James V

1512–1542

James V became king of Scots as an infant after his father’s death at Flodden. He escaped the control of the Douglas family in 1528 and built a personal government that relied on royal justice, taxation and church revenues. His marriages to Madeleine of France and Mary of Guise strengthened the French alliance. After defeat at Solway Moss and a period of illness, he died in 1542, leaving the infant Mary, Queen of Scots, as heir.

James appears in Jean Plaidy’s The Thistle and the Rose and in Scottish historical fiction dealing with Margaret Tudor, the Douglases and Mary of Guise. He is often portrayed as a romantic “King of the Commons” who travelled in disguise, a tradition based partly on folklore. Novels also emphasise the burden of a monarchy surrounded by powerful kin and competing English and French interests.

In Alison Weir’s The Princess of Scotland, And when her father is exiled by King James V, Margaret is sent to England to seek refuge with her uncle, King Henry VIII. Alison Weir’s In the Shadow of Queens places James V within a narrative shaped by court politics and dynastic power and family, marriage and personal loyalty.

In non-fiction, James V is discussed in Linda Porter’s Crown of Thistles. In Linda Porter’s Crown of Thistles, Linda Porter traces the dynastic contest between the Tudor and Stewart royal houses from the victories that placed Henry VII on the English throne and James IV on the Scottish throne.