A stunning overview of the medieval landscape of ScotlandGBS_insertPreviewButtonPopup ISBN 9781474401814 ISBN 9781474401838 ISBN 9781474401821 This is a history of the forging of the Scottish kingdom during the first three centuries of the second millennium In AD 1000 the Scottish kings had embarked on the annexation of English speaking Lothian and of Cumbric speaking Clydesdale Ayrshire and Dumfriesshire The country s enlargement continued under a line of remarkably able kings with the inclusion first of the highlands and then after the defeat of the Norwegians in 1263 of the islands of the Inner and Outer Hebrides How Scotland s landscape influenced its people and conditioned its outlook on the world is a theme running throughout the book Geoffrey Barrow describes the evolution of Scottish kingship and government during the period in the process examining the character of Scottish feudalism and the manner of its imposition He discusses the social economic and political changes of the period with separate chapters on the expansion of towns and trade the role of the church and advances in education and learning A sense of national identity had he argues become sufficiently strong by the end of the thirteenth century for the country to survive humiliation by Edward I and to reunite under Robert Bruce With Bruce s coronation as Robert I in 1306 this richly detailed and readable account of Scotland s formative period comes to an end Since its first edition in 1981 this revised edition in The New History of Scotland series as indicated in the preface by the series editor Jenny Wormald can now rightly take its place amongst the classics of Scottish history Key features Appearing for the first time in the Edinburgh Classic Edition seriesLong seen as a key text for students of medieval ScotlandGeoffrey Barrow a respected and renowned historianReadable cinematic in scope colourful and scholarly at the same time