#stirling bridge

[bantarleton]

Behold the glorious artwork of Angus McBride, depicting two scenes from the battle of Stirling Bridge, fought by Scottish and English forces on 11 September 1297.

In the first piece, William Wallace (right) rejects two Bendictine monks sent by the English to negotiate while another Scottish noble, Andrew Moray, (left) looks on. It is likely that Moray, with higher social standing, more military experience and more men under his command, was actually the leader of the Scottish forces during the battle, and not Wallace. According to Medieval chronicler Walter of Guisborough the Scots rejected the English offers with the following statement (though he doesn't specify if it was Wallace or Moray doing the talking);

“Go back and tell your men that we come not for the good of peace, but we are ready to fight to defend ourselves and free our realm! Therefore, let them advance when they wish, and they will find us ready to fight them even into their beards!”

The English attempted to ford the river beneath Stirling Castle - crossable only via a narrow timber bridge - and were set upon by the Scots with half their force still on the opposite bank. A slaughter of the English ensued, accentuated when the bridge itself collapsed. In the lower artwork Wallace can be seen on the left and Moray on the right, leading the attack on the English knights. The slightly corpulent Englishman on foot before Moray with the three black swans as his heraldry is Hugh de Cressingham, the second-in-command of the English force and one of the men responsible for administering the English occupation of Scotland. He was killed and after the battle, according to several chroniclers, his body was flayed in revenge for the tortures he had inflicted upon the Scots. Part of him was used by Wallace to make a scabbard for his sword; "of his skin William Wallace caused a broad strip to be taken from the head to the heel, to make therewith a baldrick for his sword."

tl;dr look at this badass artwork of William Wallace being depicted historically and not in Dumbass Fantasy Mode.

[m1male2]

Stirling Bridge

[landscape-lunacy]

Stirling Bridge, Scotland - by Caledonianino

[brigantias-isles]

Stirling Bridge and the Wallace Monument

Stirling, Scotland

[donkeysanddug]

FREEDOM!

[adjchem]

Trip to Stirling

[bantarleton]

Stirling Bridge, and the monument to William Wallace. While the battle of Stirling Bridge was a standout Scottish victory over the English, the actual bridge itself was timber and collapsed during the battle - its location is further downstream compared to the more recent stone construction. 

[whitedeath56grey]

o know that for many nameholders, the origin may not have been Scottish at all, but English, Welsh or Breton! Recorded in the spellings of Wallace, Wallice, Walles, Wallis and Wallas, and first recorded in England, the surname derivation is from the Norman French word 'waleis', meaning a 'foreigner'. In England this was generally taken to mean a Welshman or a person living in the border counties of England and Wales, or a Celt from Cornwall, or a former Breton who settled in East Anglia after the Norman Conquest of 1066! Quite a range of possibilities. To add to the confusion the old 12th century British kingdom of Strathclyde, which nominally at least owed sovereignty to the king of England, extended north from the west end of what is now the English-Scottish border, upto and beyond the Clyde Valley. The inhabitants of this region were known as 'walensis', and it was here that Sir William Wallace was born. The surname is first recorded in England in the mid 12th Century (see below), and early recordings include Robert Walleis in the Pipe Rolls of Norfolk, in the year circa 1168. The surname is first recorded in Scotland in 1190 when one Richard Waleis witnessed a charter relating to Kelso Abbey. Sir William Wallace (1272 - 1305), the Scottish patriot, hero of romance, and joint Warden of Scotland, (he was also known as the "Terror Anglorum"), organised the Scottish army in 1296 and for ten years kept the invading armies of Edward 1st of England at bay. He was ultimately betrayed, taken prisoner, and executed as a traitor in London on August 24th 1305. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Osbert Waleis, which was dated circa 1156, in the "Book of Seals" of Warwickshire. This was during the reign of King Henry 11nd of England, and known as "The Builder of Churches", 1154 - 1189.

© Copyright: Name Origin Research 1980 - 2017

William Wallace and his Scottish army defeat the English at Stirling Bridge by C L Doughty