History Scotland

Explore centuries of Scottish history and archaeology with fascinating features on topics from all branches and periods of Scottish history and archaeology, written by leading historians, archaeologists and museum curators. With news on the latest research, opinion, expert reviews and spotlights on the country's most significant historical archives, this lavishly-illustrated magazine has everything you need to explore Scotland's rich past.

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History Scotland

LEWIS CHESSMAN FETCHES RECORD PRICE AT AUCTION • A newly-discovered warder attributed to the Lewis Chessmen workshop has sold at Sotheby’s London to an anonymous buyer for £735,000, a record for a medieval chess piece at auction

James Duncan article in History Scotland vol.19 no.4

New proposal to transform John Knox House into a new Literature House • The City of Literature Trust has unveiled a proposal for John Knox House on Edinburgh’s Royal Mile to become the Literature House for Scotland, as part of an expanded ‘literary quarter’ in the Netherbow area of the historic thoroughfare

Century-old letter on display in East Lothian • A letter written 100 years ago and dropped over Nova Scotia from the R.34 airship during its record-breaking double transatlantic crossing is now on display at the National Museum of Flight to mark the centenary of the R.34’s departure from its East Fortune base

THE SOBIESKI STUARTS AND THE GARDE-ROBE OF SCOTLAND • Julie Holder provides a new assessment of the celebrity brothers John and Charles Edward Sobieski Stuart, whose assertion of descent from Prince Charles Edward Stuart has tended to overshadow their important work in the study of tartan and the history of Gaelic culture

history SCOTLAND insider • our brand new newsletter, exclusively for History Scotland subscribers

Kinauld Tannery: Excavating one of the last paper mills on the Water of Leith • Diana Sproat presents the results of recent excavations on the Water of Leith, where the remains of an 18th-century paper mill were uncovered, allowing the mill buildings to give up their secrets

NEW EVIDENCE UNCOVERED FROM ROMAN CONQUEST OF SCOTLAND • GUARD archaeologists have discovered a hitherto unknown Roman marching camp that was constructed during the Roman conquest of Scotland, alongside a west coast route from which Ireland can be glimpsed

THE BUZZART DYKES PARK LANDSCAPE • A view into Scotland's medieval environment

A century of Roman silver – new views on the Traprain Treasure • Dr Fraser Hunter provides a timely reassessment of the Traprain Treasure with the results of a ten-year research project that invites us to reassess why this treasure was ‘hacked’ and what this can tell us about Roman links to Scotland

The Aberdeen doctors and resistance to the national covenant • Karie Schultz recounts the story of the six ministers and scholars of Aberdeen who publicly opposed the national covenant of 1638, suggesting that they should be understood as symbols of a much more fractious theological landscape than the traditional picture of a monolithic covenanting movement tends to allow

THE ‘BLACK DINNER’ OF 1440 • History Scotland’s consultant editor, Dr Allan Kennedy, explores the infamous murder of the young earl of Douglas during a dinner at Edinburgh castle

ONE OF ROME’S LEGIONS IS MISSING • Duncan B Campbell investigates an old legend that a Roman legion was destroyed by the ancestors of the Scots – and discovers a strange tale that has its roots in 19th-century excavations in Silchester

Arbroath’s mariners, shipbuilders, merchants and manufacturers • Dr D.C. McWhannell explores the economic fortunes of modern Arbroath, discovering that the effects of Scotland’s mercantile and industrial expansion since the mid-18th century...