What Alexander Stuart’s Bones Tell Us About Flodden
In the long and often brutal tapestry of Scottish history, few battles are as infamous—or as devastating—as the Battle of Flodden, fought on September 9, 1513. Among the 10,000 Scottish dead was a young nobleman whose life was a swirl of privilege, intellect, and tragedy: Alexander Stuart, the illegitimate son of King James IV, and at just 21 years old, Abbot of Dunfermline, Archbishop of St. Andrews, and Lord Chancellor of Scotland.
Though his title list reads like that of a seasoned power broker, Alexander was barely more than a boy. His untimely death in the mud and chaos of Flodden would have faded into the thousands of other noble losses—if not for a grisly rediscovery in 1820, when builders excavating near the High Altar of St. Andrews Cathedral uncovered a skeleton with a deep sword cut through the skull, almost certainly his.
This blog explores what Alexander Stuart’s bones—and the life they once carried—tell us about the grandeur, the dysfunction, and the human cost of power in early 16th-century Scotland.
The Making of a Teenage Powerhouse
Alexander Stuart was born around 1493, an illegitimate child of King James IV and Marion Boyd, a noblewoman of the Boyd family. Despite the lack of formal legitimacy, Alexander was no back-room secret. He was instead fast-tracked into elite positions of church and state as part of his father’s bold strategy to control both crown and clergy.
By the age of 15, Alexander was already Abbot of Dunfermline, one of the most prestigious abbeys in Scotland. Soon after, he was appointed Archbishop of St. Andrews, the highest ecclesiastical office in the kingdom. These weren’t ceremonial roles—these were real sources of power, influence, and wealth, placed in the hands of a teenager because of his bloodline.
Educated by none other than Desiderius Erasmus, the great European humanist and scholar, Alexander was praised as intelligent, moral, and devout. Erasmus spoke highly of his pupil’s character—no small praise in an age where the church was rife with corruption.
So why did such a promising young man die so young—and so violently?
Flodden: A King’s Gamble and a Nation’s Grief
The Battle of Flodden was fought between Scotland and England, sparked by the complex web of alliances during the War of the League of Cambrai. King James IV invaded England to honor Scotland’s “Auld Alliance” with France. But James was met at Flodden by a cunning English force led by the Earl of Surrey.
Alexander Stuart, despite being an ecclesiastical figure, joined his father in battle, reflecting the medieval fusion of church and war. It was common for high-ranking clerics—especially politically appointed ones—to appear on battlefields not just in robes, but in armor.
The result was catastrophic. King James IV was killed—one of the last reigning monarchs in the British Isles to die in battle—and so was Alexander, along with much of Scotland’s political and religious elite. Their deaths left a gaping void in the country’s leadership, and for years afterward, Scotland reeled from the loss.
The Skull in the Cathedral: Discovery and Clues
In 1820, during works at St. Andrews Cathedral, workers unearthed a grave near the High Altar that contained a skeleton with a sword cut through the cranium. Given the burial site—reserved for high-ranking churchmen—and the recorded death of Alexander Stuart at Flodden, scholars strongly concluded that the remains were his.
The wound was severe: a deep blade strike that had cut through the bone, likely killing him instantly. This wasn’t a glancing blow or a stray arrow—it was personal and brutal, suggesting hand-to-hand combat.
For a man of the cloth—technically a bishop—to die this way reveals a lot about the role of religious leaders in early 16th-century Scotland. The line between churchman and noble warrior was thin, and often nonexistent. Alexander may have gone to war with a cross on his robe, but he died with a blade in his skull.
The bones tell us more than just how he died—they tell us how clergy were weaponized, how sons were sacrificed, and how quickly the loftiest plans of kings could come undone in the churn of war.
The Larger Lesson: When Ambition Kills the Future
Alexander Stuart was no ordinary fatality. His death marked the end of a royal experiment. King James IV had hoped to build a dynasty that blurred the lines between throne and altar. Alexander’s rise was meant to create a spiritual power base loyal to the crown, led by the king’s own blood. But Flodden shattered those ambitions.
The skeleton with the shattered skull is not just a grim artifact; it’s a symbol of overreach, of a system where titles were stacked too high on too young a frame. The Reformation that would begin just a generation later was driven, in part, by these same abuses—of pluralism, nepotism, and power concentrated in too few hands.
What Alexander’s bones ultimately reveal is that Scotland’s future could not be built on the backs of boy-bishops and king-priests. The death of one young man, struck down at 21 in a foreign field, marked not only a family tragedy but the collapse of a vision for royal control over church and state.
Adapted From: Henderson, E. (1879). Annals of Dunfermline, A.D. 1069–1878.
