The Declaration of Arbroath, the Newbattle Assembly and the Community of the Realm

This article reassesses Archie Duncan’s seminal reconstruction of the events surrounding the writing of the Declaration of Arbroath and argues that the letter’s date of 6 April 1320 represents the day on which a major political assembly at Newbattle abbey agreed the document’s wording. This event was a continuation of an important royal gathering held around Easter. Abbot Bernard, the chancellor, probably spent the rest of April in Berwick, before returning to his home abbey of Arbroath in May, when he completed business enacted at Newbattle, including the letters to the pope. There is a good chance that the three-week royal assembly at Newbattle was a parliament. This article discusses attendance at this potential parliament. While most sealers of the Declaration were probably present, the number of earls was probably inflated for political reasons. This was vital to the letter’s argument, which implied that there was little point in the pope opposing Robert’s claim to kingship, since the community of the realm, led by the earls, would merely replace him with another figure. Thus events in the spring of 1320 reflect both the hard-nosed power for which the Bruce party was known, as well as an organic action by a large portion of the political community in an attempt to create a framework for Scottish independence.