Battle of Bannockburn

Bannockburn is a village immediately south of the city of Stirling in Scotland. It is named after the Bannock Burn, a burn running through the... village before flowing into the River Forth. Land in the vicinity of Bannockburn village, probably between the Pelstream and Bannock burns, was the site of the Battle of Bannockburn fought in 1314 — one of the pivotal battles of the 13th/14th century Wars of Independence between the kingdoms of Scotland and England. A large monument and visitor centre is located near the site of the battle. In the late 18th and early 19th centuries the Wilson family, of Bannockburn, designed and wove tartans for the British army. Many of the so-called Clan tartans were created by the Wilsons in response to the needs of the Clan chiefs who, without their own authentic tartans, approached the Wilsons for suitable patterns. The visit of King George IV to Edinburgh in 1822, and his insistence that the Clan chiefs attend his banquets and levees in their Clan tartans, prompted this reaction. The Wilson family ceased business in 1924.
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The First War of Scottish Independence lasted from the invasion by England in 1296 until the de jure restoration of Scottish independence with the... Treaty of Edinburgh-Northampton in 1328. De facto independence had been established in 1314 at the Battle of Bannockburn. Throughout Scotland, there was widespread discontent and disorder after the supposed conquest, and acts of defiance were directed against local English officials. In 1297, the country erupted in open revolt, and Andrew de Moray and William Wallace emerged as the first significant Scottish patriots. Andrew de Moray was the son of a northern landowner, Sir Andrew de Moray of Petty. Andrew and his father were both captured in the rout after the Battle of Dunbar in April 1296. Andrew the younger was initially held captive in Chester Castle on the Anglo-Welsh border, from which he escaped during the winter of 1296-97. He returned to his father's castle at Avoch on the northern shore of the Moray Firth, where he raised his banner in the name of Scotland's king, John Balliol.
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