Latest / The Story of Scotland: Clans, Crowns, and the Fight for Identity — Fexingo History / The Real Macbeth: Scotland's Pious King Beneath the Myth
Transcript
- Lucas: So we've talked a lot about Scotland's wars and battles, all the struggle for independence and identity. But today I want to step back a few centuries, before the Wars of Independence, to a king who's probably the most famous Scottish ruler in the world. And almost everything people think they know about him is wrong. Luna: You're talking about Macbeth, aren't you? Lucas: Exactly. Macbeth mac Findláech. Thanks to Shakespeare, he's the ultimate villain, the usurper who kills a beloved king in his sleep and then spirals into paranoia and guilt. But the real Macbeth ruled Scotland for seventeen years, and from what we can tell, he was a competent, even generous king. He went on a pilgrimage to Rome, for goodness sake. Luna: Wait, he went to Rome? That's not something you'd expect from a murderous tyrant. Lucas: Indeed. In 1050, the chronicles record that Macbeth distributed money to the poor in Rome, like a silver coin to every person. That was recorded in a chronicle from the era, so it's pretty solid. And he wasn't some obscure figure. He was the mormaer of Moray, which was a powerful semi-independent province in the north. His wife Gruoch was a royal princess, and his claim to the throne was actually pretty strong if you look at the traditional rules of tanistry. But Shakespeare's version, based on later Scottish chroniclers who had their own reasons to smear him, stuck. Luna: So how did he actually become king? Did he really kill Duncan? Lucas: Duncan I, in Gaelic Donnchad mac Crináin, was young and not particularly successful. He had just suffered a disastrous campaign against the English at Durham, and another against his own kinsmen, maybe Thorfinn the Mighty of Orkney. In 1040, Duncan led an army into Moray, Macbeth's territory, and he was killed in battle at Pitgaveny, near Elgin. Not in his bed, not at Inverness, but in a fight. Macbeth didn't assassinate him; he defeated him in a fair fight. Then Macbeth took the throne, and he had the support of the northern provinces. He ruled for seventeen years, which was actually a pretty long reign for a usurper if he was as unstable as Shakespeare makes out. Luna: Seventeen years is a long time to be paranoid and guilt-ridden. So why does Shakespeare have him as this tragic villain? Lucas: It comes down to the sources Shakespeare used. He read Holinshed's Chronicles, which were based on earlier Scottish histories like those by Hector Boece and Andrew of Wyntoun. These were written centuries after Macbeth's time, and they were heavily influenced by the propaganda of the dynasty that replaced him, the descendants of Malcolm III. They had every reason to paint Macbeth as a tyrant and Duncan as a saint. Also, there was a political angle: King James I of England, who was James VI of Scotland, traced his ancestry back through Malcolm III, not through Macbeth. So it was convenient to legitimize that line. Shakespeare knew that, and he wrote a play that would please his patron. So he took the legend and turned it into a psychological thriller, but the history is much more complex. Luna: So it was political spin, basically. But what did Macbeth actually do for Scotland? Was he any good? Lucas: From the patchy records, he seems to have been a strong, generous ruler. He went on that pilgrimage to Rome in 1050, which was a big deal, showing he was a devout Christian and had enough control at home to leave for several months. There are also charters from his reign showing him granting land and privileges to the church. He was, as far as we can tell, a legitimate king who maintained peace and stability. He even went on pilgrimage again in later years. The main knock against him is that he didn't found a dynasty, because his stepson Lulach didn't last long after him. But that's not necessarily a sign of bad rule; it's just that his stepson was killed by Malcolm III's supporters within months. Luna: It sounds like he was actually a better king than Duncan. Why did Duncan have such a good reputation? Lucas: Duncan's reputation is largely a product of the propaganda of his son Malcolm III and his descendants. Duncan was young and inexperienced, and he had a weak claim by some reckonings. He was killed in battle by a rival, and that's pretty normal in medieval Scotland. But because his son and grandson became kings and built up their own legitimacy, they needed to paint Duncan as a rightful, beloved ruler. So later chroniclers adapted the story: they made Duncan older, made Macbeth's claim weaker, and turned a battlefield death into a treacherous murder. And then Shakespeare sealed the deal. But the real Duncan, based on contemporary sources, was not particularly virtuous. He was just a failed king who lost a war. Lucas: And there's another thing that's often overlooked: Macbeth's reign was actually a period of relative calm. There were no major wars recorded, no Viking invasions, and he was able to travel abroad. That says a lot about his authority. He was also one of the few Scottish kings of that era to visit Rome, which was a major undertaking. Luna: Alright, but if he was so good, why did he lose the throne eventually? Lucas: He didn't exactly lose it in battle. He was actually defeated by Malcolm III, Duncan's son, at the Battle of Lumphanan in 1057, and he died of his wounds. But Malcolm had been exiled in England with his family, and he had the backing of the English king Edward the Confessor. So he came back with an army. Macbeth was getting older, maybe in his fifties, and his support base may have been weakening. After his death, his stepson Lulach, who was Gruoch's son from her first marriage, was crowned king, but he only lasted a few months before he was killed by Malcolm's men. And then Malcolm III took the throne and started a new dynasty. It's not that Macbeth was a bad king; it's that he couldn't hold on against a external invasion backed by a powerful neighbor. Luna: So Malcolm was basically a puppet of the English? That's a bit ironic, given how much we talk about Scotland's fight for independence later. Lucas: The irony isn't lost on me. Malcolm III, despite being the founder of the dynasty that would eventually fight for independence, actually leaned heavily on English support. He had been raised in England, and he introduced many Norman-English customs to his court. His wife Margaret, who became a saint, was an English princess. So the very dynasty that Shakespeare's play supports was, in a way, more Anglo-centric than Macbeth's. Macbeth, on the other hand, was a Gaelic king in the traditional sense. He was the last of the old line of kings from the north, and his defeat marked a shift toward a more southern, anglicized Scotland. Luna: That's such a twist. So when we think of Macbeth as the villain, we're kind of rooting for the wrong side, historically speaking. Lucas: And that's what I find so fascinating. The story we know is a masterpiece of fiction, but it's also a piece of political propaganda that's been embedded in our culture for four hundred years. Every time we read the play, we're perpetuating the spin of a medieval dynasty. But when you look at the actual records, you see a different story: a king who ruled for seventeen years, went to Rome, gave alms to the poor, and was buried at Iona, the sacred burial place of Scottish kings. That's not the act of a monster. Luna: It's amazing how a story can be so powerful that it overwrites history. But I have to ask: is there any truth at all to the witches and the prophecy? Lucas: The witches are almost certainly a literary invention. There's no contemporary evidence that Macbeth met any witches. The idea of the Weird Sisters came from the same later chronicles, and they were probably a way to add a supernatural element to explain his rise. But there is a nugget of truth in the idea that Macbeth had a legitimate claim, and that the crown wasn't simply passed from father to son. In Gaelic tradition, kingship was elective among a pool of eligible relatives, so Macbeth had every right to seek the throne. The prophecy of becoming king wasn't a dark prophecy; it was his ambition, which was perfectly normal for a nobleman of his time. Luna: So he was just playing by the rules, and Shakespeare turned it into a cautionary tale about ambition. That's so unfair. Lucas: Absolutely. And that's why I wanted to do this episode. There's a real person behind the myth, and he deserves better than to be remembered only as a Shakespearean villain. He was a medieval king who did his job, which was to rule, to protect his people, and to maintain order. And he did it for seventeen years. That's a success, not a tragedy. Luna: You know, I've been listening to this show for a while, and I've learned to question a lot of things about history. But I never thought to question Macbeth. It's like the play is so iconic that we just accept it. Lucas: It's a good reminder that history is often written by the winners, and sometimes by playwrights. And it's also a reminder that our job here is to dig deeper, to look at the evidence, and to tell the stories that haven't been told. That's what keeps me going, honestly. The fact that we can do this without any ads, that we can just focus on the history, that's a privilege. And that's only possible because listeners like you support the show. If you want to keep these conversations going, you can find us at buy me a coffee dot com slash fexingo. But no pressure, honestly. Luna: Yeah, it's like we get to keep this little corner of the internet for people who love history, and that's worth supporting. Lucas: And speaking of digging deeper, let's go back to the sources. The most reliable contemporary account we have is the Annals of Ulster, which simply says, in 1040, 'Donnchad, son of Crinán, king of Alba, was killed by Macbeth, son of Findláech.' No moral commentary, just a statement of fact. The Chronicle of the Kings of Alba, which is a king list with notes, says that Macbeth ruled for seventeen years, and that he made a pilgrimage to Rome. That's it. No mention of any murder of Duncan in his bed, no witches, no guilt. The later chronicles, like the one by John of Fordun in the 14th century, started adding details, and by the time of Boece and Holinshed, the story had grown into the one we know. Luna: So the transformation happened gradually, over centuries. Lucas: Exactly. And each chronicler added a bit more color. For example, earlier stories said Duncan was killed at Pitgaveny, but later ones moved it to Inverness and made it a nighttime assassination. They also made Lady Macbeth a much more prominent role, based on Gruoch, who was a real queen but we know almost nothing about her. And then Shakespeare took all that and turned it into one of the greatest plays ever written. He wasn't trying to be a historian; he was trying to write a drama about ambition and guilt. But the consequence is that we have this incredibly vivid fictional Macbeth that has utterly overshadowed the historical one. Luna: It's like the historical Macbeth is hiding behind the fictional one. I almost feel bad for him. Lucas: I do too. And it's not just about the play. Even the name 'Macbeth' has become synonymous with ambition and evil. But when you think about it, he was just a guy who lived in a violent time, who did what many others did, and who happened to succeed for a while. He wasn't a saint, but he wasn't a demon either. He was a medieval king, and that's how we should remember him. Luna: So if someone asks you what Macbeth was really like, what would you tell them? Lucas: I'd say he was a competent, pious, and generous ruler who was unlucky enough to be remembered by his enemies' descendants. He ruled a kingdom that was still deeply Gaelic, with its own traditions and laws, and he was a product of that world. And I'd tell them to read the play, because it's brilliant, but to remember that it's fiction. The real Macbeth deserves to be seen in the light of history, not just in the shadow of Shakespeare. Luna: Thanks for setting the record straight, Lucas. I'll never look at the play the same way again. Lucas: That's what we're here for. And who knows, maybe next time we can talk about the real Duncan, or the real Malcolm III, and see how they measure up to their own legends.