A Short History of Scotland | Page 7

backing his own niece,
Matilda, as Queen of England in opposition to Stephen, crossed the
Border in arms, but was bought off. His son Henry received the Honour
of Huntingdom, with the Castle of Carlisle, and a vague promise of
consideration of his claim to Northumberland. In 1138, after a
disturbed interval, David led the whole force of his realm, from Orkney
to Galloway, into Yorkshire. His Anglo-Norman friends, the Balliols
and Bruces, with the Archbishop of York, now opposed him and his
son Prince Henry. On August 22, 1138, at Cowton Moor, near
Northallerton, was fought the great battle, named from the huge
English sacred banner, "The Battle of the Standard."
In a military sense, the fact that here the men-at-arms and knights of
England fought as dismounted infantry, their horses being held apart in
reserve, is notable as preluding to the similar English tactics in their
French wars of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.
Thus arrayed, the English received the impetuous charge of the wild
Galloway men, not in armour, who claimed the right to form the van,
and broke through the first line only to die beneath the spears of the
second. But Prince David with his heavy cavalry scattered the force
opposed to him, and stampeded the horses of the English that were held
in reserve. This should have been fatal to the English, but Henry, like
Rupert at Marston Moor, pursued too far, and the discipline of the
Scots was broken by the cry that their King had fallen, and they fled.
David fought his way to Carlisle in a series of rearguard actions, and at
Carlisle was joined by Prince Henry with the remnant of his
men-at-arms. It was no decisive victory for England.
In the following year (1139) David got what he wanted. His son Henry,
by peaceful arrangement, received the Earldom of Northumberland,
without the two strong places, Bamborough and Newcastle.

Through the anarchic weakness of Stephen's reign, Scotland advanced
in strength and civilisation despite a Celtic rising headed by a strange
pretender to the rights of the MacHeths, a "brother Wimund"; but all
went with the death of David's son, Prince Henry, in 1152. Of the
prince's three sons, the eldest, Malcolm, was but ten years old; next
came his brothers William ("the Lion") and little David, Earl of
Huntingdon. From this David's daughters descended the chief claimants
to the Scottish throne in 1292--namely, Balliol, Bruce, and Comyn: the
last also was descended, in the female line, from King Donald Ban, son
of Malcolm Canmore.
David had done all that man might do to settle the crown on his
grandson Malcolm; his success meant that standing curse of Scotland,
"Woe to the kingdom whose king is a child,"--when, in a year, David
died at Carlisle (May 24, 1153).

SCOTLAND BECOMES FEUDAL.
The result of the domestic policy of David was to bring all accessible
territory under the social and political system of western Europe, "the
Feudal System." Its principles had been perfectly familiar to Celtic
Scotland, but had rested on a body of traditional customs (as in
Homeric Greece), rather than on written laws and charters signed and
sealed. Among the Celts the local tribe had been, theoretically, the sole
source of property in land. In proportion as they were near of kin to the
recognised tribal chief, families held lands by a tenure of three
generations; but if they managed to acquire abundance of oxen, which
they let out to poorer men for rents in kind and labour, they were apt to
turn the lands which they held only temporarily, "in possession," into
real permanent property. The poorer tribesmen paid rent in labour or
"services," also in supplies of food and manure.
The Celtic tenants also paid military service to their superiors. The
remotest kinsmen of each lord of land, poor as they might be, were
valued for their swords, and were billeted on the unfree or servile
tenants, who gave them free quarters.
In the feudal system of western Europe these old traditional customs
had long been modified and stereotyped by written charters. The King
gave gifts of land to his kinsmen or officers, who were bound to be
"faithful" (_fideles_); in return the inferior did homage, while he

received protection. From grade to grade of rank and wealth each
inferior did homage to and received protection from his superior, who
was also his judge. In this process, what had been the Celtic tribe
became the new "thanage"; the Celtic king (_righ_) of the tribe became
the thane; the province or group of tribes (say Moray) became the
earldom; the Celtic Mormaer of the province became the earl; and the
Crown appointed _vice- comites_, sub-earls, that is sheriffs, who
administered the King's justice in the earldom.
But there were regions,