A a was first printed in the fourth edition of Percy's Reliques, 1794, I, 18, and A b in the first edition, 1765, I, 18.
By far the most circumstantial account of the battle of Otterburn is given by Froissart (Chroniques, Buchon, XI, 362 ff, chap. 115 ff), and his highly felicitous narrative may be briefly summarized as follows.
The quarrels of Richard II with his uncles and a consequent feud between the great northern families of Neville and Percy furnished the Scots an inviting opportunity for an invasion of England on a large scale. Under the pretext of a festive meeting, a preliminary conference of barons and knights was held at Aberdeen, and it was there agreed that they should muster, the middle of August, 1388, at a place on the border near Jedburgh, with such forces as they could command. In all this they took no counsel with the king, who was then past seventy, and was regarded as of no account for their purposes. The result was a larger gathering than had been seen for sixty years, quite twelve hundred lances and forty thousand ordinary fighting-men.
The Earl of Northumberland and his sons, the Seneschal of York, and the Captain of Berwick had heard of the intended meeting at Aberdeen, and had sent heralds and minstrels thither, to get further information. These agents reported that all Scotland was astir, and that there was to be another parley in the forest of Jedburgh. The barons and knights of Northumberland made due preparations, and, the better to keep these secret, remained quiet in their houses, ready to sally as soon as they learned that the Scots were in motion. Feeling themselves incapable of coping with so large a body as had been collected, they decided upon a simultaneous counter-raid, and that from the east or from, the west, according as the enemy should take the road from the west or the east. Of this plan of the English the Scots obtained knowledge from a spy whom they had captured, and to foil it they divided their army, directing the main body towards Carlisle, under command of Archibald Douglas, of the Earl of Fife, son of the king, and many other nobles, while a detachment of three or four hundred picked men-at-arms, supported by two thousand stout fellows, partly archers, all well mounted,[foot-note] and commanded by James, Earl of Douglas, the Earl of March and Dunbar, and the Earl of Murray, were to strike for Newcastle, cross the river, and burn and ravage the bishopric of Durham.
The eastern division (with which alone we are concerned) carried out their program to the letter. They advanced at speed, stopping for nothing, and meeting with no resistance, and the burning and pillaging had begun in Durham before the Earl of Northumberland knew of their arrival. Fire and smoke soon showed what was going on. The earl dispatched his sons Henry and Ralph Percy to Newcastle, where the whole country rallied, gentle and simple; he himself remaining at Alnwick, in the hope of being able to enclose the Scots, when they should take the way north, between two bodies of English. The Scots attained to the very gates of Durham; then, having burned every unfortified town between there and Newcastle, they turned northward, with a large booty, repassed the Tyne, and halted at Newcastle. There was skirmishing for two days before the city, and in the course of a long combat between Douglas and Henry Percy the Scot got possession of the Englishman's pennon. This he told Percy he would raise on the highest point of his castle at Dalkeith; Percy answered that he should never accomplish that vaunt, nor should he carry the pennon out of Northumberland. 'Come then to-night and win it back,' said Douglas; 'I will plant it before my tent.' It was then late, and the fighting ceased; but the Scots kept good guard, looking for Percy to come that very night for his pennon. Percy, however, was constrained to let that night pass.
The Scots broke up their camp early the next morning and withdrew homewards. Taking and burning the tower and town of Ponteland on their way, they moved on to Otterburn, thirty miles northwest from Newcastle, where there was a strong castle or tower, in marshy ground, which they assailed for a day without success. At the end of the day they held a council, and the greater part were in favor of making for Carlisle in the morning, to rejoin their countrymen. But the Earl of Douglas would not hear of this; Henry Percy had said that he would challenge his pennon; they would stay two or three days more and assault the castle, and see if Percy would be as good as his word. So the Scots encamped at their ease, making themselves huts of trees, and availing themselves of the marshes to fortify their position. At the entrance of the marshes, which was on the Newcastle road, they put their servants and foragers, and they drove their cattle into the bogs.
Henry Percy was greatly vexed and mortified at the loss of his pennon, and in the evening he represented to the knights and squires of Northumberland how much it concerned his honor to make good what he had said to Douglas, that the pennon should never be carried out of England. But these gentlemen were all convinced that Douglas was backed by the whole power of Scotland, of which they had seen only the van, by forty thousand men who could handle them at their will; at any rate, it was better to lose a pennon than two or three hundred knights and squires, and expose the country to risk. As for the loss of the pennon, it was one of the chances of arms; Douglas had won it handsomely; another time Percy would get as much from him, or more.[foot-note] To this the Percys were fain to yield. Later there came scouts with information that Douglas was encamped at Otterburn, that the main army was not acting in conjunction with him, and that his forces, all told, did not exceed three thousand. Henry Percy was overjoyed at the news, and cried, To horse! by the faith I owe to God and my father, I will go seek my pennon, and the Scots shall be ousted before this night is over. The evening of that same day the Bishop of Durham was expected to arrive with a great many men, but Henry Percy would not wait. Six hundred lances and eight thousand foot were enough, he said, to serve the Scots, who had but three hundred lances and two thousand other folk. The English set forth as soon as they could get together, by the road which the Scots had taken, but were not able to move very fast by reason of their infantry.
Some of the Scots knights were supping, and more were asleep (for they had had hard work at the assault on the tower, and were meaning to be up betimes to renew the attack), when the English were upon the camp, crying, Percy! Percy! There was naturally great alarm. The English made their attack at that part of the camp where, as before said, the servants and foragers were lodged. This was, however, strong, and the knights sent some of their men to hold it while they themselves were arming. Then the Scots formed, each under his own earl and captain. It was night, but the weather was fair and the moon shining. The Scots did not go straight for the English, but took their way along by the marshes and by a hill, according to a plan which they had previously arranged against the case that their camp should be attacked. The English made short work with the underlings, but, as they advanced, always found fresh people to keep up a skirmish. And now the Scots, having executed a flank movement, fell upon their assailants in a mass, from a quarter where nothing was looked for, shouting their battle-cries with one voice. The English were astounded, but closed up, and gave them Percy! for Douglas! Then began a fell battle. The English, being in excess and eager to win, beat back the Scots, who were at the point of being worsted. James Douglas, who was young, strong, and keen for glory, sent his banner to the front, with the cry, Douglas! Douglas! Henry and Ralph Percy, indignant against the earl for the loss of the pennon, turned in the direction of the cry, responding, Percy! Knights and squires had no thought but to fight as long as spears and axes would hold out. It was a hand-to-hand fight; the parties were so close together that the archers of neither could operate; neither side budged, but both stood firm. The Scots showed extraordinary valor, for the English were three to one; but be this said without disparagement of the English, who have always done their duty.
As has been said, the English were so strong that they were forcing their foes back, and this James Douglas saw. To regain the ground, he took a two-handed axe, plunged into the thickest, and opened a path before him; for there was none so well armed in helmet or plate as not to fear his strokes. So he made his way till he was hit by three spears, all at once, one in the shoulder, another in the chest, another in the thigh, and borne to the ground. The English did not know that it was Earl Douglas that had fallen; they would have been so much elated that the day would have been theirs. Neither did the Scots; if they had, they would have given up in despair. Douglas could not raise himself from the ground, for he was wounded to the death. The crush about him was great, but his people had kept as close to him as they could. His cousin, Sir James Lindsay, reached the spot where he was lying, and with Lindsay Sir John and Sir Walter Sinclair, and other knights and squires. Near him, and severely wounded, they found his chaplain, William of North Berwick, who had kept up with his master the whole night, axe in hand; also Sir Robert Hart, with five wounds from lances and other weapons. Sir John Sinclair asked the earl, Cousin, how fares it with you? 'Indifferently,' said the earl; 'praised be God, few of my ancestors have died in their beds. Avenge me, for I count myself dead. Walter and John Sinclair, up with my banner, and cry, Douglas! and let neither friend nor foe know of my state.' The two Sinclairs and Sir John Lindsay did as they were bidden, raised the banner, and shouted, Douglas! They were far to the front, but others, who were behind, hearing the shout loudly repeated, charged the English with such valor as to drive them beyond the place where Douglas now lay dead, and came up with the banner which Sir John Lindsay was bearing, begirt and supported by good Scots knights and squires. The Earl of Murray came up too, and the Earl of March and Dunbar as well, and they all, as it were, took new life when they saw that they were together and that the English were giving ground. Once more was the combat renewed. The English had the disadvantage of the fatigue of a rapid march from Newcastle, by reason whereof their will was better than their wind, whereas the Scots were fresh; and the effects appeared in this last charge, in which the Scots drove the English so far back that they could not recover their lost ground. Sir Ralph Percy had already been taken prisoner. Like Douglas, he had advanced so far as to be surrounded, and being so badly wounded that his hose and boots were full of blood, he surrendered to Sir John Maxwell. Henry Percy, after a valorous fight with the Lord Montgomery, became prisoner to the Scottish knight.
It was a hard battle and well fought, but such are the turns of fortune that, although the English were the greater number, and all bold men and practised in arms, and although they attacked the enemy valiantly, and at first drove them back a good distance, the Scots in the end won the day. The losses of the English were put by their antagonists at 1040 prisoners, 1860 killed in the fight and the pursuit, and more than 1000 wounded; those of the Scots were about 100 killed and 200 captured.[foot-note] The Scots retired without molestation, taking the way to Melrose Abbey, where they caused the Earl of Douglas to be interred, and his obsequies to be reverently performed. Over his body a tomb of stone was built, and above this was raised the earl's banner.
Such is the story of the battle of Otterburn, fought on Wednesday, the 19th day of August,[foot-note] in the year of grace 1388, as related by Froissart (with animated tributes to the hardihood and generosity of both parties) upon the authority of knights and squires actually present, both English and Scots, and also French.
Wyntoun,ix, 840-54, 900f (Laing, III, 36f) says that the alarm was given the Scots by a young man that came right fast riding (cf. A 20, 21, B 4, C 17), and that many of the Scots were able to arm but imperfectly; among these Earl James, who was occupied with getting his men into order and was "reckless of his arming," and the Earl of Murray, who forgot his basnet (cf. C 20). Earl James was slain no man knew in what way. Bower, Scotichronicon, II, 405, agrees with Wyntoun. English chroniclers, Knyghton, col. 2728, Walsingham (Riley, II, 176[foot-note]), Malverne, the continuator of Higden (Polychronicon, Lumby, IX, 185), assert that Percy killed Douglas with his own hand, Knyghton adding that Percy also wounded the Earl of Murray to the point of death.
That a Scots ballad of Otterburn was popular in the sixteenth century appears from The Complaynte of Scotlande, 1549, where a line is cited, The Perssee and the Mongumrye met, p. 65, ed. Murray: cf. B 91, C 301.[foot-note] In the following century Hume of Godscroft writes:[foot-note] The Scots song made of Otterburn telleth the time, about Lammasse, and the occasion, to take preyes out of England; also the dividing of the armies betwixt the Earles of Fife and Douglas, and their severall journeys, almost as in the authentick history. It beginneth thus:
Motherwell maintains that the ballad which passes as English is the Scots song altered to please the other party. His argument, however, is far from conclusive. "That The Battle of Otterbourne was thus dealt with by an English transcriber appears obvious, for it studiously omits dilating on Percy's capture, while it accurately details his combat with Douglas;" that is to say, the ballad as we have it is just what a real English ballad would have been, both as to what it enlarges on and what it slights. "Whereas it would appear that in the genuine Scottish version the capture of Percy formed a prominent incident, seeing it is the one by which the author of The Complaynt refers to the ballad [The Perssee and the Mongumrye met]:" from which Motherwell was at liberty to deduce that B and C represent the genuine Scottish version, several stanzas being given to the capture of Percy in these; but this he would not care to do, on account of the great inferiority of these forms. A Scotsman could alter an English ballad "to suit political feeling and flatter national vanity," as Motherwell says the Scots did with Chevy Chace. (See further on, p. 303.) There is no reason to doubt that a Scots ballad of Otterburn once existed, much better than the two inferior, and partly suspicious, things which were printed by Herd and Scott, and none to doubt that an English minstrel would deal freely with any Scots ballad which he could turn to his purpose; but then there is no evidence, positive or probable, that this particular ballad was "adapted" from the Scots song made of Otterburn; rather are we to infer that the few verses of B and C which repeat or resemble the text of A were borrowed from A, and, as likely as not, Hume's first stanza too.[foot-note]
A, in the shape in which it has come down to us, must have a date long subsequent to the battle, as the grammatical forms show; still, what interested the borderers a hundred years or more after the event must have interested people of the time still more, and it would be against the nature of things that there should not have been a ballad as early as 1400. The ballad we have is likely to have been modernized from such a predecessor, but I am not aware that there is anything in the text to confirm such a supposition, unless one be pleased to make much of the Wednesday of the eighteenth stanza. The concluding stanza implies that Percy is dead, and he was killed at Shrewsbury, in 1403.
A. 3. Hoppertope hyll, says Percy, is a corruption for Ottercap Hill (now Ottercaps Hill) in the parish of Kirk Whelpington, Tynedale Ward, Northumberland. Rodclyffe Cragge (now Rothley Crags) is a cliff near Rodeley, a small village in the parish of Hartburn, in Morpeth Ward, south-east of Ottercap; and Green Ley ton, corruptly Green Lynton, is another small village, south-east of Rodeley, in the same parish. Reliques, 1794, I, 22.
8. Henry Percy seems to have been in his twenty-third year. As for his having been a march-man "all his days," he is said to have begun fighting ten years before, in 1378, and to have been appointed Governor of Berwick and Warden of the Marches in 1385: White, History of the Battle of Otterburn, p. 67 f. Walsingham calls both Percy and Douglas young men, and Froissart speaks at least twice of Douglas as young. Fraser, The Douglas Book, 1885, I, 292, says that Douglas was probably born in 1358. White, as above, p. 91, would make him somewhat older.
17. The chivalrous trait in this stanza, and that in the characteristic passage 36-44, are peculiar to this transcendently heroic ballad.
26, 27. The earldom of Menteith at the time of this battle, says Percy, following Douglas's Peerage, was possessed by Robert Stewart, Earl of Fife, third son of King Robert II; but the Earl of Fife was in command of the main body and not present. (As Douglas married a daughter of King Robert II, the Earl of Fife was not his uncle, but his brother-in-law.) The mention of Huntley, says Percy, shows that the ballad was not composed before 1449; for in that year Alexander, Lord of Gordon and Huntley, was created Earl of Huntley by King James II. The Earl of Buchan at that time was Alexander Stewart, fourth son of the king. Reliques, 1794, I, 36.
352. 'The cronykle will not layne.' So in 'The Rose of England,' No 166, st. 22 4, 'The cronickles of this will not lye,' and also 172; and in 'Flodden Field,' appendix, p. 360, st. 1214.
43, 49. It will be remembered that the archers had no part in this fight.
45, 46. "The ancient arms of Douglas are pretty accurately emblazoned in the former stanza, and if the readings were, The crowned harte, and, Above stode starres thre, it would be minutely exact at this day. As for the Percy family, one of their ancient badges or cognizances was a white lyon statant, and the silver crescent continues to be used by them to this day. They also give three luces argent for one of their quarters." Percy, as above, p. 30.
48. So far as I know, St. George does not appear as Our Lady's knight in any legendary, though he is so denominated or described elsewhere in popular tradition. So in the spell for night-mare, which would naturally be of considerable antiquity,
Reginald Scot, The Discoverie of Witchcraft, 1584, as reprinted by Nicholson, p. 68, ed. 1665, p. 48; and Fletcher's Monsieur Thomas, iv. 6, Dyce, VII, 388. In Nicholas Udall's 'Roister Doister,' known to be as old as 1551, Matthew Merrygreek exclaims, "What then? sainct George to borow, Our Ladie's knight!" Ed. W.D. Cooper, p. 77, Shakespeare Society, 1847. The Danish ballad of St. George, 'St. Jørgen og Dragen,' Grundtvig, No 103, II, 559 ff, the oldest version of which is from a 16th century Manuscript, begins, "Knight St. George, thou art my man" (svend); and in the second version, George, declining the princess whom he has rescued, says he has vowed to Mary to be her servant.[foot-note] In the corresponding Swedish ballad, of the same age as the Danish, George is called Mary's knight (Maria honom riddare gjorde, st. 2): Geijer and Afzelius, ed. Bergström, II, 402. This is also his relation in German ballads: Meinert, p. 254; Ditfurth, I, 55, No 68.[foot-note]
B. 1, 9, 14 nearly resemble A 1, 50, 68, and must have the same origin. In B 9 Douglas is changed to Montgomery; in 14 Douglas is wrongly said to have been buried on the field, instead of at Melrose Abbey, where his tomb is still to be seen.
7 is founded upon a tradition reported by Hume of Godscroft: "There are that say that he was not slain by the enemy, but by one of his owne men, a groome of his chamber, whom he had struck the day before with a truncheon in the ordering of the battell, because hee saw him make somewhat slowly to; and they name this man John Bickerton of Luffenesse, who left a part of his armour behinde unfastned, and when hee was in the greatest conflict, this servant of his came behinde his back and slew him thereat." Ed. 1644, p. 105.
11. The summons to surrender to a brakenbush is not in the style of fighting-men or fighting-days, and would justify Hotspur's contempt of metre-ballad-mongers.
12, 13. B agrees with Froissart in making a Montgomery to be the captor of Henry Percy, whereas A represents that Montgomery was taken prisoner and exchanged for Percy. In The Hunting of the Cheviot Sir Hugh Montgomery kills Percy, and in return is shot by a Northumberland archer.
C. Scott does not give a distinct account of this version. He says that he had obtained two copies, since the publication of the earlier edition, "from the recitation of old persons residing at the head of Ettrick Forest, by which the story is brought out and completed in a manner much more correspondent to the true history." C is, in fact, a combination of four copies; the two from Ettrick Forest, B a, and the Manuscript copy used in B b to "correct" Herd.
8, it scarcely requires to be said, is spurious, modern in diction and in conception.
19. Perhaps derived from Hume of Godscroft rather than from tradition. When Douglas was dying, according to this historian,[foot-note] he made these last requests of certain of his kinsmen: "First, that yee keep my death close both from our owne folke and from the enemy; then, that ye suffer not my standard to be lost or cast downe; and last, that ye avenge my death, and bury me at Melrosse with my father. If I could hope for these things," he added, "I should die with the greater contentment; for long since I heard a prophesie that a dead man should winne a field, and I hope in God it shall be I." Ed. 1644, p. 100.
22 must be derived from the English version. As the excellent editor of The Ballad Minstrelsy of Scotland, Glasgow, 1871, remarks, "no Scottish minstrel would ever have dreamt of inventing such a termination to the combat between these two redoubted heroes ... as much at variance with history as it is repulsive to national feeling: " p. 431.
Genealogical matters, in this and the following ballad, are treated, not always to complete satisfaction, in Bishop Percy's notes, Reliques, 1794, I, 34 ff; Scott's Minstrelsy, 1833, I, 351, 363 ff: White's History of the Battle of Otterburn, p. 67 ff; The Ballads and Songs of Ayrshire, I, 66 f.
A is translated by Doenniges, p. 87; C by Grundtvig, Engelske og skotske Folkeviser, No 12, p. 74, and by Talvj, Charakteristik, p. 537.
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