours, James was proclaimed king in London, the news received without protest or disturbance.
On 5 April 1603, James left Edinburgh for London, promising to return every three years (a promise he failed to keep, returning only once, in 1617, fourteen years after his initial departure), and progressed slowly from town to town, in order to arrive in the capital after Elizabeth's funeral. Local lords received James with lavish hospitality along the route; and James's new subjects flocked to see him, relieved above all that the succession had triggered neither unrest nor invasion. As James entered London, he was mobbed. The crowds of people, one observer reported, were so great that "they covered the beauty of the fields; and so greedy were they to behold the King that they injured and hurt one another." James's English coronation took place on 25 July, with elaborate allegories provided by dramatic poets such as Thomas Dekker and Ben Jonson
Ben Jonson
Benjamin Jonson was an English Renaissance dramatist, poet and actor. A contemporary of William Shakespeare, he is best known for his satirical plays, particularly Volpone, The Alchemist, and Bartholomew Fair, which are considered his best, and his lyric poems...
, though the festivities had to be restricted because of an outbreak of the plague. Nevertheless, all London turned out for the occasion: "The streets seemed paved with men," wrote Dekker. "Stalls instead of rich wares were set out with children, open casements filled up with women".
Whatever residual fears many in England may have felt at the prospect of being ruled by a Scot, James's arrival aroused a mood of high expectation. The twilight years of Elizabeth had been a disappointment; and for a nation troubled for so many years by the question of succession, the new king was a family man who already had male heirs in the wing. But James's honeymoon was of very short duration; and his initial political actions were to do much to create the rather negative tone which was to turn a successful Scottish king into a disappointing English one. The greatest and most obvious of these was the question of his exact status and title. James intended to be King of Great Britain
Great Britain
Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...
and Ireland. His first obstacle along this imperial road was the attitude of the English Parliament.
In his first speech to his southern assembly in March 1603 James gave a clear statement of the royal manifesto;
Parliament may very well have rejected polygamy; but the marriage, if marriage it was, between the realms of England and Scotland was to be at best morganatic. James's ambitions were greeted with very little enthusiasm, as one by one MPs rushed to defend the ancient name and realm of England. All sorts of legal objections were raised: all laws would have to be renewed and all treaties renegotiated. For James, whose experience of parliaments was limited to the stage-managed and semi-feudal Scottish variety, the self-assurance — and obduracy — of the English version, which had long experience of upsetting monarchs, was an obvious shock. He decided to side-step the whole issue by unilaterally assuming the title of King of Great Britain
Great Britain
Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...
by a Proclamation concerning the Kings Majesties Stile on 20 October 1604 announcing that he did "assume to Our selfe by the cleerenesse of our Right, The Name and Stile of KING OF GREAT BRITTAINE, FRANCE, AND IRELAND, DEFENDER OF THE FAITH, &c." . This only deepened the offence. Even in Scotland there was little real enthusiasm for the project, though the two parliaments were eventually prodded into taking the whole matter 'under consideration'. Consider it they did for several years, never drawing the desired conclusion.
Opposition to the union
In Scotland the incorporating union desired by James met with the same lack of zeal that it did in England, but for different reasons. Whatever pleasure there was in seeing a Scottish king succeeding to the crown of England, rather than the danger for centuries past of an English king seizing the crown of Scotland, there were early signs that many saw the risk of the 'lesser being drawn by the greater', as Henry VII once predicted. The obvious example before Scottish eyes was the case of IrelandKingdom of Ireland
The Kingdom of Ireland refers to the country of Ireland in the period between the proclamation of Henry VIII as King of Ireland by the Crown of Ireland Act 1542 and the Act of Union in 1800. It replaced the Lordship of Ireland, which had been created in 1171...
, a kingdom in name, but — since 1601 — a subject nation in practice. John Russell, lawyer and writer, an initial enthusiast for 'the happie and blissed Unioun betuixt the tua ancienne realmes of Scotland and Ingland' was later to warn James:
These fears were echoed by the Scottish Parliament, learning from its English cousin that the King's word was not law after all. MPs, in much the same way as those in England, were telling the king that they were 'confident' that his plans for an incorporating union would not prejudice the ancient laws and liberties of Scotland; for any such hurt would mean that 'it culd no more be a frie monarchie.'
Scottish fears can scarcely have been allayed when the king, now aware of the depths of English hostility, attempted to reassure his new subjects that the new union would be much like that between England and Wales
Wales
Wales is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and the island of Great Britain, bordered by England to its east and the Atlantic Ocean and Irish Sea to its west. It has a population of three million, and a total area of 20,779 km²...
, and that if Scotland should refuse 'he would compel their assents, having a stronger party there than the opposite party of the mutineers'. In June 1604 the two national parliaments, with obvious lack of enthusiasm, passed acts appointing commissioners to explore the possibility of 'a more perfect union'. One cannot but sympathise with these men whose remit was to achieve the impossible — a new state that would still preserve the laws, honours, dignities, offices and liberties of each of the component kingdoms. James, in a more sober and wiser mood, closed the final session of his first parliament with a rebuke to his opponents in the House of Commons — 'Here all things suspected...He merits to be buried in the bottom of the sea that shall but think of separation, where God had made such a Union.'
National animosity
James, of course, was moving too quickly for both nations, attempting to conjure away centuries of mutual hostility virtually overnight. He scarcely improved his position as large numbers of impoverished Scottish aristocrats and other place seekers made their way to London, ready to compete for the very highest positions at the heart of government. Several years later Sir Anthony Weldon was to write that 'Scotland was too guid for those that inhabit it, and too bad for others to be at the charge of conquering it. The ayre might be wholesome, but for the stinking people that inhabit it...Thair beastis be generallie small (women excepted) of which sort there are no greater in the world.' But the most immediately wounding observation came in the comedy Eastward Ho, a collaboration between Ben JonsonBen Jonson
Benjamin Jonson was an English Renaissance dramatist, poet and actor. A contemporary of William Shakespeare, he is best known for his satirical plays, particularly Volpone, The Alchemist, and Bartholomew Fair, which are considered his best, and his lyric poems...
, George Chapman
George Chapman
George Chapman was an English dramatist, translator, and poet. He was a classical scholar, and his work shows the influence of Stoicism. Chapman has been identified as the Rival Poet of Shakespeare's Sonnets by William Minto, and as an anticipator of the Metaphysical Poets...
and John Marston
John Marston
John Marston was an English poet, playwright and satirist during the late Elizabethan and Jacobean periods...
. In enthusing over the good life to be had in the colony of Virginia
Virginia
The Commonwealth of Virginia , is a U.S. state on the Atlantic Coast of the Southern United States. Virginia is nicknamed the "Old Dominion" and sometimes the "Mother of Presidents" after the eight U.S. presidents born there...
it is observed;
But the Scots were too happy to pay out these libels, with interest. The age-old French slander that the English had tails like monkeys was once again in circulation, joining many more original anti-English satires, so much so that in 1609 the king had an act passed, promising the direst penalties against the writers of "pasquillis, libellis, rymis, cockalanis, comedies and sicklyk occasiones whereby they slander and maligne and revile the estait and countrey of England..."
Against this cultural and political background the gentlemen of the parliamentary commission had little real prospect of making any progress along the road to a close and intimate union. As early as October 1605, well before the commissioners reported, the Venetian
Republic of Venice
The Republic of Venice or Venetian Republic was a state originating from the city of Venice in Northeastern Italy. It existed for over a millennium, from the late 7th century until 1797. It was formally known as the Most Serene Republic of Venice and is often referred to as La Serenissima, in...
ambassador noted 'the question of the Union will, I am assured, be dropped; for His Majesty is now well aware that nothing can be effected, both sides displaying such obstinacy that an accommodation is impossible; and so his Majesty is resolved to abandon the question for the present, in hope that time may consume the ill-humours.' It did, but over a far longer period than James can ever have imagined.
Citizens and subjects
By 1606 James's dream of an Imperial British Crown was looking sickly. The Union Commission made some limited progress, but only by setting the big picture to one side, concentrating instead on the seemingly more manageable issues like hostile border laws, trade and citizenship. The borders were to become the 'middle shires', as if history could be side-stepped by semantics. But the issues of free trade proved highly contentious, threatening powerful economic interest groups, as did the issue of equal rights before the law. It was to be, in essence, the immigration debate of the day. Fears were openly expressed in Parliament that English jobs would be threatened by all the poor people of the realm of Scotland, who will 'draw near to the Sonn, and flocking hither in such Multitudes, that death and dearth is very probable to ensue.' The exact status of the post nati, those born after the Union of March 1603, was never to be decided by Parliament. In the end the deadlock had to be broken by the courts in 1608 in Calvin's Case, involving the baby Robert Calvin, which extended property rights to the King's subjects (i.e. the Scots) in English common law.Symbols of the union
In the end James never got his 'imperial crown', and of political necessity was obliged to accept the reality of polygamy. Denied the substance he played with the symbols, devising new coats of arms, a uniform coinage and the like. But the creation of a national flag proved just as contentious as a national crown. Various designs were tried, that which proved acceptable to one side almost inevitably offended the other. James finally proclaimed the new Union Flag on 12 April 1606, but it was greeted without a great deal of enthusiasm, especially by the Scots, who seeing a St. George's CrossFlag of England
The Flag of England is the St George's Cross . The red cross appeared as an emblem of England during the Middle Ages and the Crusades and is one of the earliest known emblems representing England...
superimposed upon a St. Andrew's Saltire
Flag of Scotland
The Flag of Scotland, , also known as Saint Andrew's Cross or the Saltire, is the national flag of Scotland. As the national flag it is the Saltire, rather than the Royal Standard of Scotland, which is the correct flag for all individuals and corporate bodies to fly in order to demonstrate both...
sought to create their own 'Scotch' design which saw the reverse superimposition take place. (This design was used in Scotland until 1707.) For years afterwards vessels of both nations continued to fly their respective 'flags', the royal proclamation notwithstanding. Ironically, the Union Flag
Union Flag
The Union Flag, also known as the Union Jack, is the flag of the United Kingdom. It retains an official or semi-official status in some Commonwealth Realms; for example, it is known as the Royal Union Flag in Canada. It is also used as an official flag in some of the smaller British overseas...
only entered into common use under Cromwell's Protectorate
The Protectorate
In British history, the Protectorate was the period 1653–1659 during which the Commonwealth of England was governed by a Lord Protector.-Background:...
.
British
James did not create a British Crown but he did, in one sense at least, create the British as a distinct group of people. In 1607 large tracts of land in UlsterUlster
Ulster is one of the four provinces of Ireland, located in the north of the island. In ancient Ireland, it was one of the fifths ruled by a "king of over-kings" . Following the Norman invasion of Ireland, the ancient kingdoms were shired into a number of counties for administrative and judicial...
fell to the crown. A new Plantation
Plantation (settlement or colony)
Plantation was an early method of colonization in which settlers were "planted" abroad in order to establish a permanent or semi-permanent colonial base. Such plantations were also frequently intended to promote Western culture and Christianity among nearby indigenous peoples, as can be seen in the...
was started, made up of Protestant settlers from Scotland and England, mostly from the Border country
Border Country
Border Country is a novel by Raymond Williams. The book was re-published in December 2005 as one of the first group of titles in the Library of Wales series, having been out of print for several years. Written in English, the novel was first published in 1960.It is set in rural South Wales, close...
(the "middle shires" between the Firth of Clyde
Firth of Clyde
The Firth of Clyde forms a large area of coastal water, sheltered from the Atlantic Ocean by the Kintyre peninsula which encloses the outer firth in Argyll and Ayrshire, Scotland. The Kilbrannan Sound is a large arm of the Firth of Clyde, separating the Kintyre Peninsula from the Isle of Arran.At...
and the Mersey Estuary), with a minority from Bristol
Bristol
Bristol is a city, unitary authority area and ceremonial county in South West England, with an estimated population of 433,100 for the unitary authority in 2009, and a surrounding Larger Urban Zone with an estimated 1,070,000 residents in 2007...
and London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
. Over the years the settlers, surrounded by the hostile Catholic Irish, gradually cast off their separate English and Scottish roots, becoming British
Great Britain
Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...
in the process, as a means of emphasising their 'otherness' from their Gaelic neighbours (Marshall, T., p. 31). It was the one corner of the United Kingdom where Britishness became truly meaningful as a political and cultural identity in its own right, as opposed to a gloss on older and deeper national associations.
Though, over time, Britishness also took some root in England and Scotland – especially in the days of Empire
British Empire
The British Empire comprised the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom. It originated with the overseas colonies and trading posts established by England in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. At its height, it was the...
– by and large people were English or Scottish first, and British second. In Northern Ireland the Protestant communities were to be British first, second and last. It was James's most enduring – and troublesome – legacy.
Success of the union
In many ways the problems of the dynastic union between England and Scotland were little different from those engendered by similar experiments elsewhere in Europe: the case of AragonKingdom of Aragon
The Kingdom of Aragon was a medieval and early modern kingdom in the Iberian Peninsula, corresponding to the modern-day autonomous community of Aragon, in Spain...
and Castile
Kingdom of Castile
Kingdom of Castile was one of the medieval kingdoms of the Iberian Peninsula. It emerged as a political autonomous entity in the 9th century. It was called County of Castile and was held in vassalage from the Kingdom of León. Its name comes from the host of castles constructed in the region...
might be compared, as does the temporary union of Sweden
Sweden
Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....
and Poland (see Polish-Swedish union
Polish-Swedish union
Polish–Swedish union was a short-lived personal union between the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, and the Kingdom of Sweden, when Sigismund III Vasa, King of Poland, was crowned King of Sweden in 1592. In 1599, after a civil war, he lost this crown and returned to Warsaw.-Prelude:After the death of...
). Unions of this kind can be made to work, but they take time to bed down. In the end the union of Scotland and England was to be successful but it was never a marriage of equals. James promised that he would return to his ancient kingdom every three years. In the end he came back only once — in 1617 — and even then his English councillors pleaded with him to remain in London. Scotland, up to the full parliamentary Union of 1707, may have retained its institutional independence, but it lost control of vital areas of policy, most notably foreign relations, which remained the prerogative of the crown. This meant, in practice, that policy matters were inevitably tied to English rather than Scottish interests. A case in point was the Dutch Wars of Charles II
Charles II of England
Charles II was monarch of the three kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland.Charles II's father, King Charles I, was executed at Whitehall on 30 January 1649, at the climax of the English Civil War...
, which took Scotland to war with its strongest trading partner, though no Scottish interest was served and none threatened. The failure of Scotland's attempts to establish overseas trading colonies, firstly in Nova Scotia
Nova Scotia
Nova Scotia is one of Canada's three Maritime provinces and is the most populous province in Atlantic Canada. The name of the province is Latin for "New Scotland," but "Nova Scotia" is the recognized, English-language name of the province. The provincial capital is Halifax. Nova Scotia is the...
then later in the Isthmus of Panama
Isthmus of Panama
The Isthmus of Panama, also historically known as the Isthmus of Darien, is the narrow strip of land that lies between the Caribbean Sea and the Pacific Ocean, linking North and South America. It contains the country of Panama and the Panama Canal...
, (under the ill-fated Darien scheme
Darién scheme
The Darién scheme was an unsuccessful attempt by the Kingdom of Scotland to become a world trading nation by establishing a colony called "New Caledonia" on the Isthmus of Panama in the late 1690s...
), were also in part due to the priority given to English interests over those of Scotland by the sovereign. James's imperial crown over time diminished in size and scope, so much so that in 1616 he was to admit openly in the Star Chamber
Star Chamber
The Star Chamber was an English court of law that sat at the royal Palace of Westminster until 1641. It was made up of Privy Counsellors, as well as common-law judges and supplemented the activities of the common-law and equity courts in both civil and criminal matters...
that his intention 'was always to effect union by uniting Scotland to England, and not England to Scotland.' Years later Queen Anne
Anne of Great Britain
Anne ascended the thrones of England, Scotland and Ireland on 8 March 1702. On 1 May 1707, under the Act of Union, two of her realms, England and Scotland, were united as a single sovereign state, the Kingdom of Great Britain.Anne's Catholic father, James II and VII, was deposed during the...
, the first true British monarch, was to describe the Scots as 'a strange people' and told her first parliament that she knew her heart 'to be entirely English.' It was to be George III — a scion of the German House of Hanover
House of Hanover
The House of Hanover is a deposed German royal dynasty which has ruled the Duchy of Brunswick-Lüneburg , the Kingdom of Hanover, the Kingdom of Great Britain, the Kingdom of Ireland and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland...
— who recaptured something of the old spirit of King James of 1603 when he declared his pride 'in the name of Briton.'