John Balliol (c.1249–1314): King John and the Fall of the Scottish Crown

Each major claim carries one of three labels. established means supported by primary records, official bodies or several independent reliable sources. shared means the core fact is sound but sources disagree on details, dates or interpretation. traditional means widely repeated but not traceable to a primary or independent source.

Balliol is better documented than many medieval kings, because so much of his reign was recorded by the English government. That is also the problem. The record of his humiliations was kept by his overlord, and almost all Scottish writing about him was produced after 1306 by supporters of the Bruce dynasty, who had every reason to belittle him. His own voice is hard to hear. Dates of the abdication ceremonies and of his death differ between sources, and his place of burial is not certainly known.

Family and inheritance

established Balliol came from a great Anglo-French baronial house. The family took its name from Bailleul in Picardy and held Barnard Castle in County Durham and large estates in England, including Hitchin in Hertfordshire. His father, John Balliol of Barnard Castle, was one of the leading barons of northern England. His mother, Dervorguilla, was a daughter of Alan, lord of Galloway, and a great-granddaughter of David, earl of Huntingdon, brother of William the Lion.

established His parents founded Balliol College, Oxford. Its beginnings are traditionally dated to 1263, and the college was certainly operating by June 1266. After John senior's death Dervorguilla gave it lands and a permanent house, and in 1282 she approved its statutes, sealing them at "Botel", her castle of Buittle in Galloway. The statutes and her seal survive in the college archives.

traditional The college is said to have begun as a penance imposed on John Balliol senior by the bishop of Durham after a quarrel. Balliol College's own archive treats this as a legend.

established John was a younger son and was not expected to inherit. His elder brothers died, leaving him heir to the Balliol lands in England and France. In 1286 he asked Alexander III's council to release the aged Thomas of Galloway, a son of Alan of Galloway who had been held at Barnard Castle since the 1230s. His mother's death on 28 January 1290 made him lord of Galloway and carried her claim to the Scottish throne to him.

The claim

established When the Maid of Norway died in 1290, Balliol was the senior descendant of Earl David by strict primogeniture: the grandson of David's eldest daughter. Robert Bruce of Annandale was a generation closer but descended from the second daughter. Balliol's supporters included Bishop William Fraser of St Andrews and the powerful Comyns; his sister Eleanor was married to John Comyn of Badenoch, one of the Guardians.

established In the court of the Great Cause, held at Berwick from 1291, Balliol named forty of the 104 auditors. Barrow showed that his list was the weightier, including six bishops and eight heads of religious houses, and that his lawyers argued just two points: the kingdom could not be divided, and Balliol was the senior heir. On 17 November 1292 Edward I gave judgement in his favour. Like the other claimants, Balliol had first accepted Edward as superior lord of Scotland.

King John

established Balliol was enthroned at Scone on St Andrew's Day, 30 November 1292. The young earl of Fife's traditional role of placing the king on the royal seat was performed by a deputy, Sir John de St John. Balliol did homage to Edward I both after the judgement and again after his enthronement.

shared Some details of his government show English influence. His seal called him "by God's grace king of Scots" rather than the older Scottish style. His first chancellor was a Yorkshireman, Master Thomas of Hunsingore, and he appointed Scotland's first treasurer. Barrow saw these as small signs of English influence rather than a programme of anglicisation.

established His reign also shows constructive government. An ordinance of 1293 created three new sheriffdoms in the west: Skye (with Wester Ross and the northern isles) under the earl of Ross, Lorn under Alexander Macdougall of Argyll, and Kintyre under James the Stewart. Barrow judged that this showed a real grasp of how to govern the west Highlands, and that it foreshadowed Robert I's later policy there.

The appeals and the Macduff case

established Edward I used his overlordship at once. On 7 December 1292, a week after the inauguration, a Berwick burgess named Roger Bartholomew appealed to him against judgements of the Guardians' court. Edward decided the case at Newcastle on 22 December. When Balliol's councillors protested, Edward replied on 31 December that his earlier promises had been "for the time being" and that he would hear any appeal and could summon the king of Scots himself. On 2 January 1293 Balliol was made to release Edward from all his interregnum promises and to annul the Treaty of Birgham.

established Further appeals followed. Barrow noted that most came from foreigners or men with grievances: a Bordeaux wine merchant, John Mazun, owed money by Alexander III; the abbot of Reading; Bishop Bek of Durham, who claimed Berwick and Haddington; and Hebridean and Manx claimants. The best known was Macduff, a younger son of the earl of Fife, who complained that Balliol had imprisoned him and denied him lands at Creich and Rires.

established Balliol was summoned before the English court of King's Bench. Edward's council drew up rules requiring the king of Scots to attend in person to answer for his judgements. After Michaelmas 1293 Balliol appeared before the English parliament. He first said he dared not answer on a matter touching his kingdom without the advice of his people. Then, threatened with the loss of his three chief castles and towns, he gave way, renewed his homage and asked for a delay.

shared Barrow argued that the Macduff case, perhaps because the name is memorable, has been given far more weight in the story than it deserves. There was no rush of Scots to appeal to England; what wrecked relations was Edward's whole claim of direct lordship. Macduff himself later fought for Scotland and was killed at Falkirk in 1298, fighting for the king he had appealed against.

The council of twelve and the French alliance

established In June 1294 war broke out between Edward I and Philip IV of France over Gascony. Edward summoned Balliol, ten Scottish earls and sixteen barons to serve overseas. They did not come. Before the end of 1294 the Scots obtained absolution from Pope Celestine V from oaths sworn under duress.

established At a parliament at Stirling in July 1295 the direction of affairs was taken out of Balliol's hands and given to a council of twelve: four bishops, four earls and four barons. Barrow identified the bishops as St Andrews, Glasgow, Dunkeld and Aberdeen and the earls as Buchan, Mar, Strathearn and Atholl, with John Comyn of Badenoch and James the Stewart probably among the barons.

shared English chroniclers described this as stripping Balliol of power, and Barrow called it "a sober constitutional revolution". Amanda Beam has challenged that reading, arguing that the council was formed to help defend the realm and that Balliol continued to issue acts in his own name, so he was not set aside.

established Four envoys led by Bishop Fraser went to Paris. The treaty of 23 October 1295 bound Scotland to make war on England by land and sea while the Anglo-French war lasted, and France to send aid if Scotland was invaded. It was to be sealed by the marriage of Balliol's son Edward to Jeanne, niece of Philip IV. The Scottish parliament ratified it on 23 February 1296. Barrow stressed that this was not the start of the "Auld Alliance": Franco-Scottish co-operation against England went back at least to 1173.

established The council expelled English clerks from Scottish livings and seized the lands of those who sided with Edward, including the Bruces. Annandale was given to the earl of Buchan.

The war of 1296

established The Scottish host was summoned to Caddonlee near Selkirk for 11 March 1296. On Easter Monday, 26 March, seven Scottish earls raided Cumberland and attacked Carlisle, whose castle was held for Edward by Robert Bruce of Annandale. On 30 March Edward stormed Berwick, the largest town in Scotland, protected only by a ditch and palisade. Thirty Flemish merchants died defending their Red Hall. Edward ordered that no one be spared, and the slaughter of townspeople went on until the clergy begged for mercy.

established On 27 April 1296 the main Scottish army attacked an English force under John de Warenne, earl of Surrey, which was besieging Dunbar Castle. As the English crossed the Spott Burn, the Scots thought they were fleeing and left their strong position on the hill. Warenne's cavalry routed them. Many nobles were captured, including the earls of Atholl, Ross and Menteith. Resistance then collapsed. Roxburgh surrendered, Edinburgh held out for about a week, and Stirling was abandoned.

Abdication: "Toom Tabard"

established Balliol and the Comyns retreated north. Around midsummer they sent to Edward at Perth asking for terms, and were told by Bishop Bek at Brechin Castle that Balliol must resign his kingdom. Barrow dates the stages as follows: at Kincardine on 2 July Balliol confessed his rebellion; in the kirkyard of Stracathro on 7 July he renounced the French treaty; at Montrose on 8 July he resigned his kingdom and royal dignity to Edward.

shared Other accounts compress these events or date the abdication to 10 July at Stracathro or Brechin. The documents of early July survive, but the order of the ceremonies is reconstructed differently by different historians.

established The royal arms were stripped from his surcoat, or tabard. The Scots nicknamed him "Toom Tabard", the empty coat.

traditional Popular retellings place the stripping at Stracathro or Brechin and describe it as a formal public degradation. The nickname is genuine and early, but the details of the ceremony come from chroniclers.

established Edward then removed the symbols of Scottish kingship: the Stone of Destiny from Scone, the regalia and records, and the Black Rood of Saint Margaret. At a parliament at Berwick in August 1296 Scottish landholders swore fealty, recorded on the Ragman Roll.

Captivity and papal custody

established In August 1296 Balliol was taken to the Tower of London. He was later moved to Hertford, near his own manor of Hitchin, where he was allowed a huntsman and ten hounds. His son Edward was kept as a state prisoner.

established Pope Boniface VIII and Philip IV both pressed Edward to release him. On 18 July 1299 he was handed over at Wissant to the bishop of Vicenza on condition that he live at a papal residence. The record called him hopefully "called king of Scotland". When his baggage was searched at Dover, the golden crown of Scotland and the royal seal were found; Edward kept the seal and had the crown offered at Canterbury.

established In papal custody Balliol lived first at Malmaison in the diocese of Cambrai and then at Gevrey-Chambertin in Burgundy. Barrow noted that papal letters called him "king of Scots" by November 1299 and "illustrious king of Scots" by September 1300.

The king over the water

established Throughout 1297–1304 the Scots fought in King John's name. William Wallace and Andrew Murray issued letters "in the name of the famous prince the lord John". In the summer of 1301 Philip IV released Balliol from papal custody and installed him in the family château at Bailleul-en-Vimeu in Picardy. From 1301, under the Guardian John de Soules, Scottish government acts were issued directly in Balliol's name and dated by his regnal years. A new seal carried his name and title on one side and Soules's on the other.

established In 1300 the Scots asked Edward for Balliol's restoration and recognition of his son's right to succeed. In 1302, when Robert Bruce submitted to Edward, the terms of his submission openly considered that Scotland might be handed back to Balliol or his son. Barrow saw this as striking proof of Edward's weakness at that moment.

established Restoration never came. The French defeat at Courtrai in July 1302 and the Anglo-French peace of 20 May 1303, which left the Scots out, ended the hope of a French army bringing Balliol home. The Scots submitted in 1304. Bruce's seizure of the throne in 1306 ignored Balliol's rights, although many Scots, including the Comyns, still regarded him or his son as the rightful king. Philip IV was still paying Balliol as "king of Scotland" in April 1308, but by July 1309 he was calling Robert I "king of Scots".

Death

shared Balliol died in Picardy. Barrow, writing of Edward Balliol, says his father died in 1313. Most reference works give late 1314, at the family château of Hélicourt, and November 1314 is often quoted. His burial place is uncertain.

established His son Edward Balliol, kept in England for years after 1296, later lived on the family lands in Picardy. In 1324 Edward II gave him a safe-conduct to come to England, a move Barrow saw as a threat aimed at Robert I. In the 1330s, after the deaths of Robert I and his chief lieutenants, Edward Balliol revived the family claim with English support and was for a time recognised as king, but he never held Scotland securely.

Reputation then and now

established The hostile picture of Balliol began early. A contemporary English writer compared him to a lamb among wolves who dared not open his mouth. The Bruce regime's declaration of 1309 claimed that Edward I had made Balliol king against the wishes of the Scottish people, who believed Bruce had the better right. Barrow showed that this was the earliest appearance of the puppet-king story and that it was false. Fourteenth- and fifteenth-century chroniclers such as Fordun, Wyntoun and Bower wrote under the Bruces and Stewarts and treated Balliol and the Comyns with contempt.

shared The historian G. W. S. Barrow, in Robert Bruce and the Community of the Realm of Scotland (1965; 4th edn 2005), took a middle line. He accepted that Balliol was weak, gave way under Edward's browbeating in 1293, and made an abject abdication. But he argued that Balliol "made a worthwhile effort at government", that his claim was lawful, and that the Scots fought for eight years in his name because he was their rightful king. He described Balliol as "ground between the upper and nether millstones" of a demanding overlord and a community insisting he stand firm.

shared Later historians have pushed further. Amanda Beam's The Balliol Dynasty, 1210–1364 (John Donald, 2008) argues that earlier writers judged the Balliols as failed Scottish kings rather than as great Anglo-French lords, and that John and Edward Balliol used their English connections to pursue real political aims. Others still see John as a ruler overwhelmed by circumstances. There is no consensus, but the old picture of a contemptible puppet is no longer accepted by specialists.

• Balliol's parents founded Balliol College, Oxford, which still bears the family name.
• His mother sealed the college statutes at Buittle Castle in Galloway in 1282.
• He was enthroned on St Andrew's Day, 30 November 1292.
• Scotland's first recorded treasurer was appointed in his reign.
• His 1293 plan for new sheriffdoms in the west Highlands anticipated Robert I's policy there.
• When he left England in 1299 the crown of Scotland was found in his baggage.
• For a time after 1301 Scottish government acts were issued in his name while he lived in France.
• His son Edward Balliol revived the claim and was for a time recognised as king of Scots in the 1330s.

• Myth: Edward I picked Balliol as a puppet against the wishes of the Scots. Balliol won on the legal rule of primogeniture and had wide Scottish support. The puppet story first appears in Bruce propaganda in 1309.
• Myth: Balliol did nothing as king. His short reign produced a scheme for new west Highland sheriffdoms and other acts of government, and he resisted Edward's appeals before giving way.
• Myth: the Scots abandoned Balliol after 1296. They fought in his name until 1304 and issued government acts in his name in 1301–02.
• Disputed: whether the council of twelve deposed him in 1295. English chroniclers and Barrow saw it as taking power from him; Amanda Beam argues it worked alongside him.
• Disputed: the dates and places of the abdication. The acts of 2, 7 and 8 July 1296 at Kincardine, Stracathro and Montrose are recorded, but some accounts give 10 July at Stracathro or Brechin.
• Disputed: when he died. Barrow gives 1313; most reference works give late 1314.