northeast, and the kingdom of Strath-Clóta (Strathclyde). In a.d. 730 Aonghus Mac Feargus, king of the Picts, was recognised as High King of all three kingdoms. The next century, Coinneach Mac Alpín became king of both Picts and Scots and united the two kingdoms. It was obvious that at this time Gaelic was spoken throughout the north of Scotland. In a.d. 945, the former independent kingdom of Cumbria, conquered by Edmund of England, became a province of Scotland. Lastly, in a.d. 1018, following the battle of Carham, the small kingdom of the Angles, around the mouth of the Tweed, became part of Scotland, or Alba, as it then was known. This was the greatest territorial expansion of the kingdom. However, in a.d. 1157 Maol Callum a’ chinn mhòir, High King of Alba, gave up Cumbria. In the next century, the monarchy, followed by the southern gentry and traders, began to Anglicise themselves, and the Gaelic language was on the defensive.

The next centuries saw England ever trying to advance her domination over Scotland and a continual defensive war by the Scots against incursions from England. In 1603 the Anglicised James VI of Scotland was invited to become monarch of England on the death of Elizabeth I. He became James I of England. James made several attempts to unite his two kingdoms, one of which was rejected by the English Parliament in 1607. Exactly one hundred years later, in 1707, at a time when it became economically advantageous for England to do so, the union was carried out. It was achieved by bribes, both of finance and of position and title. “We’re bought and sold for English gold,” lamented the poet Robbie Burns.

In the years following the union, in which both England and Scotland were supposed to disappear and a new state of co-equal partners called Great Britain was supposed to emerge, the Scots, realising how they had been duped, made several efforts to sever the union. The first parliamentary effort was made in 1714, while insurrections and attempted insurrections occurred throughout the eighteenth century. The last major one was in 1820.

The constitutional position of Scotland is curious indeed. The English broke the Treaty of Union, the written constitution of Great Britain, almost as soon as the ink was dry. “Have we not