Burning the Water
Page 30
Most of this is fiction, set against a true tale – the Rough Wooing (a later term) was the period where an ailing Henry VIII tried to assert his power to ensure the union of England and Scotland with a marriage between his young son Edward and Mary Queen of Scots. The more violence he used, the more violence he met from Scots who would not be forced.
Ancrum Moor was a real battle, the latest in a sad list of them, and the victory was won in part by the big guns which I have Batty leading – the determined Scots foot faked a withdrawal that brought the English army – mainly German and Spanish mercenaries – in exultant pursuit right into the mouths of those cannon. What really won it, all the same, was the Border horse who had taken English money to fight the Scots – and who suddenly changed sides.
The Wallis of Twa Corbies is an invention, though the Wallis Clan was certainly extant in the 16th century, notably in South Yorkshire. The main clans of the English side of the Border were the Charltons, Dodds and Robsons among others.
The Egyptiani – Gypsies – were a feature of life on both sides of the Border and Johnny Faa, self-styled king, was indeed chartered by King James V in 1540 establishing his lordship over all the Gypsies in Scotland.
Fabrizio Maramaldo is all-too real. An illiterate from Naples or Calabria or perhaps somewhere in Spain, he was always listed as an ‘Italian condottiere’. He fled Naples after murdering his wife, fought the Ottomans in Hungary and the French in Piedmont and his reverse at the siege of Asti – where Batty lost his arm – made him notorious until the incident with Ferruci, his arch-enemy.
Maramaldo attacked the wounded, dying and disabled Ferruci in full view of everyone, stabbing him to death and kicking the corpse while cursing him, an act which gained him a reservoir of disgust among the great and the good. So much so that today in the Italian language, he substantive maramaldo and the adjective maramaldesco means ‘ruthless’ or ‘villainous’. There is also a verb maramaldeggiare in the sense of ‘treat someone badly by ruthless mockery’. He died in 1552.
Lastly – Little Jack Horner. Always popularly thought to be a satirical rhyme on the misuse of power, in the 19th century a story began to gain currency that the rhyme is actually about Thomas Horner, who was steward to Richard Whiting, the last abbot of Glastonbury under the dissolution of monasteries ordered by Henry VIII.
It is asserted that, prior to the abbey’s destruction, the abbot sent Horner to London with a huge Christmas pie which had the deeds to a dozen manors hidden within it as a gift to try to convince the King not to nationalise Church lands. During the journey Horner opened the pie and extracted the deeds of the manor Mells in Somerset which he kept for himself. It is further suggested that, since the manor properties included lead mines in the Mendip Hills, the plum is a pun on the Latin plumbum, for lead. While records do indicate that Thomas Horner became the owner of the manor, both his descendants and subsequent owners of Mells Manor have asserted that the legend is untrue and that Wells purchased the deed from the abbey.
I hope I have done them all some sort of justice. If not – crank up the vielle and play a different tune.
Glossary
APOSTLES – A collection of wooden, stoppered flasks filled with an exact amount of powder and ball for a single pistol or caliver shot, which made for quicker and more reliable loading. They were suspended by a cord from a leather bandolier worn by arquebusiers, seven flasks in front and five in back, for a total of twelve, hence the name.
BARMKIN – A defensive wall built round a castle or keep, usually with a walkway for sentries.
BIRL – To spin round.
BILL – An official warrant, issued by a March Warden or the like, demanding that a suspected miscreant present himself for judgement. If ignored – fouled – then someone appointed by the Wardens would go and bring him to justice. This was Batty’s job until the war stopped all Warden activity.
BLACKMEAL – A payment made, in coin or bartered goods (grain or meal), to the more powerful family who could do you harm. In essence, the 16th century Borders were run like Mafia bosses and paying to keep them away was sometimes the only recourse. Origin of the word ‘blackmail’.
CALIVER – An improved version of the arquebus, in that it had standard bore, making loading faster and firing more accurate.
CRUCK HOUSE – A building made of a frame of curved timbers set in pairs. Used to build small huts up to large barns, it was the simplest cheapest building method of the medieval age.
CRUSIE – A simple container with a wick that provided light.
DAGG – A pistol as opposed to an a long-barrel musket.
DEBATABLE LAND – An area ten miles long and four wide created by edicts from both countries about settling it or raising any permanent structures. The area’s people ignored this and powerful clans moved in, notably the Armstrongs. For three hundred years they effectively controlled the land, daring Scotland or England to interfere. It became a haven for outlaws of all sides.
GRAYNE – Borders word for ‘clan’. ‘Name’ is another version of it.
HEMP – Hanging, from the material used to make the rope.
HIRPLE – Limp.
HOT TROD – The formalities of pursuing reivers, usually by the forces of the Wardens. Up to six days after the seizure of any cattle by thieves taking them across the other side of the Border, the forces attempting to recover them and apprehend the guilty were permitted to also cross the Border freely in pursuit. They had to do it with ‘hue and cry, with horn and hound’ and were also obliged to carry a smouldering peat on the point of a lance to signify the task they were on.
JACK – The ubiquitous garment of the Border warrior – the jack of plates. Most ordinary Border fighters had a jack, a sleeveless jerkin with either iron or the cheaper horn plates sewn between two layers of felt or canvas.
JALOUSE – To surmise or suspect.
KERTCH – A kerchief, usually used by married women to cover their hair.
KISTING – Funeral. A kist is a chest or a box.
LATCHBOW – A cheap crossbow, light enough to be used from horseback, with a firing mechanism as simple as a door latch. The power was light but at close range it would wound or kill an unprotected man and knock the wind out of a one wearing a jack.
PERJINK – Proper, neat.
PRIMERO – 16th century poker where you attempt to bluff your competitors out of betting against you. Players vie or vye by stating how high a hand they are claiming to have and can flat-out lie to overstate it. It was played using a 40-card deck, but there are no surviving written rules, only descriptions.
RAMSTAMPIT – Blustering loud boaster.
RIDE/RIDING – The raids mounted by one reiver family, or Name, against another, either for robbery or revenge. Depending on how many family members and affiliated Names you could get to join you, these were brief affairs of one night or ones involving several thousand men who could lay waste to entire villages and towns on either side of the Border. The usual Riding times lasted from Lammas (August 1) to Candlemas (February 2).
SCUMFISH – How raiders got people out of their bastel houses – the modern definition is ‘to disgust or stifle’ which is what raiders did, by getting on the roof and throwing damp burning bracken down the chimney, essentially smoking out the inhabitants. The defenders kept covered wooden buckets handy, forked the burning bracken into them and closed the lid until the contents could be thrown back outside.
SKLIMMING – Moving fast. Can also mean throwing stones across a pond.
SLORACH – Any bog or morass or filthy mess you might step in.
SLOW MATCH – Early firearms were called ‘matchlocks’ because they were ignited by a smouldering fuse, called a slow match, brought down into the pan. Keeping a slow match smouldering required constant vigilance, a good manufacturer – and no rain. By the middle of the 16th century, pistols with a wheel-lock mechanism were being made, which utilised an iron pyrite to create sparks and was more reliable.
SNELL – Cold, icy.<
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STRAVAIGIN – Wandering or scattered.
TESTOON – Coin minted during the last days of Henry VIII, with more copper than silver in it, so that the portrait of Henry on one side wore down to the copper on his embossed nose becoming known as ‘coppernoses’ as a result. They transmuted, eventually into the English shilling.
Border Reivers
A Dish of Spurs
Burning the Water
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First published in the United Kingdom in 2020 by Canelo
Canelo Digital Publishing Limited
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Copyright © Robert Low, 2020
The moral right of Robert Low to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 9781800320901
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
Grateful acknowledgement is made to Derek Stewart and Julia Stewart for supplying reenactment images used on the cover artwork.
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