Looking for a book on Scottish history

[ThistleDown]

That will require some pondering, to be sure...of course, is this just Scottish history, or may I include titles relating to the Scottish diaspora?

Some titles that come to mind:

Alan Young's In the Footsteps of Robert Bruce. Sutton Publishing, 1999.
Maggie Craig's Damn Rebel Bitches: Women of the '45 Edinburgh: Mainstrem, 2000.*
Diana Henderson's Highland Soldier: A Social Study of the Highland Regiments, 1820-1920. John Donald, 1997 and The Scottish Regiments. Collins (2nd Edition), 2001.

*I just like typing the title.

T.

Maggie Craig also wrote "Bare-Arsed Banditti: Men of the 45", Todd . Both her books are well researched and written, and entertaining to boot.

How serious should we get with this list? Leaving out historical fiction and the like and anything to do with emigration and the diaspora we have a never-ending library to draw on for suggestions.

Just on the Jacobite uprisings of the 18C, their causes and effects, I suggest in no particular order "Letters from a Gentleman in the North to His Friend in London" by Edmund Burt; "Memoirs of the Jacobites" by Mrs Thomson; "Social Life of Scotland in the Eighteenth Century", by Henry Grey Graham; "Jacobite Estates of the Forty-Five" by Annette M Smith; "The Jacobite Army in England 1745" by FJ McLynn; "From Chiefs to Landlords" by Robert A Dodgshon; "Easter Ross 1750-1850" by Ian RM Mowat; "After the Forty-Five" by AJ Youngson; "The Jacobite General" by Katherine Tomasson; "Pickle the Spy" by Andrew Lang; "History of the Rebellion of 1745" by Robert Chambers; "Lives of Lovat & Forbes" by John Hill Burton.

As a learned treatise on the last 300 years of Scottish history there is nothing so fine as "The Scottish Nation" by Tom Devine.

[macwilkin]

Maggie Craig also wrote "Bare-Arsed Banditti: Men of the 45", Todd . Both her books are well researched and written, and entertaining to boot.

How serious should we get with this list? Leaving out historical fiction and the like and anything to do with emigration and the diaspora we have a never-ending library to draw on for suggestions.

Just on the Jacobite uprisings of the 18C, their causes and effects, I suggest in no particular order "Letters from a Gentleman in the North to His Friend in London" by Edmund Burt; "Memoirs of the Jacobites" by Mrs Thomson; "Social Life of Scotland in the Eighteenth Century", by Henry Grey Graham; "Jacobite Estates of the Forty-Five" by Annette M Smith; "The Jacobite Army in England 1745" by FJ McLynn; "From Chiefs to Landlords" by Robert A Dodgshon; "Easter Ross 1750-1850" by Ian RM Mowat; "After the Forty-Five" by AJ Youngson; "The Jacobite General" by Katherine Tomasson; "Pickle the Spy" by Andrew Lang; "History of the Rebellion of 1745" by Robert Chambers; "Lives of Lovat & Forbes" by John Hill Burton.

As a learned treatise on the last 300 years of Scottish history there is nothing so fine as "The Scottish Nation" by Tom Devine.

Rex,

Many thanks for the tip on "Bare-Arsed Banditti" -- I'm off to our library's online catalog to see if I can order that from Washington University in St. Louis, which has a rather large Scottish collection in its stacks. If it's anything like "Damn Rebel Bitches", then I can't wait for it to arrive! I've always loved the story of Colonel Anne Mackintosh, and Craig certainly did wonders with that story.

T.

[ThistleDown]

Rex,

Many thanks for the tip on "Bare-Arsed Banditti" -- I'm off to our library's online catalog to see if I can order that from Washington University in St. Louis, which has a rather large Scottish collection in its stacks. If it's anything like "Damn Rebel Bitches", then I can't wait for it to arrive! I've always loved the story of Colonel Anne Mackintosh, and Craig certainly did wonders with that story.

T.

Yes, a truly remarkable personality for any age. Raeburn's painting of her in the National Portrait Gallery depicts an ultra-slim, almost masculine woman to match her persona as "Colonel" Anne, a title she herself never used. Her correspondence and that of her husband, Angus, leads one to a more domestic image of her. At this distance of time and politics one is tempted to ask if the real Anne wouldn't please stand up.

Rex

[BobsYourUncle]

I heartily endorse all of the recommendations made so far. Among the recommendations are some very good general surveys. For anyone who wishes to delve in more depth, I have a few ideas.

One of the better histories is actually a four book set, the series title is The Edinburgh History of Scotland, which is comprised of [not necessarily in any order]: (1) W. Ferguson, Scotland: 1689 to the Present, (2) E. Donaldson, Scotland James V-James VII; (3) R. Nicholson, Scotland: the Later Middle Ages; (4) A.A.M. Duncan, Scotland: the Making of the Kingdom.

Another idea is a book called Scotland: The Autobiography, which makes principal use of original document extracts and contemprorary writings to bring you through Scotland's history. It is a modestly sized volume, and a fun way to hear about Scotland's history from contemporary sources without the filter of some historiographer.

For those intereset in social history, the field is a little more fraught. There has been a decades long debate between economic and social historians of Scotland over economic and social developments, especially in discussing the Highland Clearances. I have just begun reading J. Hunter's The Making of the Crofting Community, which was first published in the mid-70's, and has been quite controversial in painting a very critical picture of landlords and their factors actions in the Highland Clearances. Hunter criticizes much of the economic and social history that has been written as failing to accurately account for the experience, perspective and plight of the individuals and communities dislocated by the clearances.

The opposing camp, which seems to hold that such history over sentimentalizes a nasty, brutish and obsolete lifestyle which soon would have been destroyed by global economic developments anyway, is perhaps epitomized in T.C. Smout, A History of the Scottish People 1560-1830 [1969]

In the introduction to the 2000 edition of The Making of the Crofting Community, Hunter states that his book was greatly influenced by, and in some respects patterned on, E.P. Thomson's The Making of the English Working Class[Hunter's title being a direct adaptation of Thomson's], wherein the idea is to discuss history from the bottom up, instead of the top down.

Hunter is very critical of Smout and his ilk, concluding that they are too dismissive of the human and cultural cost of the Highland Clearances, and that it is appropriate for historians to include their moral conclusions in their work. Hunter argues against what he perceives to be Smout et. al.'s "landlord centric" approach, and in which Hunter claims they discredit history of the clearances taking the perspective of individuals and destroyed culture as the product of "popularizers" [like Hunter himself, and John Prebble] who have failed to adequately account for the economic and social data contained in available sources. Smout et. al. remind me of some historiographers in the Annale school, who seek to elevate demographic data over the anecdotal. Of course, the greater truth probably lies in some balance between the various approaches.

I'm not sure that I am going to devote extensive time to plumbing the depths of the controversy, my real interest is in an attempt to gain some insight into what life was actually like before and after the Highland Clearances. It appears that there may be considerable work in filtering out the historiographical controversy, and the attendant philosophical and political disputes. We''ll see how much patience I have for that.

Great thread, great ideas! Happy reading!

[ThistleDown]

You might want to consider "From Chiefs to Landlords" by Robt. Dodgshon as an accompaniment to "The Making of the Crofting Community". It's a difficult read but essential to an understanding of the transition of land tenure in the Highlands.

Rex