Skip to 0 minutes and 25 seconds STEVEN REID: Hello, you’re joining me here at the Palace of Holyroodhouse, where Mary Queen of Scots. Spent much of her short and tumultuous personal reign. It’s a great place to welcome you to the life and afterlife of Mary, Queen of Scots, an online course hosted by the University of Glasgow and Future Learn. Mary is arguably the most famous person in Scottish history, and you might think you know her story. A story that is full of marriages, murders, and tragedy.
Skip to 0 minutes and 55 seconds But Mary’s life and reign were far more complex than the well known narrative suggests, and she faced a wide range of unique challenges as queen due to her gender, her religion, and her upbringing in France. Much of her later reputation is built on stories created to justify her removal from the throne in 1567, which in turn were responded to by her defenders and which have led to huge debate ever since. In this course we asked two key questions. Who was the real Mary Queen of? Scots, in her own time? And why has there been such massive and continual interest in her story ever since?
Skip to 1 minute and 33 seconds You’ll hear from a range of leading historians of Mary, of 16th Century Scotland in Europe and of Mary’s cultural history, and we’ll examine a wide range of places, people and objects connected to the Queen of Scots.
Skip to 1 minute and 47 seconds We’ll guide you through this minefield with competing evidence not to give you one set view of Mary. There’s no such thing, but to give you a sense of how subjective the idea of truth is when it comes to the Queen of Scots.