Duncan II (1093-94)- King of Scotland , son of Malcolm III and grandson of Duncan I. (Died 1094)
For many years (1072?-87) Duncan lived as a hostage of the Norman English, allegedly as a confirmation of his father's homage to William I of England. He became king of the Scots while driving out his uncle, Donald Bane, in 1094, an enterprise in which he was helped by some English and Normans. He was killed at the instigation of Donald Bane, possibly at Monthechin, making way for the restoration of Donald Bane.
Donald Bane (restored 1094-1097)
These years saw the last attempt of the Celts to maintain a king of their race and a kingdom governed according to their customs. Edgar the Aetheling , who had newly befriended the Norman king of England, led an army into Scotland, dispossessed Donald Bane, and advanced his nephew Edgar, son of Malcolm III, as sole king of the Scots.
Edgar (1097 - 1107)
King of Scots from 1097, eldest surviving son of Malcolm III Canmore and Queen Margaret (granddaughter of King Edmund II of England) and thus the first king of the Scots to unite Celtic and Anglo-Saxon blood. As vassal to King William II Rufus of England, he was placed on the Scottish throne to succeed the Celtic, anti-English Donald Bane, his uncle, who was deposed. In 1098 Edgar ceded the Hebrides to Magnus III, king of Norway, who had been raiding the islands. Edgar was a generous benefactor of the church; a contemporary historian (St. Aelred of Rievaulx) called him the equal of Edward the Confessor in personal merit. Under William II Rufus, Edgar was deprived of his Norman lands in 1091, giving Malcolm an excuse for raiding the north of England. Edgar then mediated between the two kings. In 1097, acting on William's orders, he overthrew Malcolm's brother and successor, Donald Bane, a foe of the Normans, and installed Malcolm's son Edgar on the throne of Scotland. About 1102 he went on a crusade to the Holy Land. He sided with Robert Curthose, Duke of Normandy, against Henry I in the struggle for the English crown. Edgar was captured by Henry in the Battle of Tinchebrai (Sept. 28, 1106), was released, and spent the rest of his life in obscurity. He died unmarried and was succeeded by his brother Alexander I.
Alexander I (1107-1124)
The son of King Malcolm III Canmore (reigned 1058-93), Alexander succeeded to the throne upon the death of his brother King Edgar (ruled 1097-1107). In accordance with Edgar's instructions, Alexander allowed his younger brother and heir, David, to rule southern Scotland. Alexander probably acknowledged King Henry I of England as his overlord. He married Henry's illegitimate daughter, Sibylla, and in 1114 he led a Scottish contingent in Henry's Welsh campaigns. Nevertheless, Alexander strove to preserve the independence of the Scottish Church from the English Church and to assert his will over the Scottish bishops. The outcome of these struggles was inconclusive at his death. He was succeeded by David (David I, 1124-53), who ruled over the whole of Scotland.
David I (1124-1153)
Born 1082 - Died May 24, 1153, Carlisle, Cumberland, Eng.One of the most powerful Scottish kings (reigned from 1124). He admitted into Scotland an Anglo-French (Norman) aristocracy that played a major part in the later history of the kingdom. He also reorganized Scottish Christianity to conform with continental European and English usages and founded many religious communities, mostly for Cistercian monks and Augustinian canons.
The youngest of the six sons of the Scottish king Malcolm III Canmore and Queen Margaret (afterward St. Margaret), David spent much of his early life at the court of his brother-in-law King Henry I of England. Through David's marriage (1113) to a daughter of Waltheof, earl of Northumbria, he acquired the English earldom of Huntingdon and obtained much land in that county and in Northamptonshire. With Anglo-Norman help, David secured from his brother Alexander I, king of Scots from 1107, the right to rule Cumbria, Strathclyde, and part of Lothian. In April 1124, on the death of Alexander, David became king of Scots.
David recognized his niece, the Holy Roman empress Matilda (died 1167), as heir to Henry I in England, and from 1136 he fought for her against King Stephen (crowned as Henry's successor in December 1135), hoping thereby to gain Northumberland for himself. A brief peace made with Stephen in 1136 resulted in the cession of Cumberland to David and the transfer of Huntingdon to his son Earl Henry. David, however, continued to switch sides. While fighting for Matilda again, he was defeated in the Battle of the Standard, near Northallerton, Yorkshire (Aug. 22, 1138). He then made peace once more with Stephen, who in 1139 granted Northumberland (as an English fief) to Earl Henry. In 1141 David reentered the war on Matilda's behalf, and in 1149 he knighted her son Henry Plantagenet (afterward King Henry II of England), who acknowledged David's right to Northumberland.
In Scotland, David created a rudimentary central administration, issued the first Scottish royal coinage, and built or rebuilt the castles around which grew the first Scottish burghs: Edinburgh, Stirling, Berwick, Roxburgh, and perhaps Perth. As ruler of Cumbria he had taken Anglo-Normans into his service, and during his kingship many others settled in Scotland, founding important families and intermarrying with the older Scottish aristocracy. Bruce, Stewart, Comyn, and Oliphant are among the noted names whose bearers went from northern France to England during the Norman Conquest in 1066 and then to Scotland in the reign of David I. To these and other French-speaking immigrants, David granted land in return for specified military service or contributions of money, as had been done in England from the time of the Conquest.
