I have lit the lantern of the north

Our big fascination is grenzgänger situations. In a former post we have tried to define what exactly a grenzgänger situation is.

In the previous post, I stated my lack of love for the stewarts and the damage they have done to Alba. One Stewart, who should gain our respect is Alexander Stewart, better known as the Wolf of Badenoch, the man that set the north on fire.

Others are better equiped to describe the pendantic details of his life etc. What is more interesting is his last night at Ruthven castle where he played chess with the de'il. Legend has it, the Wolf was visited by a man dressed in black, they played chess in the great hall. The Wolf said, check and the de'il said checkmate, a thunderstorm arose which dominated the night.

In the morning the corpse of the Wolf was found with no scars, just the nails had been pulled out of his boots. The soldiers guarding the castle were all dead with scars that suggested they had been struck by lightning.

The Wolf was certianly motivated by power and self interest. His Achille's heel was having a wife Euphemia Ross, who could not bear him a hier. Alexander Bur, the bishop of Elgin saw this as the weakness and struck hard on this point, anulling his marriage on the grounds of unfaithfulness.

The church, not following Christ's legacy in fighting against poverty, suffering and all those great issues their saviour rallied against, wanted to build a powerbase in the kingdom of Alba. The Wolf unwittingly became the enemy in using his methods of land grabbing with his caterans.

The church, especially the Bishop of Moray forced the Wolf into a corner. Lochindorb s a spectacular place, but isolated. Here the Wolf's resentment grew, and with his wild wykked Heiland men, the caterans, he set off on a rampage, burning Forres to the ground, destroying Pluscarden Abbey and then Elgin, destroying Parish Church of Saint Giles, the Hospital of Maison Dieu, the Monastery of the Greyfriars and Elgin Cathedral and eighteen mansions belonging to the Cathedral’s Canons and Chaplain.

Why is this a Grenzgänger situation and what is the role of the de'il in all of this. To use the modern name, Scotland is not a homogenous nation, the lowlands, closer to England and the church and the north, the last bastion of the picts and gael. The churchs incursion fuelled by greed rather than altruistic motives, the destruction of an exciting culture far superior to the new culture which they wished to introduce.

Elgin Cathedral, the lantern of the north must have been a spectacular building and anyone seeing it then can only have been impressed.Wolf's attack showed the vulnerability, where was their God, to prevent the destruction. The Wolf, not a nice man by any accounts, but he was playing the game everyone else was playing. The targeting of the Wolf by the bishop forced him into a humiliating corner.

If the bishop instead of being interested in procuring wealth, gaining land, playing political games, had been doing his job, tending to his flock, then the conflict would never have arisen. The Wolf was placed in a grenzgänger situation, his options, to back down or to lash out. Like a character in a tragedy, the Wolf's reaction could only be one, to lash out.

And then the legend with the de'il, believe me the de'il is cleverer than one will ever give him credit for. This has nothing to do with him, rather the macchinations of the Bishop of Moray. Bur is solely responsible for the destruction of the lantern of the north.

Black Donald