Day One The Quest For Bannockburn

700 years ago, in June, 1314,

two armies clashed just to the south of Stirling.

It's the sight of Scotland's most famous

and iconic battle against the English - Bannockburn.

What was at stake 700 years ago was this castle.

Whoever captured it on that day would decide the future

of both the Kingdom of Scotland and Britain.

Just down there is a statue of the man who led the Scots to victory.

Against all the odds,

Robert the Bruce fought off the English

in an epic two-day battle, and despite it being

one of the most significant clashes in British history,

still today the precise location of the battlefield remains a mystery.

No-one has ever managed to precisely locate the battlefield,

and that's the quest that we've set ourselves.

And we also want to find out just how Robert the Bruce was able to

secure a victory over an army that wasn't just

twice the size of his own, but also regarded as one of the most

effective fighting forces in the whole of the medieval world.

MEN SHOUT

It was an epic clash.

The spearmen of Bruce's army fighting for independence,

up against the cavalry and archers of Edward II,

intent on suppressing once and for all their unruly northern neighbour.

Oh, that is the best thing ever!

Together with a team of the country's most experienced archaeologists,

we're going to launch the biggest ever search for evidence

of this elusive battle.

Oh, yes.

We'll use the latest technology to help us understand

what the landscape actually looked like seven centuries ago.

Oh, that's great. Stirling's gone.

Look, there's the Bannock Burn coming in.

Sinuously winding its way around, looping.

Really quite insignificant from here,

but up close and personal, it was a killer.

This isn't the first time Tony and I

have searched for the location of the Battle of Bannockburn.

-Look at that.

-TONY LAUGHS

As fledgling archaeologists,

we were approached in 2002 to make the TV series Two Men In A Trench.

And, in one episode, we tried to find the Battle of Bannockburn.

Look at you, you look about 12!

'..clean that rubbish off, we came across this...'

-What's happened to you?

-Yeah, it's hard living, man.

'That's exactly what we were hoping to find.'

Wait till we see you, hang on a minute.

Time stands still for no man, you know.

-Look at your hair! How could you see anything with all that hair?

-I know.

-I'd just left school then. That's my first job.

-That's true!

It was the first time you did any work, anyway!

Right, that's you and me digging.

'As soon as we'd removed the plough soil, we got our first surprise.

-'What are you getting down there?

-'Coal dust.'

And, to be honest, coal dust was pretty much all we found back then.

And we didn't have long to do what we did then, did we?

That was just a couple of weeks before and a couple of weeks there.

Yeah, the whole thing took three weeks - the survey,

excavation, the whole kit and caboodle.

We just scratched the surface.

Tony and I have never lost our passion for digging up the past.

While I went on to present TV shows about it,

Tony became a leading expert in battlefield archaeology.

-Look at young us. Breaks my heart!

-Can't look back.

The only good thing is time's been kind to me.

Which makes us the perfect candidates for

what might well be the biggest challenge of our careers.

2014 is the 700th anniversary of what, to many Scots,

was and remains THE defining moment in their history.

What happened over the two-day battle

still sets the pulse of many a Scot racing.

It was the battle that helped win Scotland's independence.

Even to this day,

rallies are held every year to mark the anniversary of the battle.

Bannockburn is still argued about, still studied,

and constantly reassessed by historians and writers.

It's one of the key conflicts in British history, but despite

its iconic status, no-one knows where the actual site is.

This is the National Trust for Scotland's new Bannockburn Centre,

redeveloped to mark the 700th anniversary of the battle.

-Look at that 3D!

-It's like something out of James Bond.

'Here, visitors are given a bird's-eye view.'

There's the castle. My house must be on here!

'This 3D map, specially constructed for the centre,

'covers 13 square miles of the landscape around Stirling Castle.

'Somewhere down there lies the battle ground.'

So, what do we know? 700 years ago there was a battle.

-We know it was fought somewhere on this map.

-And it took two days.

The problem is finding it, because after 700 years, obviously,

this landscape has changed dramatically.

And you think it still matters to find it?

Does that change how we view the battle?

Very much so, because I think if we're going to understand

the events of the battle and the history of that period,

knowing exactly where it took place is an important stepping stone.

But first thing we need to look at

are the accounts that come from the time.

And how good are the historical accounts?

For the time, they're pretty good

but I think we should limit our expectations.

This isn't like today, where the news is instant.

These are written decades, in most cases, after the battle.

They're not instant eyewitness recollections.

But we've got four main contenders, really.

They're almost like four gospels,

each of which gives a slightly different take on the battle.

The most famous is probably one of the Scottish ones.

This is The Brus by Barbour, and it's an epic poem

which basically glamorises the life of Robert the Bruce.

-It's not all about the battle?

-Not at all,

a small segment tells the story of the battle. But it's very important,

-it's a Scottish perspective on the event.

-Yeah.

This is the Scalacronica.

Now, this is interesting

because this is written from an eyewitness perspective -

Sir Thomas Grey, who fought on the English side

but was captured by the Scots and passes this account down to his son.

-But it's clearly written for a Scottish audience.

-Right.

-So, we can count it really as a Scottish account.

-OK.

And on the English side, we have The Chronicle of Lanercost,

which was set down by the monks of the Abbey of Lanercost

in the North of England.

One of the stories it tells is

of a big set-to between Scotland and England.

The other one on the English side is the tripping-off-the-tongue

-Vita Edwardi Secundi.

-So it's the life of Edward II.

Exactly, it's Edward II's official biography.

So what, if anything, do the chronicles agree on?

Well, for a start, they agree it's a two-day affair, and on day one,

the English arrive within striking distance of the Scots.

'Edward arrived on June 23rd, 1314,

'intent on relieving Stirling Castle,

'in English hands but besieged by Robert the Bruce.'

Stirling lies at the heart of Scotland,

and this medieval map shows the strategic importance of the castle.

It guarded the bridge crossing the River Forth,

and in 1314 was one of the few crossings to the Highlands.

It was the key to the Kingdom of Scotland.

I never get tired of looking at that castle.

That's the best castle in Scotland, that one.

It's the way it stands out on the plain.

That's the whole point.

The English army would have seen it miles back.

'Just north of the castle is the River Forth.'

That's a fantastic view. Look at that.

You've got the river here, and it loops around like a huge intestine,

doesn't it? It's amazing. A major barrier between the Highlands,

-and the Lowlands, and the Central Belt.

-Yeah.

And look at the size of that ground.

You could have caught a battle in lots of places down there.

And the town's expanded outwards.

The footprint of the town is so huge.

And our problem is that it's 700 years ago.

If we were able to find, archaeologically,

evidence for this battle, it would certainly be the oldest

-battle in Britain that's been found archaeologically.

-It is a big ask.

It's a real challenge.

I've been living in Stirling for six or seven years now.

It's always amazing to me that there's such a major battlefield

on my doorstep, and yet no-one, myself included, knows where it is.

Yeah. Only you and I would be foolish enough to try and find out, my friend.

Only you and I don't find what we don't find.

With the panache that we don't find it with!

And south of the castle flows the Bannock Burn.

This long, meandering stream gave the battle its name

and mythical status.

MEN SHOUT

Bannockburn was one of THE great pivotal events

in the shaping of the British Isles.

Bruce's victory helped seal Scotland's future

as an independent kingdom, with a powerful new identity.

But while the battle lasted just a couple of days,

the war for the Kingdom of Scotland had been raging for 18 long years.

Which was why Edward II marched north with an army of over 16,000,

bent on finishing the invasion his father, Edward I, had started.

Son of a nobleman, Robert the Bruce was just 22 years old

when Edward I defeated the Scots and deposed the Scottish King,

John Balliol, in 1296.

As far as Edward was concerned,

there would only ever be one King of Scotland - the King of England.

So he marched to Scone, near Perth,

to remove one of Scotland's most precious symbols of kingship.

Just over the wall from the cemetery

is the original site of the Abbey of Scone.

And it's here, up until the time of Bruce,

that the kings of Scotland were enthroned.

This book's the Scalacronica,

and it describes the times in which Bruce grew up.

'Scott McMaster runs the National Trust for Scotland's

'Battle of Bannockburn Centre,

'and is a specialist in the Scottish Wars of Independence.'

What is the Stone of Destiny?

The Stone of Destiny was a piece of red sandstone

-which previous kings were enthroned upon.

-Yeah.

Of course, what Edward's doing is,

when he's taken this stone away, he's actually making a point.

Scotland is no longer a kingdom, there's no longer a King of Scots,

it's a province which is a subject of Edward I of England.

'And to add insult to injury,

'he jammed the stone firmly

'underneath the English Coronation chair.'

It's a replica, obviously, but it gives some idea.

You've got the stone shoved underneath it there.

What's the idea with that?

Well, this chair was built specifically by Edward I

with one purpose -

that all future monarchs of England are crowned on top of the

Stone of Destiny, and it symbolises that Scotland is subject to England.

But as Edward himself was to discover, it wasn't

as straightforward as sticking a stone underneath a chair.

No, absolutely not.

It takes a lot more than just the removal of a stone to try

and strip away the Scottish kingdom.

Yes, indeed. Very interesting.

There was resistance, of course.

This monument marks the spot where, in 1297,

William Wallace launched his attack

to crush the English at Stirling Bridge and take the castle.

Edward's archers annihilated Wallace's army

at the Battle of Falkirk a year later.

But getting Stirling Castle back from the Scots

was quite another matter.

This was the moment Edward I earned his nickname, Hammer of the Scots.

Stirling Castle seemed impregnable,

but Edward had a secret and terrible weapon.

In his determination to get the castle back,

Edward spared no expense, and ordered a new siege engine,

a monstrous trebuchet, the War Wolf.

It was one of the largest trebuchets ever built,

and its lead weights were transported in 27 wagons.

It was a terror weapon.

It's big up close, isn't it?

So we become the moving parts, do we?

You are. You're going to be our giant hamsters for today.

Oh, no, I don't like the sound of that.

-I'm a bit worried about our armoured tea cosies.

-Yeah, well.

I'm sure I look every bit as good in mine as you do in yours.

Boys, are you ready?

ALL: Born ready!

'War Wolf was capable of hurling 300lb missiles

'to smash through the castle walls.'

-It's quite fast.

-That's right.

It's going at a heck of a speed, surely? How are you doing, Tony?

-I don't know.

-It's horrendous.

'It was also great entertainment.

'Edward even set up a tent

'so the ladies could enjoy watching the siege.'

-TANNOY:

-'The trebuchet is now live and ready to launch.'

-Look at the size of it.

-But this is a baby compared to War Wolf.

Yeah, War Wolf was, I would say, at least twice that size.

Have a care!

Ohh! Ohhh!

Oh, that is the best thing ever!

-DISTANT THUD

-Oh, do that again!

Oh, I love that.

I love that more than anything else I've ever seen in my life!

-That is truly awesome.

-Wow!

That was fantastic. Do that again - all day!

The siege of Stirling took its time, though, as Scalacronica describes.

War Wolf's destruction of Stirling Castle's walls

completed the conquest of Scotland, and in the summer of 1304,

Edward was, at long last, able to return home to England.

This gave Robert the Bruce the chance

to quietly plot to become King of Scotland.

With the death of his father, Robert the Bruce

inherited his family's claim to the Scottish throne.

Bruce faced a stark choice - submission to the English King,

or make a bid to become King of Scotland.

Here, at the Abbey of Cambuskenneth on the banks of the River Forth,

the decision was made for him.

Bruce secretly met with Scotland's leading bishops,

who promised him the Church's backing.

Now, with God on his side, Bruce declared his kingship,

and was hurriedly crowned King of Scots

at Scone Abbey in March, 1306.

Bruce has himself crowned. What's Edward's take on this?

-How does he react?

-Edward is absolutely furious.

If you can imagine him when he hears, gets wind of this,

kicking things over, despite his old age, and really

there's no quarter given to Bruce or any of his supporters.

Three of his brothers are executed.

His daughter and his wife, essentially, are captured.

That's the way Edward deals with it.

If you support Bruce, you've had it, as far as Edward's concerned.

Bruce spent the next year in hiding.

But then, in 1307, his luck changed.

Edward I died on his way to Scotland.

But his son, Edward II, had other plans.

He decided to leave Scotland for another day,

giving Bruce a much-needed breathing space.

Bruce took full advantage,

and set about taking Scotland back, castle by castle.

It was to be a war of attrition counted in years rather than months.

By 1314, the English occupying forces

had been all but driven out of Scotland.

When he captures castles, he reduces them.

When he takes towns, he reduces the walls

so they can't be re-garrisoned, and because without a castle,

you can't collect tax, you can't dispense law.

These are fundamental in the medieval period.

The last major castle that remained under Edward's control was Stirling.

Bruce's men laid siege.

Edward's chronicle tells of the dramatic moment

he receives news that he's about to lose this castle as well.

The constable had agreed to hand over the castle to the Scots

unless an English force arrived to relieve him by 24th June, 1314.

So they come away from Berwick-upon-Tweed on 17th June.

They cross the border on the 17th,

and they're running all the way up, very quickly.

These are just the night stops.

So, it's one night, two nights, three, four,

-five and they're at Falkirk.

-And that's by the 23rd June.

23rd, they're in the vicinity

and we get our first day's contact on the 23rd.

And they've come... There has been a muster of English forces

so there's crossbowmen from Bristol,

there's spearmen from Wales,

they're all up and they've had to bring everything with them.

And it must have been quite a sight.

This thing must have been tailing back for miles.

And, in fact, if we were the English garrison of the castle,

we'd quite clearly see Edward approaching.

Amazing to see that from up here.

If you were up here, you'd be an Englishman surrounded by Scots.

You'd be delighted to see it, obviously.

'Although the contemporary accounts make no mention of it,

'we're confident Edward and his 16,000-strong army must have followed

'the thousand-year-old Roman road from Falkirk to Stirling.

'This was the only logical route of approach for Edward's army,

'given its numbers and size of the baggage train.'

'So, if we follow the course of the Roman road,

'we can find where it crossed the Bannock Burn.

'Then we will be able to work out where Bruce

'made his stand against Edward to block his path to the castle.'

-See the road there? Straight as a die.

-Yes.

Telltale sign of a Roman road.

That would have been Edward's route into Stirling.

-Yeah. And it points pretty much at the castle.

-Yeah.

'Looking from above, it's easy to follow this Roman road.

'But, suddenly, the modern road becomes distinctly wriggly,

'and the straight Roman road just disappears.

'Back in 2002, this is where we found

'the last evidence of the road.'

How many years is that since we excavated that

-for Two Men In A Trench?

-Too long to remember!

This is the Roman road that we were looking for.

The large stones dotted along in that line are all that survives

of the curve that was put in place to hold the whole thing together

and stop the surface going flat as the whole thing slid downhill.

And this, that we've got our feet on, is all that remains

of the surfacing, the actual metalled surface

that vehicles were able to move over.

What always amazes me as well is the fact that

-even by the time Edward was using that road, that was ancient.

-Yeah.

That road had been there since, you know, way before memory.

Problem is, as we know, it disappears, and we don't even know

where it crosses the Bannock Burn closer to Stirling.

Somewhere on the other side of the Bannock Burn,

Bruce would have been waiting.

'At Beechwood Park, in the shadow of Stirling Castle,

'a community dig organised by Stirling Council Archaeology

'is in full swing.'

-What is this?

-That's the bottom of an old wine bottle.

-That could be 200 years old.

-Ohh!

'Led by Murray Cook, the team has made a major discovery.

'They've found another section of the Roman road, north of the Bannock Burn

'and two miles north of where Neil and I excavated back in 2002.'

So, Murray, are you confident that you have the Roman road here?

Very much so. We've got the classic cobbles,

we've also got a series of later medieval resurfacings.

It's got green glazed pottery and an Elizabethan coin. Very exciting.

-It looks like one.

-I have to say, from what I've seen, I agree.

One of the reasons I think you're right is that we've seen this before,

when we first looked way back outside of Stirling

and we found the Roman road there.

It's pretty much the same dimensions, seven or eight metres wide.

It's got a camber, so it's coming up in the middle

which yours definitely is, worn cobbles...

So pretty much mirroring what we had there.

The problem is, obviously, as we came in, it just totally disappeared.

But having found it so close in to the castle is pretty amazing, really.

It's a significant discovery.

What this medieval resurfacing and pottery tell us

is that the Roman road was maintained right up to 1314,

taking Edward's army to the gates of Stirling Castle.

We now have confirmed sites for the road to the north

and south of the Bannock Burn, so the next step is to work out

the precise route between these two locations,

and discover where Edward's forces would have crossed the burn.

'To do this, we're going to use

'a highly accurate model of the landscape.'

-Wow, so this is the LiDAR model of Bannockburn?

-Yep.

'One of my PhD students is reconstructing the route using

'LiDAR imaging, or laser mapping.'

So what we've got here is really a 3D computer model of the landscape?

Yeah, yeah, essentially.

Edward's approaching from the south,

heading towards the castle along the Roman road.

Have you been able to work out where the Roman road

is most likely to cross the Bannock Burn?

-Cos that's a big mystery today in the modern landscape.

-Yeah,

-you can get a general idea of line just by linking those.

-Wow.

And it comes across the Bannock Burn,

it seems to cut just to the north of Milton Bog,

and then goes up into the New Park close by the visitor centre.

So, with the help of LiDAR, we now know the most likely route

of the Roman road, and where it crossed the Bannock Burn.

I suppose a major problem that an army on the move

would deal with at the time is that when you come to waterways,

there's not a lot of bridges around, really.

No, bridges at that time are a major construct, and most of the time

you're going to be finding shallow places to cross, fords like this.

This is what Edward's going to be looking for,

cos he's got to cross the Bannock Burn to get to Bruce.

Yeah, that's it.

So the onus is on him because he's got to get to the castle.

Horses and men are one thing

because, you know, maybe they can swim, but it's the kit.

It's all that equipment.

Whatever food supplies, and weaponry...

It's the whole moving city that goes with the medieval army,

that you've got to get across places like this

with the enemy on the other side of it.

So, you don't know what's going to happen

as you're weakened as you cross it.

On the north side of the Bannock Burn, Bruce was waiting for them.

This statue of Bruce stands on top of Monument Hill.

-The monument's come on well, all polished up.

-Yeah.

'With views commanding the castle, the Bannock Burn

'and the Roman road, this is the spot

'where the Scottish King made his stand.

'Over the centuries,

'it's been a place of pilgrimage for thousands of visitors.'

There's the new visitor centre.

Probably the one and only time we'll get to see it from above.

I guess so.

So far, the evidence suggests the monument is in the right place.

But to date,

no archaeological evidence has been found of this first encounter.

The question is, can we?

We've enlisted some local people from Stirling to help with the digging.

Digging is already under way in the search for clues

as to the site of the Battle of Bannockburn...

'Derek Alexander, head of archaeology for

'the National Trust for Scotland, is leading the dig.'

-Hello, Derek. You've got a lot of bodies here, Derek.

-Hello, everyone.

This is our volunteer army.

Got anything? Tell us about it.

So far, a lot of the things we've found

have been old bricks from the 17th, 18th century.

-So, farming?

-Farming.

-Over the years, has anything of note been found here?

-Not on this bit.

I suppose, whether or not we find anything archaeologically,

you've only got to look at where we are in relation to

the rest of the landscape to see that this would surely have been

a place where there would have been a presence.

It would have been reprehensible had they not kept

an eye on the road that leads to the castle.

So whether or not we find anything

is not going to say that this site has no relevance. This site will always be relevant.

'Bruce's camp was nearby,

'and to get an idea of what his army would have looked like in 1314,

'we invited along a local medieval re-enactment group called Clanranald.

'Led by Charlie Allan, Clanranald have amassed

'an impressive collection of weapons and kit to help give us a glimpse

'of what might have been left behind on the battlefield.'

-Hiya, Charlie.

-Hello.

-Did you bring all of your hardware or just some of it?

-Just some of it.

I'm assuming that this kind of gear is expensive?

The rank and file, would they have swords?

Would the ordinary fighting men have them?

Not every man would have had swords.

I mean, you have axes, working tools...

What about what the men are wearing? I mean, there's chain mail.

Surely that's a luxury item as well, worn by the few?

Yep, definitely. I mean, these things were handmade.

Cos this is just the sort of thing we might find,

individual or just a few of these,

-that have been smashed up and left on the battlefield.

-Yeah.

The problem we've always got is that

if anything is left behind on a battlefield

that's in any way serviceable,

-it's going to be collected within minutes.

-Absolutely.

Even broken weaponry.

I mean, the metal itself is a valuable commodity.

Well, you've got a forge there, you could melt it down again.

We're looking for stuff that's genuinely gone out of sight,

it's gone into a river or it's been trampled into the mud.

-If it's visible and it's metal, somebody's going to take it away on the day.

-Aye.

Back at the excavation, the team are digging several trenches...

..metal detecting...

..and using geophysics to cover as much of Monument Hill as possible.

And there is plenty of archaeological evidence

to show that this was a busy place through the centuries.

There are one or two nice little pieces.

This, for instance,

is a cartwheel penny from 1797.

Inasmuch as we were worried

that nothing much would survive beyond the 1960s,

the fact that there's an 18th-century coin...

Yeah, I think it shows promise,

because it shows that the ground we're working

isn't entirely imported later when they're building the monument.

And the other thing is, I think it tells part of the story,

because this is material that may have been lost

-by tourists coming up to visit in the late 18th century.

-Yes.

And it's quite nice to think that people were visiting that early on.

Now, talking of stuff surviving,

take a look at this.

-This is probably today's little gem.

-Lovely.

That is bona fide medieval. I think they call it white gritty ware.

-That is...

-For obvious reasons.

..probably of the period, it's 14th century, 1300s.

That could be camp debris, that could be from Bruce's men.

That's great, isn't it?

The base of a bowl of some sort, maybe a cooking vessel.

Which, of course, they would be carrying around with them.

And let's not forget, the Scots are here for days,

-if not weeks, before the battle.

-Yeah, they're not just fighting,

they're living and eating and drinking.

The contemporary accounts

all describe that on the eve of the battle

Bruce camped in a wooded area

known as the New Park.

Robert the Bruce is recorded as using it as cover

to hide from the advancing English.

What do you think is really meant by the term New Park?

-What is that?

-Well, it's hunting, isn't it?

Because you've got the King's castle back there -

around it he would have land where he could go out on horseback

and hunt his deer and, I suppose, not just for sport...

What would it look like? I mean, what... Is it trees...?

It's going to be trees, isn't it? It's got to be.

You've got... Cos that's theoretically what happened here.

You've got Robert the Bruce in the New Park, in the trees,

shielding himself from the English cavalry coming in that direction.

So, it's got to be a wood of some sort, that's how I see it in my mind's eye.

That's the big fascination I have about this kind of thing,

because you take this layout for granted

and then you have to, in your mind's eye, clear it,

and allow for something that looks utterly different.

Alongside the archaeology, another team is conducting

an environmental science research project.

Led by Professor Richard Tipping,

they are hoping to give us

a better understanding of the landscape

as Robert the Bruce would have seen it,

and they've uncovered something surprising.

How do you think we should be envisaging the landscape at the time?

Well, fundamentally different to the way it looks now.

There's probably more woodland now

-than there was in 1314.

-Really?

-A lot of this is...

-19th-century, even 20th-century planting.

-Yeah.

It's hard to think that there were trees enough

for Bruce's men to hide behind.

I have to say, to my mind, that's quite a revolutionary statement,

because the image we have is a kind of Robin Hood scenario,

with the Scottish army kind of concealed, weighing up its chances.

But what you're saying is

that if Robert the Bruce's army is on this hill,

it's out there in open sight, in plain sight of the English,

and that may be a full statement of intent

-on the part of Robert the Bruce.

-Yes.

This is a very sensible place to put your army,

because you are on the route of Edward's army

as they advance towards Stirling.

That's amazing. I have to say I'm really surprised to hear this,

this is incredible stuff.

To Bruce, Monument Hill made perfect sense.

It gave him the high ground

and clear views of Edward's approaching army.

So Bruce, when he's up on this hill,

is on higher ground than the road,

-he's covering it quite nicely.

-Yeah.

-It makes sense.

And the other thing is we haven't found evidence for trees,

-we haven't found...

-There's no root holes.

Or anything that you would relate to a forest.

So what Richard Tipping says

about this place being fairly free of trees

is backed up with the archaeology.

So, again, in your mind's eye

you've got to get rid of all this clutter,

and just have it as an open hilltop.

I have to say, that tree thing

is probably the thing that's surprised me the most.

That's integral to the traditional story

of what Robert the Bruce is doing here on that first day

and the days prior to that.

Whatever he was doing, he wasn't hiding in the trees. Yeah.

But we've got plenty of ground to cover,

-there's a big job still ahead of us.

-Yes. Oh, yeah.

-Right, let's go and help with the backfilling.

-On you go.

TONY LAUGHS

Standing on this hill,

Bruce would have seen the English army arriving in its full splendour.

They were a far superior fighting force.

There were at least 14,000 English infantry and archers,

while the Scots footmen were only half that number.

But the main threat for the Scottish army was Edward's cavalry -

2,000 English knights on their much-feared warhorses.

So, what WAS Bruce's strategy?

Facing an army that size,

he had to exploit every advantage he could

by using the natural landscape to block the English.

To help us understand how Bruce achieved that,

the National Trust for Scotland have used Richard Tipping's research,

combined with the LiDAR data set,

to create an historically accurate map of Stirling's landscape

700 years ago.

Oh, that's great, isn't it?

-Time machine.

-Stirling's gone.

Right, we're back in 1314.

It's the landscape that catches your eye

rather than the built-up area.

Yeah, exactly. That's what we need to look at.

So, that's the line of approach then, that's the Roman road.

That's it, coming from the south.

Straight towards the castle, which is the English target.

And the English army can see the Scots.

Yeah. That's the thing,

they're up on this ground here, which is a high rise.

So Robert Bruce can see the English approaching

from a good distance away.

So the English have options there -

they either go left or right, around the Scots.

Should they go to the left,

which would force them into boggy ground

and then some conspicuously high ground,

or should they go right,

which would take them down onto possibly more boggy ground?

So, the favoured option, clearly,

is to break on straight through,

but that's where the trouble lies, cos the Scots are in the way.

Bruce was determined to force Edward's army onto difficult ground.

And as the contemporary accounts tell us,

he had several tricks up his sleeve to make sure he did.

As Barbour describes...

'These treacherous medieval minefields

'could stop cavalry dead in their tracks,

'as the volunteers

'from the local medieval re-enactment group Clanranald

'are about to show me.'

It's such a simple, low-tech way to break up horsemen, isn't it?

-Aye.

-The most feared weapon in medieval Europe, the heavy horse.

You dig some three-foot-deep holes and they can't deploy. Brilliant.

-Should be deep enough to just snap one of the legs.

-Yeah.

And when you've got a few rows like this, staggered,

they couldn't really jump them either.

As well as breaking up the heavy horse,

even infantry couldn't advance, in formation,

over ground that's been prepared like this.

Not at any great speed anyway.

It's so simple. How long do think you would take...to complete one?

In this ground? Half an hour.

-Half an hour.

-Yeah. Easy.

-And you'd put the effort in

-if you knew it would save your life the following day!

-Oh, yeah!

Although it's hard labour just the same.

-Rather you than me.

-THEY LAUGH

Now, remember, they only work by the hundreds,

so I need another 250...

by the end of the day. Best of luck.

So where did Bruce plant this medieval minefield?

It's probably easiest if I draw a rough map.

Now, if you imagine that's the river, Bannock Burn,

and it's crossed at some point by the Roman road.

The English heavy horse and the rest of them

are moving in this direction.

They cross the river at that available point.

Just beyond the water,

the Bruce had ordered his men

to dig the pits either side of the road...

..which meant that as soon as they came out of the water,

the heavy horse,

the riders realised they couldn't fan out into a front.

Instead, they were kept hemmed in

and could only proceed in that direction

in a group just a couple of horses wide,

and that configuration would leave them vulnerable to attack.

There's no doubt that the pits posed a fearsome threat.

One contemporary chronicle had them as "a contrivance full of evils

"formed for the feet of horses

"so they may not pass without disasters."

And the pits were even more evil when combined with these.

-Schiltron!

-ALL:

-Huh!

Bruce had trained his men well.

How many pikes are lying over there?

'Charlie Allan has made a study of the Scots' tactics.

'Using real weapons, he trains his Clanranald combat team

'in the same way Robert the Bruce would have done,

'to work in a tight fighting unit.'

These guys are clearly used to fighting in various forms.

So they could almost be like a medieval army

that fights every now and again

and then comes back together for another war.

Absolutely. When you get a group of guys into that mindset,

working as a team together,

with all one cause in common,

that's to get the job done and get the job done properly...

-Which is exactly what Robert Bruce would have to do.

-Yeah.

To pull those men together

up against a formidable force, like the English had on that day,

to get those guys to put their head in the lion's mouth, so to speak,

you know, he must have had great respect from his men.

-You know, and that goes two ways.

-He for them.

-Yeah.

MEN CHANT

One of the techniques in which the Scots worked together

was schiltrons.

These medieval hedgehogs

were large groups of tightly packed men armed with spears.

They formed a sort of tank,

impenetrable by cavalry.

The Vita Edwardi Secundi, the Life Of Edward II,

describes the schiltrons in detail.

Charlie, how does this here schiltron work?

Come here and I'll show you.

-You need one of these.

-OK.

-Pike.

-That is quite a substantial piece of wood.

-It is, yeah.

Obviously there's a particular way to hold it.

If you were front-line,

-obviously you'd wedge that pointed end into the ground.

-OK.

Your left foot against it, side-on,

and then kneel down in a comfortable position,

try not to stretch your knee too far.

-OK...

-That's it. And that way you've kind of got the control now.

Any horse that came on top of that would just impale itself.

The whole point of the schiltron was to keep everybody tight together.

So you were basically creating a spiky fence,

so that nobody could penetrate that.

-Arms up!

-MEN:

-Huh!

Schiltron!

-MEN:

-Huh!

That's not as easy as it looks.

No, it's not.

Do that again.

Schiltron!

-MEN:

-Huh!

By the end of the day we'll have you snappy.

Looks very cool, though.

Well, your front line's your main defence.

Its sole purpose is to stop the cavalry getting in.

So the front line would go down on their knees first.

You can see I'm having to move back already.

Now, looking at that on its own, you would probably think,

"Well, I could smash my way through that and step in

"and thrust in with a sword."

But what you've got is your secondary protection...

over the top.

So now you see that even gives YOU a bit of defence.

I've got a roof now.

I feel safer.

OK, and then your third line coming in over the top,

standing in between the people in front of them.

So you've got this massive hedge.

At this point, there's absolutely nowhere I can go.

By the time you get in so far, past this one,

you've got this, you know, head-height.

These are razor-sharp. There's just no way.

-That is formidable.

-For as long as there's numbers behind,

the wall will always remain the same.

You'd need to be Superman to get through that.

Of course, Edward had no idea what preparations Bruce had made.

To get a better understanding of what happened next...

..we're about to conduct a unique archaeological experiment,

using stuntmen, horses,

a small army of battle re-enactors,

and state-of-the-art special effects.

We're going to try to piece together

what happened when the English and Scottish forces finally clashed

on the first day of the battle.

Welcome to our medieval battlefield.

It's actually the River Endrick near Drymen,

but it bears a striking resemblance

to what Bannock Burn would have looked like in 1314.

It's wider than the Bannock Burn and much sandier,

but for the purposes of this experiment, it's going to be ideal.

The English army arrived late in the afternoon of June 23rd.

At this point, Edward and his commanders

confidently assumed that their vast and powerful army

would effortlessly wipe out the Scots,

whose forces were half its size.

And this arrogance is demonstrated

when the English knights first encountered the Scots.

A vanguard of English cavalry started to cross the Bannock Burn.

At their head was a young knight,

Sir Henry de Bohun.

According to Barbour, he spotted the Bruce addressing his troops

and decided to challenge the King of Scots.

De Bohun's horse is clearly much bigger than Robert the Bruce's.

Yeah, de Bohun would be riding a destrier, a warhorse.

He's a young knight who's trying to make a good name for himself,

this is his opportunity here.

If he gets Bruce, who's lightly armed, only with a small battle-axe,

then it's game over,

and it'll send a shock wave throughout the Scots.

It's worth a chance, isn't it?

And...action!

-He's off.

-Oh, wow.

Scene one, de Bohun's attack on Bruce.

This is how Barbour describes it in the Scottish version.

"The vanguard rode in good array, without stopping,

"straight to the Park.

"And when the Bruce knew they were come so near in full order of battle

"he set his men in array.

"The gallant Sir Henry de Bohun knew the King

"by reason of the crown on his basinet."

MEN SHOUT

"When the Bruce saw him come on so openly before all his comrades,

"he turned his horse towards him.

"The Bruce, with his keen, strong axe,

"dealt him such a mighty blow

"as neither hat nor helmet could withstand.

"The axe handle shivered in two

"and de Bohun crashed, helpless, to the earth."

It's a rather graphic account, but the chronicles don't entirely agree.

What do the sources say exactly happened?

Well, Barbour records it very well.

And Barbour writes that the Bruce, during the incident,

cleaved de Bohun's head in two.

"He cleaves his head in twain but breaks his axe." However...

the Vita Edwardi Secundi, The Life Of Edward II,

sort of reports it in a different way altogether.

And it basically reports that de Bohun was moving forward

with some of his men, spots the Bruce

and then tries to make it back to his companions.

And Bruce rides after him and strikes him dead.

-So...

-That's the English version.

-That's the English version.

-The Brus version is the hero's version.

-Yeah.

And that's really what the book's about,

being elevated to heroic status.

Is it possible that the Bruce

was able to inflict the kind of damage

that's described in Barbour?

-You know, split his head in two.

-I think...

Well, in some accounts, he basically splits the head in two from the...

right through the skull to the chest bone.

Now, I don't know if that is possible. We'd have to...

I think what we need to do is a little experiment

and I know the man we need for that job.

I think we all do.

Charlie.

-Steady on, lad.

-It's a man with an axe!

Charlie, what do you think is the most likely way in which

that scene played out in real life, between the Bruce and de Bohun?

Well, personally, you risk glancing off armour

or any kind of helmet with an edged blade.

My choice would have been, you know, the pick

because, even if I hit the armour, it's going to go through it.

If I miss the armour and hit him anywhere on the body,

it's going to go through it.

Right, Charlie, hit it with the blade of the axe first, see what that does.

HE YELLS

You've split it.

It's certainly going to have done some damage to him,

but not killed him outright or split his skull wide open,

-that's for sure.

-Yeah, nothing like that account of the skull opening,

-the helmet opening right down to his...

-To the chest bone.

-..chest.

Try it with the point this time, Charlie.

HE YELLS ALL: Oh!

HE YELLS ALL: OH!

Bull's-eye!

-Wow.

-He's a goner, he's dead.

-He is a goner.

-And it's turned his head through 180 degrees.

Which doesn't help!

-Well...

-There you go.

-Poor old de Bohun, eh?

Whatever the manner of the slaying,

Robert the Bruce had made himself the leader of legend.

De Bohun's killed by the Bruce.

What impact does that English knight's death have on both sides?

It has two big impacts, to be honest, two main impacts.

For the Scottish foot soldiers, for the infantry,

it's a huge morale boost.

They've just seen their King basically take out a leading knight

from the English army in a spectacular fashion.

It sends a shock wave through to the English ranks, as well,

because they've seen a young knight

basically being killed very effectively with a small axe.

So there's a boost to morale for them,

and to the English, they go, "Hang on -

"what exactly have we got here?

-"This is not the guerrilla fighter, he can handle himself."

-Yeah.

So, after that instant shock on both sides, what...

How does it unfold after that?

Well, the second element, of course, was de Bohun is slain

but then Hereford and Gloucester lead the attack

upon the Scots schiltron and are basically repulsed backwards.

-So pretty disastrous, all in, for the English on day one?

-Absolutely.

-Let's see how that unfolds.

-OK.

Stand by, schiltron!

And...action!

Scene two, the English cavalry charge.

In anger, the English cavalry charge the schiltrons.

It's an impetuous move, fuelled by rage over de Bohun's killing.

Barbour describes Bruce encouraging his men to stick to the plan.

As long as they stayed together,

the schiltrons would stand firm against the English cavalry.

THEY SHOUT

HOOVES THUNDER

"Be not dismayed because of their din

"but set your spears before you

"and keep all back-to-back, with the spear points out."

THEY SHOUT

The combination of schiltrons and pits proved so impenetrable

that the English, in frustration, hurled their weapons at the Scots.

"Many spears, darts, knives and weapons of all sorts

"were cast among the Scots, but they defended themselves so skilfully

"that the English were filled with wonder."

THEY SHOUT

From the outset, Bruce knew he would be outnumbered

and that the English cavalry posed the greatest threat.

But Bruce chose his position well,

and cleverly used the natural landscape

to stop Edward's army in its tracks.

By digging a honeycomb of pits,

and forming his men into well-drilled schiltrons,

he saw off the English cavalry charge.

So far, we've not found any evidence of the battle on Monument Hill

and that backs up what the contemporary accounts tell us.

The only thing that happened on day one was a skirmish.

With the light fading, Edward decided to have one more go

at the Scots by trying to outflank the Bruce.

As we get to the end of the first day,

the English vanguard have another crack

and they send a unit under Clifford and Beaumont off the high ground,

-onto the flat ground of the carse...

-..to try and outflank the Scots.

Exactly. And there's another encounter somewhere around here,

and the English come off worse again,

but what that move allows them to do is to reconnoitre the ground

so they know that they can get off there, onto that lower ground.

So, by the evening

the entire English army is moving onto the carse.

And imagine trying to get 20,000 men

across that burn onto the other side -

-it's probably going to take them most of the night.

-Yeah.

And they end up spending the night, probably fairly uncomfortably,

in this area here, between the Bannock Burn and the Pelstream.

Unable to proceed north or west to the castle,

Edward II was forced to lead his men down onto a huge plain to the east -

the carse, bounded by the river Bannock Burn and the Pelstream.

'So we find ourselves on the edge of the carse.

'On Midsummer's Eve, 1314,

'the English camped here, waiting for the next day's battle.

'No-one has found any evidence of where it was fought,

'and that's our next challenge.'

Do you think the English had to suffer midges?

I think everybody for the last 100,000 years

-in this part of the world's suffered midges.

-Unbelievable.

Not a comfortable place to be camping, really, is it?

Cos if this WAS the evening after the first day,

-they've had a really bad day.

-Uh-huh.

They've lost twice, two actions, pushed off the high ground,

down here onto the carse.

I would imagine our equivalents, stood around fires like this,

would be fairly disgruntled by now.

"What the hell are we doing here? This wasn't supposed to happen."

Enough of them, though. You know what worries me?

Look at the size of this place.

The carse is massive,

and our problem is that, somewhere in here,

-we've got to find that battlefield.

-Yeah.

We're going to have to be really careful about what we do,

about where we look, because we don't have for ever to do that.

-No, we just have the midges.

-Millions.

'Next time on The Quest For Bannockburn...

'..we recruit an army of volunteers to search for the site

'where these two mighty armies clashed.

'We investigate the Bannock Burn itself.'

In all the years of talking about Bannock Burn, I've never been on it.

I'm off!

'We discover how Bruce's spearmen won the battle...'

Yeah, that's our team, look. All the way along the Bannock Burn.

'..and at last, the carse reveals some of its treasures.'

What have we here? Ooh!

That's superb.