THE BRUCE: A STUDY OF JOHN BARBOUR'S HEROIC IDEAL BY ANNE M. MCKIM Ph. D. UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH 1980 TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS .......... 000.0a ii INTRODUCTION .... 99oo*0@@0&a001 Chapter 1. FORM AND THEME ............. 28 2. THE THEOLOGICAL PHILOSOPHICALFRAMEWORK 67 AND ...... 3. JAMES DOUGLAS: THE IDEAL KNIGHT .... 0....... 122 4. ROBERTBRUCE: PORTRAIT OF-AN IDEAL KING ........ 176 5. LITERARY DEBTS AND INFLUENCES .... a. 0...... 233 CONCLUSION.......................... 288 a00aaa00000a0900a0000000000aa00000 SELECTEDBIBLIOGRAPHY 297 .................... ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I am grateful to Patricia Crangle and to my husband Ian for kindly undertaking to proof-read this thesis and for offering helpful comments. I also wish to thank Professor John MacQueen of the School of Scottish Studies at the University of Edinburgh, who supervised the writing of the thesis and offered invaluable advice and encouragement. ii ABSTRACT The purpose of this dissertation is to examine John Barbour's Bruce (c. 1375) as a literary work from the point of view of the author's heroic ideal. There has been singular confusion about the nature and form of the work and about Barbour's theme. Until recently, critics who have attempted to characterize and categorize the poem have concluded that although it shares some of the qualities and conventions of romance, epic, biography and verse-chronicle, it is a mixture of forms and is unusual because of Barbour's realistic treatment and patriotic emphasis. Various assumptions about medieval na tives have been brought to bear in these judgements and, on the whole, The Bruce has been found wanting or has been regarded as a modification of conventions especially with respect to chivalric codes of conduct and courtly ideals. Little attention has been paid to the poet's own statements, which are frequent and expository, about the nature of his work, his understanding of chivalry and heroism, and the relationship of the values he expressly admires to these concepts. This study attempts to explore these ideast mainly thrcuetl an examination of the language and vocabulary of the poem. The first chapter examines the nature of the work and Barbour's description of his narrative as a romance and as a 11suthfast story", and demonstrates that he conceived of his work as a romance about real historical personages and events and that he chose the romance form because he regarded it as the vehicle for the celebration of great deeds of prowess tempered by prudence and mesure. The second chapter examines the theological-philosophical framework of The Bruce, which the prevalence of a number of significant abstracts indicates. It is here that one can trace the foundations of the poet's heroic ideal, in particular, his insistence on the need for prudence and the use of reason in all human undertakings. The third and fourth chapters are devoted to his portraits of Douglas and, Bruce respectively as heroes, especially to his presentation of them as ideal figures--Douglas as an ideal knight and vassal and Bruce as an ideal king and general--effected, on the whole, through the epithets employed to characterize them. The last chapter demonstrates how Barbour promoted the view of Bruce and Douglas as heroes by comparing them to other renowned historical and pseudo-historical individuals who had been celebrated in romances, and shows that the various references to romances were used by the poet to elucidate his own heroic ideal. iii 0 INTRODUMON Unfortunately, we know very little about John Barbour, the author of The Bruce. He seems to have been born about 1320, although details of his birth and early life are wanting. But because of the nature of his public life--he was Archdeacon of I Aberdeen for nearly forty years--documentary information has survived which makes it possible to construct a circumstantial, if patchy, account of his career. His first known preferment was to the precentorship of Dunkeld, to which he seems to have been appointed shortly after June, 1355,2 and which he occupied until he succeeded Alexander de Kininmund to the archdeaconry of Aberdeen--having as his prebend the parish of Rayne in Garioch-follOwing the latter's appointment as bishop of the diocese in 1356. Barbour must have attained possession before 12th July, 1356 when Andrew UmfraY succeeded him as precentor of Dunkeld. He is first referred to as Archdeacon of Aberdeen on August 13th, 1357 when he was 'Most of the official records have been brought together by W. W. Skeat in the introduction to his edition of The Bruce, 2 vols. (E. E. T. S., 1870,1889; reprint ed., 1896), 1, pp. xviii-xxviii. I rely here mainly on Skeat's biographical notes (pp. xxix-xxxv) and on D. E. R. Watt, A Bibliogra: phical Dictiona, (OýTford; of Scottish Graduates to A. D. 1410 Clarendon Press, 1 s. v. "Barbour". 2Wattl p. 28. Se also his Fasti Ecclesiae Scoticanae (-St-And=ews Medii Aevi ad annum 1638,2d draft & Scottish Record Society, 1969), p. 96. I given a safe-conduct by Edward III to go with three scholars to 3 Oxford for the purposes of study. This was the first of four safe-conducts granted by Edward III, three of which expressly state that Barbour may pass through England in order to pursue his academic studies. He is amongst those granted a safe-conduct to study in England for a year on 4th November, 1364.4 Another issued on 16th October, 1365, again for one year, allowed him to pass through England on a pilgrimage to, St. Denis near Paris, and may have been used to visit Paris University. Four years later he still appears to have been prosecuting his academic studies, for he received another safe- conduct on 30th November, 1368, for one year, to travel through 5 England and France, causa studendi. Watt notes that in this last safe-conduct Barbour occurs for the first time with the style of 6 Master, and although papal records and contemporary records of Aberdeen Cathedral do not attach any degree to his namet he suggests that Barbour may have taken an M. A. at Paxis in the period February 1364/5-June 1368, for which the records of the English nation there are missing. However, he a1so feels that this would have been 3ROtuli Scotiae, 1,808, cited by Skeat, ps xviii. 4 Ibid., 1,886, cited by Skeat, p. xix. 5jbid., 1,926, Skeat, p. xix. 6 He is also so styled in the exchequer accounts of March (Exchequer 1384/5 and April 1386 Rolls, iii, 111,681) and after his death by WyntOun, The Orygynale Cronykil of Scotland, ed. David Laing, 3 vols, (Edinburgh; Edmonston and Douglas, 1872T, 29 bk. VIII, 978, and in the 16th century obituaries of Aberdeen Cathedral. (Spalding Registrum Episcopatis Aberdonensis Club, 1845), 2.' 7, 212. 2 (Barbour have rather late in life to take such a degree would been in his forties by this time), and considers it more likely that Barbour's studies were in law in which he may have obtained the bachelor level, which could have earned him the occasional 7 courtesy of the style Master. The probability that Barbour's studies were in law receives support from the fact that the professional work of the higher clergy consisted almost entirely in ecclesiasticaI administration, for which a study of Canon Law was considered the 8 most important qualification. The Faculty of Decrees at the University of Paris had a high reputation for the study of this 9 discipline. An archdeacon was the most important official in the diocese after the bishop, and it was his duty to administer his bishop's jurisdiction. He was responsible for parochial visitation and the imposition of fines for moral and ecclesiastical offences, although it soon became customary for him to receive a fee instead of visiting and to collect fines out 11 10 he of court by deputy. For all that, as Coulton points outo 7Watt, p. 28. ' 8 Hastings Rashdall, The Universities of Europe in the Middle Ages ed. F. M. Powicke and A. B. Emden ý=Ordt Clarendon Press, 1936), 3 vols-, 3: 447. 9Scotland had no universities at this period. The first, St. Andrews, was not founded until 1411. 10 As a result, he was under great temptation to accept bribes and he is frequently the object of satire on this account in the writings of the period. See, for example, the beginning of Chaucer's Friar's Tale. II G. G. Coulton, Medieval Panorama (Cambridge: University 1ý4-97T-p- 135. Press, 1938; reprint ed. 9 3 to be needed to be something of a lawyer if he was at all efficient* to It was certainly common for ecclesiastics of all ages obtain leave of absence to study at the universities, although 12 more often than not they did not graduate with degrees. It may be that Barbour was amongst those who attended courses but did not actually graduate as a licentiate or doctor in decrees. Skeat, noting the long period Barbour devoted to academic studies after he had been promoted to the archdeaconry of Aberdeen, suggests that a love of learning may have been the incentive 13 rather than a desire for preferment. If this was the case, then Barbour was an unusual man for his time, According to Rashdall, university distinction was closely linked to clerical promotion. The universities were thronged with beneficed clergy "hanging on in search of preferment", and, he goes on., The idea of making a man a bishop or an archdeacon on account of his zeal, his energy, and success in the humble round of to parochial duty is one which would hardly have occurred sensible men in medieval times.