Robert the Bruce’s Rise from English Ally to King of Scotland
A period of instability that led to a national hero.
London — August 23rd, 1305 AD
It was the beginning of a summer morning, not just any morning.
A solitary figure emerges from the London Tower, a prisoner bound for execution.
He is stripped naked, tied at his feet, and attached to a horse's heel.
Dragged through the streets, the defenceless man can do nothing while many onlookers look on, jeering at the sight of him.
He arrives at his destination — Smithfield — to meet his fate.
The executioner wastes no time. The prisoner is barbarically hung and eventually ‘quartered’, burning his ‘privy parts’ before him while still alive.
The prisoner… William Wallace.
No Hollywood cry of ‘Freedom’ but rather a swift implementation of a sham trial.
Days earlier, Wallace would receive his execution orders without a jury, labelled ‘King of the Outlaws’ and a traitor to Edward the 1st of England, “Edward Longshanks”.
His reply “I could not be a traitor to Edward, for I was never his subject.”
