Dumbarton Castle (, ; ) has the longest recorded history of any stronghold in Scotland. It sits on a volcanic plug of basalt known as Dumbarton Rock which is high and overlooks the Scottish town of Dumbarton.
History Dumbarton Rock was formed between 330 and 340 million years ago, during the Early Carboniferous period, a time of widespread volcanic activity in the area where Glasgow is now situated; over time, the softer exterior of the volcano weathered away, leaving behind a volcanic plug of basalt.
Iron Age At least as far back as the Iron Age, this has been the site of a strategically important settlement, as evidenced by archaeological finds.
The people that came to reside there in the era of Roman Britain were known to have traded with the Romans. However the first written record about a settlement there was in a letter that Saint Patrick wrote to King Ceretic of Alt Clut in the late 5th century.
Early Medieval era David Nash Ford has proposed that Dumbarton was the Cair Brithon ('Fort of the Britons') listed by Nennius among the 28 cities of Sub-Roman Britain. From the 5th century until the 9th, the castle was the centre of the independent Brythonic Kingdom of Strathclyde. Alt Clut or Alcluith (, , 'Rock of the Clyde'), the Brythonic name for Dumbarton Rock, became a metonym for the kingdom. The king of Dumbarton in about AD 570 was Riderch Hael, who features in Welsh and Latin works.
Merlin was said to have stayed at Alt Clut. The medieval Scalacronica of Sir Thomas Grey recorded the legend that says that "Arthur left Hoël of Brittany his nephew sick at Alcluit in Scotland."Leland, John, Collectanea, vol.1 part 2 (1770), p.510. John Leland's note of the Scalachronica: Sir Thomas Grey of Heton, Scalachronica, Edinburgh, (1836), p.318, French: "et lessa Hoel son neuew de la Peteit Bretaigne a Alclud en Escoz maladez." Hoël made a full recovery, but was besieged in the castle by the Scots and Picts. The story first appeared in Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia Regum Britanniae.Schultz Albert, ed., Historia Regum Britanniae (1854), pp.125-6 Amongst lists of three things, in the triads of the Red Book of Hergest, the third "Unrestrained Ravaging" was Aeddan Fradog (the Wily, perhaps Áedán mac Gabráin), coming to the court of Rhydderch the Generous at Alclud, who left neither food nor drink nor beast alive. This battle also appears in stories of Myrddin Wyllt, the Merlin of Geoffrey of Monmouth's Vita Merlini, perhaps conflated with the battle of Arfderydd, located as Arthuret by some authors.Ritson, J., Annals of the Caledonians, Picts, and Scots; and of Strathclyde, Cumberland, Galloway and Murray, (1828), pp.164-5, quoting Humphrey Llwyd
In 756, the first (and second) losses of Dumbarton Rock were recorded. A joint force of Picts and Northumbrians captured the fortress after a siege, only to lose it again a few days later. By 870, it was home to a tightly packed British settlement, which served as a fortress and as the capital of Alt Clut. In 871, the Irish-based Viking kings Amlaíb Conung and Ímar laid siege to Dumbarton Rock. The fortress fell in four months, after its water supply failed. The kings are recorded to have returned to Ireland with 200 ships and a host of British, English, and Pictish captives. These prisoners may have included the ruling family of Alt Clut including the king Arthgal ap Dyfnwal, who was slain the following year under uncertain circumstances. Following the Viking destruction of the fortress, Dumbarton Rock does not appear on record again until the 13th century, and the capital of the restructured Kingdom of Strathclyde appears to have relocated up the Clyde to the vicinity of Partick and Govan.
Medieval era
In medieval Scotland, Dumbarton (Dùn Breatainn, which means "the fortress of the Britons") was an important royal castle. It is believed to be the place Sir John Menteith took William Wallace on the way to London after Wallace's capture.
The Governor of the castle in 1333, Malcolm Fleming of Fulwood, had earlier served as tutor to the young David II. He sheltered the king and his young wife, Joan of The Tower after the Scottish defeat at Halidon Hill on 19 July. He later safely conveyed the royal couple to greater safety in France, attended by his daughter Evota Fleming, as Maid of Honour. The king and queen remained in France for eight years, but Malcolm Fleming returned to Dumbarton and continued to hold it safely against an English siege. In doing so he also protected the 17-year-old Robert the Steward (later King Robert II). For these services David II created Fleming the First Earl of Wigtown (the first new Scottish earldom created in more than a century).
Wigtown was still Governor in 1361 when the Black Death again swept into Scotland and a third of the castle's garrison died. Following his own death a year later he was succeeded as Sheriff of Dunbartonshire and Governor of Dumbarton Castle by his nephew, Malcolm Fleming of Biggar.
In 1425 the castle was attacked by James Mor Stewart ("James the Fat"), youngest son of Murdoch Stewart, Duke of Albany, who had been imprisoned by King James I of Scotland on charges of treason. James the Fat became a rallying point for enemies of the King, and raised a rebellion against the crown. He marched on the town of Dumbarton and burned it, but was unable to take the castle, whose defender Sir John Colquhoun successfully held out against James' men.McAndrew, Bruce A., p.5, Scotland's Historic Heraldry Retrieved November 2010Campbell, Alastair, p. 113, A History of Clan Campbell, Volume 2 Retrieved November 2010 He was rewarded by the king, James I of Scotland, with the governorship of the royal castle, which he held until his death in 1439.
James IV and Dumbarton The former supporters of James III under the leadership of John Stewart, 1st Earl of Lennox met up at Dumbarton Castle in October 1489. They had hoped to gain the support of Henry VII of England. James IV defeated them in a battle between the Touch and Menteith hills near Stirling on 11 and 12 October.N. MacDougall, James IV, (Tuckwell, East Linton, 1997), 172–73 James IV used Dumbarton as the west coast base for his navy and campaigns to subdue the Western Isles. James was at Dumbarton with the Chancellor of Scotland, Colin Campbell, 1st Earl of Argyll, in November 1489. He had the use of a ship belonging to the Laird of Luss. In the following February a royal ship was 'chaysit' by the English and lost some of her cables. In 1494 a row barge was built at Dumbarton for the king using timber from Loch Lomond.
In March 1495 James IV was provided with a camp bed for use at sea and a boat carried cannon to Dumbarton. Patrick Hepburn, 1st Earl of Bothwell, was made Captain of the castle on 1 April 1495. A man played on the clarschaw, a Gaelic harp, for the King. In 1503, on the day after his wedding to Margaret Tudor, James gave the castle to his new queen.Porter, Linda (2024), The Thistle and the Rose: The Extraordinary Life of Margaret Tudor, Head of Zeus, London, p. 107, In 1505 Dumbarton was the King's base for visiting the Western Isles. One ship's mast was made from timber from Drymen. On 5 June James was entertained by a French "" (whistler), perhaps playing a recorder and on 8 June James played cards with John Murray and Master Robert Cockburn losing £4 and 10 shillings, and later that day attended Evensong in the Parish kirk and College of Dumbarton. In 1505 John Ramsay built a ship for the King called the Columb (Saint Columba being the father of Christianity in Scotland). In December 1505 a sword that had belonged to William Wallace was repaired.John Irving, Dumbarton Castle: its Place in the General History of Scotland (Bennett & Thomson Dumbarton 1917), pp. 21–24, quoting the Accounts of the Lord High Treasurer of Scotland.
Regent Albany, James V and the circumnavigation of Scotland On 18 May 1515 the James or the Margaret with six other ships brought John Stewart, Regent Albany to Dumbarton. These royal ships were repaired at Dumbarton in July and new docks were made for them. John Drummond of Milnab brought fourteen of their guns to Glasgow.Accounts of the Treasurer of Scotland, vol. 5 (Edinburgh, 1903), pp. xxxii-xxxiii. In September Regent Albany held court at Dumbarton, and received Thomas Benolt, the English Clarenceux King of Arms. The Carrick Herald and Clarenceux were sent to Lord Maxwell.Accounts of the Treasurer of Scotland, vol. 5 (Edinburgh 1903), pp. 223–224. In March 1516 Albany issued six letters of remission (forgiveness) to those who had held the castle for Lennox against the king in 1489.Register of the Privy Seal, vol. 1 (Edinburgh, 1908) pp. 419-420. Regent Albany sailed from Dumbarton to France on 31 May 1524.Ken Emond, The Minority of James V (John Donald, 2019), p. 187: Henry Ellis, Original Letters, Series 1 vol. 1 (London, 1824), p. 245.
In 1526 John Stewart, 3rd Earl of Lennox fortified Dumbarton against the Douglas faction who had control of the young James V, but his forces were defeated by Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of Angus at the battle of Linlithgow Bridge. James Hamilton of Finnart, who was implicated in the death of the Earl of Lennox, was given custody of the castle till 1531.J. Irving, Dumbarton Castle (1917), pp. 29-30. Later in his personal reign James V used the castle as a prison for those convicted at the justice ayre, receiving their fines and composition payments in 1539.Accounts of the Treasurer of Scotland, vol. 7 (Edinburgh, 1907), p. 282. In 1540 James circumnavigated Scotland from the Forth and arrived at Dumbarton with Cardinal Beaton, the Earl of Huntly, and the Earl of Arran each leading a force of five hundred men. This expedition was later published by Nicolas de Nicolay Seigneur d'Arfeville, cosmographer to the King of France in 1583, with the first modern map of Scotland's coastline.J. Irving, Dumbarton Castle (1917), p. 30: Nicolas D'Arfeville's map at the National Library of Scotland.
Lennox and Mary, Queen of Scots Matthew, Earl of Lennox had been an ally of the French party in Scotland led by Mary of Guise but committed himself to the pro-English faction. In 1544 munitions and ten thousand French crowns of the sun arrived with Jacques de la Brosse at Dumbarton's harbour and were secured by Lennox and the Earl of Glencairn. Lennox then went into England, leaving the castle in the keeping of William Stirling of Glorat. Lennox signed a deal with Henry VIII of England offering Dumbarton Castle and the Isle of Bute in return for land in England and marriage to Henry's niece Margaret Douglas, and the future Governorship of Scotland if circumstances permitted. Lennox undertook to prevent the infant queen Mary being taken from Scotland. However, George Stirling of Glorat, unhappy at this policy, prevented Lennox returning into the castle and he was forced to sail to Ireland. George Stirling declared that he would hold the castle in the name of the young queen only. The Privy Council of Scotland agreed to George Stirling's plan. Despite this, more French troops landed at Dumbarton under the leadership of Gabriel de Montgomery, the soldier who later killed Henry II of France at a joust in 1559.J. Irving, Dumbarton Castle (1917), pp. 31-34.