The Stirling Heads are a group of large oak portrait medallions made around the year 1540 to decorate the ceiling of a room at Stirling Castle. [1] The style, in origin, was based on Italian architectural decoration and at Stirling was probably derived from a French source. Similar medallions carved in stone adorn Falkland Palace. [2]
James V of Scotland rebuilt the royal lodgings at Stirling Castle to form a new Palace, which included suites for the king and his consort Mary of Guise. [3] The building works were supervised by James Hamilton of Finnart. [4] There is very little documentation for the works. [5] James V may have been inspired by a current belief that the Roman general Gnaeus Julius Agricola had rebuilt Stirling Castle "with diligence and sumptuous expense", [6] and some of the medallion head carvings may have been intended to depict ancient heroes as supposed forebears of the Stewart dynasty. [7]
The Stirling Head carvings were traditionally attributed to a Scottish craftsman John Drummond of Milnab, [8] and it is likely that a French colleague Andrew Mansioun was a significant contributor to the project. [9] A carpenter and carver, Robert Robertson, was recorded working at Stirling Castle in this period, and was paid for work on the ceiling of the Queen's inner chamber at Falkland Palace. [10]
The decorated coffer ceilings at Stirling were mentioned by a small number of travel writers including John Taylor, John Ray, John Macky, and John Loveday, before the King's inner chamber or inner hall ceiling was dismantled in 1777, and the heads were dispersed among antiquarian collectors. [11] An illustrated book by Jane Graham, Lacunar Strevelinense, recorded the medallions and the names of various owners in 1817. This work indicates that the surviving heads came from the King's inner hall. The surviving timber structure (now concealed) of the adjacent King's bed chamber ceiling is unusual, indicating that its ceiling was also elaborately decorated. [12]
The writer George Buchanan described the late 1530s as a period of relative stability in Scotland, and because James V was provided with heirs, he turned his attention to "useless buildings" and taxed the church and nobility to fund these projects. [13] Robert Lindsay of Pitscottie, writing about the same years, praised James V for his patronage of expert craftsmen, especially foreign artisans. [14] [15]
38 medallions now survive, and most are displayed in a dedicated museum in the upper floor of the Palace at Stirling above the Queen's outer chamber. The heads are around 74 cm in diameter. [16] [17] They were carved from planks of Baltic oak from a Polish source, [18] glued together to make up the required depth. [19]
One carving (Head number 29) has an original design sketched on its back of a baluster flanked by two figures holding masks. [20] [21] Replica carvings were made for the 2010 restoration of the Palace, [22] and these were painted based on examination of surviving traces of colour, and research into sixteenth-century practice. Originally, indigo was used to make a blue tint for the armour of the male figures. [23]
The subject matter is varied, and it is generally accepted that some of the medallions depict members of the Scottish royal family and Margaret Tudor, [25] while others portray mythological characters including Hercules, and at least two carvings represent Roman emperors. [26] One female portrait (number 40), the original destroyed in a fire in 1940, was recreated for the 2010 restoration and is said to depict Mary of Guise. [27]
Interpretation of the surviving heads has developed and changed. In the 19th century, the medallion currently identified as Margaret Tudor, holding a greyhound emblem, then in the possession of David Laing, was thought to depict Mary of Guise. [28]
James V was King of Scotland from 9 September 1513 until his death in 1542. He was crowned on 21 September 1513 at the age of seventeen months. James was the son of King James IV and Margaret Tudor, daughter of Henry VII of England. During his childhood Scotland was governed by regents, firstly by his mother until she remarried, and then by his first cousin once removed, John Stewart, Duke of Albany. James's personal rule began in 1528 when he finally escaped the custody of his stepfather, Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of Angus. His first action was to exile Angus and confiscate the lands of the Douglases.
Mary of Guise, also called Mary of Lorraine, was Queen of Scotland from 1538 until 1542, as the second wife of King James V. She was a French noblewoman of the House of Guise, a cadet branch of the House of Lorraine and one of the most powerful families in France. As the mother of Mary, Queen of Scots, she was a key figure in the political and religious upheaval that marked mid-16th-century Scotland, ruling the kingdom as queen regent on behalf of her daughter from 1554 until her death in 1560.
Stirling Castle, located in Stirling, is one of the largest and most historically and architecturally important castles in Scotland. The castle sits atop an intrusive crag, which forms part of the Stirling Sill geological formation. It is surrounded on three sides by steep cliffs, giving it a strong defensive position. Its strategic location, guarding what was, until the 1890s, the farthest downstream crossing of the River Forth, has made it an important fortification in the region from the earliest times.
The ruins of Linlithgow Palace are located in the town of Linlithgow, West Lothian, Scotland, 15 miles (24 km) west of Edinburgh. The palace was one of the principal residences of the monarchs of Scotland in the 15th and 16th centuries. Although maintained after Scotland's monarchs left for England in 1603, the palace was little used, and was burned out in 1746. It is now a visitor attraction in the care of Historic Environment Scotland.
Castles are buildings that combine fortifications and residence, and many were built within the borders of modern Scotland. They arrived in Scotland with the introduction of feudalism in the twelfth century. Initially these were wooden motte-and-bailey constructions, but many were replaced by stone castles with a high curtain wall. During the Wars of Independence, Robert the Bruce pursued a policy of castle slighting. In the Late Middle Ages, new castles were built, some on a grander scale as "livery and maintenance" castles that could support a large garrison. Gunpowder weaponry led to the use of gun ports, platforms to mount guns and walls adapted to resist bombardment.
Dunfermline Palace is a ruined former Scottish royal palace and important tourist attraction in Dunfermline, Fife, Scotland. It is currently, along with other buildings of the adjacent Dunfermline Abbey, under the care of Historic Environment Scotland as a scheduled monument.
Falkland Palace, in Falkland, Fife, Scotland, is a royal palace of the Scottish Kings. It was one of the favourite places of Mary, Queen of Scots, who took refuge there from political and religious turmoil of her times.
Scottish renaissance painted ceilings are decorated ceilings in Scottish houses and castles built between 1540 and 1640. This is a distinctive national style, though there is common ground with similar work elsewhere, especially in France, Spain and Scandinavia. An example in England, at Wickham, Hampshire, was recorded in 1974. There are records of over 100 examples, and a much smaller number of painted ceilings survive in-situ today. Some salvaged painted beams and boards are stored by Historic Environment Scotland. The paintings at Crathes Castle, dating from 1597 and 1602 are probably the best known.
John Drummond of Milnab was a 16th-century Scottish carpenter in charge of the woodwork of the palaces, castles and guns of James IV of Scotland and James V of Scotland.
Charles McKean FRSE FRSA FRHistS FRIBA was a Scottish historian, author and scholar.
Andrew Mansioun, or Mentioun or Manschone or Manson, was a French artist who worked at the court of James V, King of Scots. He was the master carpenter of the Scottish artillery for Mary, Queen of Scots and James VI of Scotland.
The Renaissance in Scotland was a cultural, intellectual and artistic movement in Scotland, from the late fifteenth century to the beginning of the seventeenth century. It is associated with the pan-European Renaissance that is usually regarded as beginning in Italy in the late fourteenth century and reaching northern Europe as a Northern Renaissance in the fifteenth century. It involved an attempt to revive the principles of the classical era, including humanism, a spirit of scholarly enquiry, scepticism, and concepts of balance and proportion. Since the twentieth century, the uniqueness and unity of the Renaissance has been challenged by historians, but significant changes in Scotland can be seen to have taken place in education, intellectual life, literature, art, architecture, music, science and politics.
Estate houses in Scotland or Scottish country houses, are large houses usually on landed estates in Scotland. They were built from the sixteenth century, after defensive castles began to be replaced by more comfortable residences for royalty, nobility and local lairds. The origins of Scottish estate houses are in aristocratic emulation of the extensive building and rebuilding of royal residences, beginning with Linlithgow, under the influence of Renaissance architecture. In the 1560s the unique Scottish style of the Scots baronial emerged, which combined features from medieval castles, tower houses, and peel towers with Renaissance plans, in houses designed primarily for residence rather than defence.
Walter Merlioun, was a Scottish master mason based in Edinburgh.
Nicolas Roy was a French stone mason who worked in Scotland for James V and his second wife Mary of Guise.
The jewellery and jewels owned by James V of Scotland are mainly known from the royal treasurer's accounts and inventories. James V reinforced his authority by lavish display.
Valentine Jenkin or Jenkins was an English decorative painter working in Scotland in the 17th century.
Thomas Peebles or Peblis was a Scottish glazier who worked for James IV, Margaret Tudor, and James V of Scotland.
Records survive of the expenses made to feed the Scottish royal household in the sixteenth century, and the remains of royal kitchens can be seen in the ruins of palaces and castles. Archaeologists can recover evidence of diet from deposits including waste from meals and food preparation.
Furniture and furnishings in early modern and late medieval Scotland were made locally or imported, mostly from Flanders and France. Although few pieces of furniture survive from the early part of the period, a rich vocabulary and typology is preserved in inventories and wills. This documentary evidence in the Scots language details the homes of the wealthy and aristocratic. Textiles and beds belonging to Mary, Queen of Scots are very well documented. Scottish wooden furniture was often carved with the initials of married couples.