Many centuries ago, much of Scotland was a law unto itself...
..beyond the reach of any king.
Here, it's not the king who's the lawgiver, it's the clan chiefs.
Like Mafia godfathers, they control the people, wield the power.
They lead armies,
scheme, slaughter...
..in a violent struggle for dominance.
It's clan against clan.
Blood will be spilt.
But it's not just gang warfare.
Mary, you forget yourself... Thinking you can talk to me...
Forget myself?! You are just a woman!
The clans will shape the fate of a nation.
Rebels and rogues will become heroes,
freedom fighters, even kingmakers...
Raibeart! CROWD: Ar righ!
..and breakers.
There's going to be no happy ending.
Ma'am, it is with great regret that I have here in my hands your death warrant,
signed by the Sovereign, Elizabeth I.
For 18 long years, Mary Stewart, Queen of Scots,
has been a prisoner in England.
Now she's been found guilty of plotting to kill the English Queen.
You'll be taken from here to a point of execution,
where your head will be removed from your body.
In a few hours, Mary will face the axeman's blade.
I thank you for your welcome news.
You do me great good
in withdrawing me from the world...
..out of which I am very glad to go.
I am of no use to anyone.
Anyone.
"I am of no good and of no use to anyone."
No truer words has Mary ever spoken.
A Catholic Queen of Scots is of no good
and of no use to an English Protestant kingdom.
But it's not the English who should take the blame for her tragic fate.
It's Scotland's clan chiefs who conspired to bring Mary down.
Their greed, their jealousy,
their murderous feuding
have led to this bleak February morning.
And now the hour has come for Mary, Queen of Scots.
How different everything looked 25 years earlier.
Leith. 1561.
A small crowd gathers at the shore.
Mary was just five when she was sent to France
to keep her from the clutches of the English King,
but now Mary Stewart, Queen of Scots was back.
Mary has been absent from Scotland for so long
she no longer considers the place home.
Her heart might be Scottish but her head was decidedly French.
The young Queen knows nothing of the way things are done in Scotland.
But family is everything,
and here to greet Mary is her older brother,
Lord James Stewart, Chief Advisor.
Outwardly, James is all smiles.
Like the crowd, he seems delighted by the return of his little sister.
Privately, he's full of mixed emotions, none of them kindly.
James would be king rather than lord if his royal blood wasn't tainted.
Mary and Lord James's father was James V of Scotland.
But while Mary's mother is Marie de Guise of France,
Lord James Stewart's mother was James's favourite mistress.
Lord James Stewart was born a bastard.
As well as being a bastard,
in Mary's eyes his new religion is illegitimate, too.
When Mary left over a decade ago, Scotland was a Catholic kingdom.
Now she's returned to find half her subjects are Protestant,
along with her brother.
Tricky - because Lord James is a big cheese.
DR ALISON CATHCART: At this moment in Scotland, he is Regent
and he is incredibly powerful.
He was one of the key members
in pushing through with the Protestant revolution
and he is head of government, so he wields enormous power.
But the Protestant revolution is only half won.
Beyond Edinburgh's walls
many of the kingdom's subjects, particularly the clans,
hold fast to the old religion.
DR ROSS MACKENZIE CRAWFORD: There is a possibility that a clan war of religion
could break out.
There have always been political differences
between the clans in Scotland,
and now, with this new religious settlement in which
some clans have become Protestant, some have remained Catholic,
there is now this new source of tension
that could lead things to a real breaking point. This is a very volatile time.
James tells Mary to pack her bags again for a trip north.
They might be tranquil to the eye,
but the Highlands are simmering with religious tension.
Lord James Stewart has a plan to unite the clans.
Mary.
A charm offensive, a royal Highland progress.
Meet the chiefs, press the flesh, use your charms to seduce them,
persuade them to abandon their sectarian differences
through a shared allegiance to you, their Queen.
Mary is lavishly entertained at every stop.
The very best of Highland hospitality.
In the evenings, Mary orders the court to wear Highland dress.
She confesses to being a fan of the harp and bardic poetry.
She even puts up with the bagpipes,
which are fast becoming the symbol of Highland culture and identity.
The charm offensive works. Mary, Queen of Scots is a hit.
But beneath the smiles and hospitality,
the Catholic clans are looking for something from Mary.
They want her to turn the clock back,
restore the old religion.
But as this chief was to discover, Mary is not for turning.
Meet the Earl of Huntly, chief of the Gordons,
known as the Cock o' the North.
Huntly is a staunch Catholic.
That's his son George.
Understandably, he's a little pale...
..because Dad - yes, he is dead - is waiting to go on trial.
The crime? Treason.
During Mary's progress,
the Gordons attempted to murder Lord James and abduct Mary...
..bully her into restoring the Catholic faith.
This was a violation of the peace.
It could provoke a war of religion between the clans.
Which side will Mary choose?
Mary refused to take sides.
Left it to her big brother to decide.
James mustered the Protestant clans to deal with the Catholic rebels.
The two sides clashed near Aberdeen.
In the moment of his defeat...
..Huntly died of a stroke.
But that's not going to stop justice being done.
Lord James had his corpse embalmed
and sent to Edinburgh for trial in Parliament.
Poor Huntly has been waiting six months.
His coffin will be upright throughout the hearing
so that the accused remains on his feet.
He will be found guilty, of course, his lands forfeited,
and his son will be sent to a new home -
in a cell in Dunbar Castle.
The fate of the Gordons made all the clan chiefs take note.
Mary's not just a pretty face.
As Scotland's Queen, Mary has shown her mettle.
The kingdom is at peace,
and a war of religion has been avoided.
Her big brother's advice has paid off.
By rights, Lord James ought to be promoted.
Earl of Moray? Thank you, that'll do nicely - for now.
Next, let's find Mary a husband.
Mary is a catch,
not just a Stewart, a Tudor, too.
With cousin Elizabeth I of England still unmarried and childless...
..Mary stands next in line to the English throne.
Who will Mary choose to marry?
I like this one, do you?
Yes.
But a little bit too fat, you think?
ROSS: She perhaps flirts with the idea of marrying herself
into either the French or the Spanish royal family,
both of which are notably Catholic.
Moray would like to avoid that
and instead he'd prefer her to marry a Protestant,
preferably a Protestant from England.
But if Mary chooses a Catholic,
James can wave goodbye to his Protestant revolution.
Portraits were the Tinder profile pictures of their day.
Mary has several suitors to choose from.
And when she considers Catholic Lord Darnley's image,
she swipes right.
I think so.
19-year-old Henry, Lord Darnley is Mary's cousin.
He's a Lennox Stewart, eldest son of the Earl of Lennox.
Darnley has the personality of a spoilt teenager.
He's violent, he's drunk, he's arrogant,
he's just spoilt in every way.
The only person who does like him is probably his dad, the Earl of Lennox.
Darnley is his opportunity and his clan's opportunity
to get back into power.
May I introduce to you Henry Lennox Stewart?
During the winter of 1565,
Darnley tries his luck at court.
23-year-old Mary likes what she sees.
I thank you.
Her brother, the newly promoted Earl of Moray, does not.
Is this infatuation or political sense?
Splicing the Lennox clan into the Stewart line
will bring Mary kin - protection.
But Moray also sees how it will play with the clans.
They'll be driven into factions,
divided between supporters of the Catholic Clan Lennox
and their Protestant enemies.
Religion's the last thing on Darnley's mind.
Darnley is flirtatious,
outrageously so.
He even teasingly proposes, ring in hand.
Mary says no.
Darnley's eyes are for Mary
but occasionally they wander to others...
..like David Rizzio, the Queen's private secretary.
Everyone else's eyes are on Darnley...
..waiting for him to put a foot wrong.
One evening, Darnley makes mischief.
Referring to Moray's newly acquired territories,
he arrogantly quips, "They are too much for his needs."
Moray is incensed.
Mary, you forget yourself. You think you can talk to me...
You forget yourself! Forget myself?!
You are just a woman!
A woman... Who needs to be married!
..who is your Queen!
You may be a queen but you are still a woman on this Earth
and you must wed to a Protestant prince!
Mary accuses Moray of ruthless ambition.
"Know your place, illegitimate half-brother.
"Perhaps you covet the Crown for yourself."
Moray's stung.
This is personal.
The truth is, he says, he just can't stand Darnley.
He's a vain, stuck-up fool
and an obvious threat to the stability of her kingdom.
Why can't she see this?
I will be wed with the man that I wish to marry.
You will be wed with the man I choose!
I choose! How dare you, madam!
Moray's little sister isn't quite as bendable as he thought.
Humiliated, he has no choice but to quit.
But that's not going to stop him
opposing Mary's budding relationship with Darnley.
Moray has a right-hand man -
James Douglas, the Earl of Morton,
chief of Clan Douglas.
He will work on the inside.
WHISPERS: ..The Queen now suspects me...
HE WHISPERS
The battle between brother and sister will now be played out in public...
..with religion as the weapon.
Palm Sunday, 1565.
A Catholic priest is abducted by a Protestant gang
and frogmarched to the Mercat Cross in Edinburgh.
They pelt him with eggs and very nearly beat him to death.
Eggs.
The Catholic symbol for Easter were deliberately chosen
for this act of ritual humiliation.
No-one knows who laid them on, but everybody guessed.
It's said the priest was pelted with 10,000 eggs.
Happy Easter, Mary.
The Easter message is from Moray -
part of a terror campaign
to keep the papists under the Protestant thumb.
But Moray's bullying tactics aren't going to stop Mary.
To raise Darnley to marriageable status...
..she makes him a knight, a baronet and the Earl of Ross
all in the same afternoon.
DR AMY BLAKEWAY: When she starts to give him titles,
including the Earldom of Ross,
it's pretty clear to everybody
that she's considering elevating him to a higher status.
In other words, the gift of the title of the Earldom of Ross
is basically an announcement of their engagement.
Mary doesn't hang about.
Two months later, the wedding bells ring out.
But it's not the wedding everyone remembers -
it's the wedding present.
Mary proclaims Darnley King.
To the good people of Scotland, I have a proclamation to make.
This is to proclaim that our good and wonderful Lord Darnley is now King.
No-one is expecting this.
Darnley's spectacular rise from son of a clan chief to king
is bad enough...
..but what the clan chiefs can't stomach
is the declaration that Darnley will share equal power with Mary.
Only one voice fills the silent void.
Darnley's dad, the Earl of Lennox.
God save His Grace!
Mary has not asked the consent of Parliament or the clan chiefs
or the noble families of Scotland for their input in this.
This upsets an awful lot of people.
Darnley's looks, charm and pedigree may have turned Mary's head,
but not the chiefs'.
They've seen right through him.
They've seen him for the boastful, unpredictable lightweight
that he really is.
The only chiefs not shocked by Darnley's meteoric promotion to King
aren't even there.
Moray and his clan allies refused to show up -
they've a rebellion to plan.
Mary's marriage to Catholic Darnley
is stoking the very thing everyone is trying to avoid.
A war of religion.
Moray and the rebels' stated aim is to solidify
the Protestant settlement in Scotland,
and they feel very threatened by the marriage between Darnley and Mary.
They've also gotten quite used to the idea of running the country via counsel,
and Mary perhaps herself feels somewhat threatened by this,
and she sees their aims as trying to depose her.
As Moray rallies the Protestant clans, Mary needs to raise an army...and fast.
First, she forgives Clan Gordon for their misdemeanour
in return for military support.
Mary also commands the loyalty of Darnley's clan,
the Lennox Stewarts,
and another big hitter, the Earl of Atholl.
Mary goes to war.
Mary is angered by the rebels' defiance of royal authority.
She dons a steel helmet and holsters a pistol
and rides out of Edinburgh at the head of 8,000 men.
Clan Lennox and Clan Gordon lead the vanguard.
Darnley, modelling an expensive gilt suit of armour, commands the rear.
As the Queen chases her brother around the kingdom,
Moray refuses to fight...
..all the while holding out for military assistance from England that never comes.
And then this man turns up.
Meet Lord Bothwell...
..Moray's sworn enemy,
Mary's knight in shining armour.
Bothwell cuts a dashing figure.
He's French-educated, but he's a man of action, not culture.
He's an experienced soldier. He favours trial by combat.
He's fought in and won at least a dozen duels.
Violence, not the law, is Bothwell's preferred option
when it comes to settling disputes.
James Hepburn, the Earl of Bothwell,
is the most powerful clan chief in the south-east.
With the loyalty of many Border chiefs and an army of 4,000 clansmen,
here's a man who can be relied upon to defend the kingdom.
Holed up in Dumfries,
Moray hears of the advancing armies of both Mary and Bothwell.
He doesn't stand a chance.
Moray cuts his losses and flees to England.
Mary has won...
..for now.
MILES: Mary is at the height of her power
and it's probably the best moment of her reign.
She now has the government of Scotland in hand,
she's not particularly dominated by anyone
and she can rule Scotland the way she wants to.
BELL CHIMES
And then, to top it all,
Mary produces her ace card.
She's pregnant, and everyone is celebrating.
Well, almost everyone.
For the baby's father, Mary's pregnancy is a threat.
Mary is the only person who recognises Darnley as King.
Parliament doesn't, and the clan chiefs hate him.
Should Mary die, he will no longer be King,
and the child will reign over the Scots.
The clock is ticking.
Mary has done nothing to restore the old religion.
So, Darnley decides he will play the Catholic card.
He secretly makes contact with Catholic Europe's major players
and markets himself as the alternative king to his weak and feeble queen.
AMY: He writes to the King of France, he writes to the Pope,
he even writes to the King of Spain,
and in all of these letters he tries to portray himself
as somebody who's trying to push the Catholic faith forward.
When Darnley's not busy plotting against his pregnant wife,
he's satisfying his libido.
And it's not just the girls that catch his eye,
it's the boys, too,
including Mary's private secretary, David Rizzio.
Rizzio has proved useful both in and out of bed.
As the Queen's secretary, he has access to Mary's state papers
and her letterheads, which Darnley has been signing without her knowledge.
AMY: When Mary realises that Darnley is trying to interfere,
she acts very firmly.
She removes the title of king.
Darnley is merely the Queen's husband.
Mary has clipped Darnley's wings, cruelly cut him down to size.
The chiefs delight in Darnley's downfall,
but one of them sees an opportunity.
Morton, chief of the Douglas clan.
Remember him?
Moray's inside man.
For months, Morton and his Protestant clan allies
have been trying to find a way to bring Moray back from exile
and returned to power,
and all along, the answer has been staring them in the face -
that idiot Darnley.
"Help me bring Moray back," he urges, "and we'll make you a real king."
Morton works quickly on Darnley,
brainwashing him.
"Only Rizzio stands in your way. He won't let you sign anything
"unless the Queen approves, and he's awfully close to her.
"He's her favourite, playing his lute
"and singing songs to her all day and night.
"Are you sure it's your baby she's carrying?
"It's a scandal, it's the talk of the court.
"Slit Rizzio's throat and you will be our Protestant king."
Morton's plan is to frame Rizzio as Scotland's deadly enemy...
..a papal spy, Mary's illicit lover,
an evil counsellor...
..on a mission to return the kingdom to the Catholic Church.
It's all pure fiction, of course,
but blind ambition has made Darnley a gullible fool,
and he never even stops to think who really stands to gain from Rizzio's death.
Moray and the rebel chiefs all saddled up and ready to ride over the border.
Darnley's a silly fish, headed for Moray's and Morton's trap,
but he just keeps swimming into it.
"Become a Protestant, back Rizzio's murder and we'll crown you King."
But Darnley's word is not enough.
He must sign a bond admitting he is the chief author of the plot.
Like the fool he is, he signs,
but not before insisting they kill Rizzio in front of Mary.
If the shock leads to a miscarriage and her death, so much the better.
Morton and the plotters act quickly.
9th March, 1566.
Mary and Rizzio are enjoying a late supper
at the Palace of Holyroodhouse in Edinburgh.
What happens next is not for the faint-hearted.
It's a miracle the Queen didn't miscarry from the shock.
What do you want?
MARY CRIES OUT
Ah! Bastardo!
HE CRIES OUT
BLADE SLICES
Even after witnessing the brutal, shocking murder of her faithful secretary,
Mary knows she must keep her wits about her,
she must take control.
Mary has made many mistakes,
and she's looking at her biggest one right now.
There's only one question, really.
Why has he done her such shame?
Believe me, it was... It was nothing to do with me.
I had no contact with what's happening.
You do believe me, don't you?
Darnley denies any involvement in the murder
but urges Mary to pardon the conspirators.
The Protestant chiefs, he says, have done her a service.
He rambles on about Mary's imaginary affair with Rizzio,
papal spy, evil counsellor...
..attempting to brainwash Mary
in the same way Morton brainwashed the gullible Darnley.
Mary's had enough.
"Why will Morton and Moray give you the Crown?
"That's just replacing one monarch with another,
"and as for becoming a Protestant, who's going to believe that?
"And if you remain a Catholic,
"those Protestant republican chiefs are waiting outside the door.
"Treachery runs through their veins. They'll kill you, just like Rizzio."
And bang on cue, next through the door is the grand puppet master,
brother Moray, the man Mary chased over the border.
Now he's back, spinning his well-rehearsed script.
Your Majesty must believe me
when I say that while I was out of the country
I could not have been involved with any of these machinations.
I'm sure it must have been done for the... Well, the goodwill of the people,
for the survival and safety of our nation and for your good Majesty's, er, safety.
Silver tongue, he assures Mary
that he had nothing to do with this dreadful affair,
but he knows a man who did.
To that end, I present my fellow Earl, er, the Earl of Morton here,
to beg on bended knee for his forgiveness.
Mary knows this is pure theatre,
but she has to play her part,
and Moray knows that he has to get pardons for Morton
and the rest of the plotters.
Mary is no fool.
If she pardons the plotters,
their lies about Rizzio will be believed.
Their coup will have worked.
But Mary has a plan.
She begs them to write out their own pardons.
"Leave them on the table. I'll sign them in the morning."
But when morning dawns, Mary, Darnley and the pardons are nowhere to be found.
Now Mary has written confessions of the assassins' treason.
Cunning. No wonder the plotters run.
Morton flees as fast as he can, all the way to England.
Mary has come out on top...just.
With their signed confessions,
Mary has the rebellious Protestant clan chiefs on a leash.
Now, after all the feuding and conspiracies,
she demands they kiss and make up.
Here they all are.
Bothwell,
Huntly...
..Moray and his allies
standing before Mary in a grand symbol of reconciliation.
But when it comes to Darnley,
reconciliation is the last thing on anyone's mind.
Darnley, the poor fool,
doesn't realise the plotters have already taken their revenge.
Darnley betrayed the plotters when he went grovelling back to Mary.
But he'd forgotten one thing -
the bond that reveals his role in Rizzio's murder.
Mary's not the first to realise the father of her child is a fool...
..to rue the day she fell for him.
For now, she decides to keep an eye on Darnley...
..keep him in the dark about her knowledge of his treachery.
And the best Darnley figures he can do for now
is sit tight, wait for the baby to be born,
and after that, maybe stage a comeback.
And pigs might fly.
A few months later, Mary gives birth to a baby boy.
BABY CRIES
BELL CHIMES
During her 20 hours of labour,
Mary prayed that she'd never been married,
but while marriage to Darnley has been a disaster,
at least there's a pay-off - a healthy, vigorous boy.
Now Mary has an heir, Scotland has an heir,
England has an heir.
And Darnley? Well, he's living on borrowed time.
MILES: After the birth of Prince James,
Mary has a spectacular political triumph in the baptism of James.
All these Crown heads of Europe come.
It's a huge party and it's a huge success,
apart from Darnley, who ruins the whole thing by not showing up,
which is a massive problem, and this sort of highlights
how bad the relationship between Mary and Darnley has got.
A relationship so toxic that Darnley is plotting his wife's overthrow.
With the backing of his clan, the Lennox Stewarts,
Darnley plans to kidnap his own son, the infant prince.
The clan chiefs realise they need to work together as a united group
to get rid of Darnley. So, in order to do that,
they want to see Morton and his accomplices pardoned
for the murder of Rizzio, because they need to work together.
Their objective is to remove Darnley.
They need to be unified to do that.
Moray, Huntly and Bothwell all lobby the Queen
to pardon Rizzio's murderer...
..Morton.
In the face of such remarkable clan unity, Mary agrees.
But Mary trusts none of them.
No wonder Mary's increasingly paranoid about the safety of her newborn son.
Even the 500 soldiers guarding him at Stirling Castle
are no guarantee of his safety.
Mary writes to her cousin, the English Queen.
Mary sees Elizabeth as the only one that can keep James secure.
She starts to see that, no matter what she does,
there will be factions bigger, beyond her control,
and she's wary of James falling into the trap of either one or other faction,
so she really starts to see that Elizabeth is the one who will keep James safe.
Elizabeth warmly agrees to Mary's proposal.
But this is more than just a family favour.
It's a tacit acknowledgement of Mary's claim to the English throne.
And then all of that went up in smoke.
One winter's night, a bright flash lights up the Edinburgh sky...
EXPLOSION
..followed by a huge explosion.
Dogs bark, windows are flung open and candles lit,
as people rush to their doors to find out what's going on.
Dawn breaks. Smoke and rubble are everywhere.
In the garden of a house,
Darnley and one of his servants are found dead under a tree...
..barely a mark upon them.
Close by is a chair...
..a rope...
..and Darnley's cloak.
Why did Darnley and his servant climb over the wall into the garden?
And why were they carrying a chair?
Were they fleeing for their lives,
or were they murdered inside the house
and just their bodies dragged outside?
When Mary wakes and hears the news, those questions hardly matter.
It's how it looks.
It looks like murder...
..which is precisely what it is.
To find out what happened,
let me take you back to the fateful moment Mary agreed to pardon Morton.
ROSS: He'd been left out in the cold by Darnley
following Rizzio's murder,
and Morton really wants to get revenge on Darnley.
As soon as his pardon was granted, Morton went straight
to see Lord Bothwell, the Queen's closest advisor.
So, he makes a pact, an alliance, with Bothwell to see to Darnley's murder.
Their opportunity came when Darnley's debauchery
caught up with him.
Third-stage syphilis forced Darnley to take lodgings
on the edge of Edinburgh.
Darnley was a sitting duck.
ROSS: One night, the conspirators sneak inside his lodgings
and they pack the cellar with gunpowder.
It seems that Darnley or his servant
seemed to hear some kind of commotion in the cellar of their lodgings,
so they attempt to escape out the window.
However, they are spotted and they are strangled and asphyxiated
in the orchard of the Kirk o' Field and their bodies are left.
The lodgings themself then explode.
EXPLOSION
AMY: After Darnley's murder, Mary's caught between a rock and a hard place.
On the one hand, as Darnley's widow,
you would expect her to be seeking vengeance.
On the other hand, as Queen, she has a duty to dispense justice.
Her cousin, Elizabeth, spelt it out in a letter written in her own hand.
"People are saying that you will look through your fingers at this deed,
"instead of avenging it, and that you don't care to take action
"against those who have done you this pleasure."
"Look through your fingers." The suggestion
that Mary might have had a hand in the killing is enough reason for Elizabeth
to end all talk of her succession.
Mary's fortunes have changed.
She'd been at the height of her powers,
ready to agree the terms of her succession to the English throne.
Now she's isolated and vulnerable.
The worry that keeps her awake at night is not pressure from Elizabeth
but something else.
It's, "Who's next on their list?"
Will it be Mary?
BABY CRIES
Will it be her son James?
Mary has been blind...
..too consumed by Darnley's plotting
to see the real plot unfold right in front of her eyes.
Mary suspects her brother is behind the murder.
MORAY: Mary, you forget yourself!
You forget yourself! You are but a woman!
NEIL: He'd hated Darnley from the beginning.
And now he's done a runner.
Moray's on his way to France.
What Mary does next takes the whole world by surprise.
Mary decides that Moray's long-standing enemy, Bothwell, will protect her,
take control of the feuding clans.
He will be the champion of the monarchy,
the only man who can save her from the same fate as Darnley.
You are strong.
And I trust you.
He will be the champion of the monarchy,
the only man who can save Mary from the same fate as Darnley.
As a signal of her confidence,
Mary puts Bothwell in charge of the military
and then lavishes gifts on him.
The last was naive, and macabre in the extreme.
Mary gave him Darnley's clothes.
MARY: Mm.
Perfect.
As Bothwell strides around town wearing his victim's clothes...
God save His Grace!
..Darnley's father piles on the pressure.
His men stick up bills around Edinburgh...
..accusing Bothwell and Mary of the murder.
Darnley becomes more of a king in death than he ever was in life.
The people's king.
Two months after the murder,
Darnley's dad marches his 3,000-strong clan army to Linlithgow
to make his vengeful intentions crystal clear.
Mary has no choice.
Bothwell goes on trial.
12th April, 1567.
Bothwell stands before Parliament accused of Darnley's murder.
But, remember, this is the land of the clans,
where the words "trial" and "fair" mean different things.
SHOUTING OUTSIDE
Outside Parliament, Bothwell has stationed 4,000 armed supporters.
The men wait patiently all day, but the wait is worth it.
Bothwell is acquitted.
If Bothwell can intimidate Parliament, Mary will be a pushover.
Two weeks after his acquittal,
Bothwell abducts Mary and imprisons her in his castle at Dunbar.
No wonder she agrees to his marriage proposal.
Bothwell doesn't hang about.
Two weeks after that, they marry.
BELLS RING OUT
Just three months after Darnley's death, Bothwell's taken the Queen, married her.
Now his position as top dog in the bloody game of clans is secure.
As Bothwell's ambitions are becoming clear,
dark rumours begin to circulate.
Mary was forced into the marriage.
Bothwell had raped her.
AMY: There was certainly a degree of coercion,
and if Mary were raped by Bothwell and she were pregnant from that,
she would have needed to marry him
to ensure that those children were not born like Lord James had been - bastards.
This is a violation.
The Queen has been dishonoured.
Bothwell will have to go.
The fiery cross is lit.
The Protestant clans muster for battle.
The Earl of Morton leads the defence of the Queen's honour,
but don't think for a minute he has Mary's interests at heart.
On 12th June, they declare Bothwell
"to be the principal author and murderer of the King's Grace of good memory
"and ravishing of the Queen's Majesty."
That's pretty rich coming from Bothwell's co-conspirators,
but this is fake news, 16th-century style.
Mary's world has been turned upside down.
A few years ago she'd been on top...
..her kingdom under control,
the clan chiefs on the leash.
Now here she is,
mentally and physically battered by the worst of them.
The Protestant clans march.
Their target - Bothwell.
Bothwell has the support of his own Clan Hepburn.
The two armies meet east of Edinburgh on Carberry Hill.
Neither side is prepared to make the first move.
The Protestant chiefs don't want a bloodbath.
They just want Bothwell.
The terms are simple.
Either Bothwell divorces Mary
or he agrees to trial by single combat.
Bothwell chooses to fight...
..providing his opponent is of sufficient rank.
The question is - who?
Morton.
Of course, both are treacherous liars, Bothwell the worst of them.
Here he is, demanding to fight the very man
who was his partner in Darnley's murder until they fell out.
Now Bothwell wants him dead.
As the testosterone and insults fly, Mary takes charge.
She's had enough of the bullying,
the relentless feuding and blood-letting.
Whatever the outcome, no-one will ever be satisfied.
If Bothwell wins, the chiefs will never accept it.
In all probability, they'll just charge or send in more champions
until Bothwell collapses or dies.
If Bothwell loses, Mary will have lost her protector.
So it's checkmate.
All Mary can do is surrender.
Mary agrees to the divorce and to give herself up...
..on the condition the chiefs guarantee her safety
and allow Bothwell to escape.
Surprise, surprise - Morton and the rebel chiefs don't keep their word.
Rather than protect Mary,
they imprison her...in a castle in the middle of Loch Leven.
A month after Mary arrives, she miscarries twins.
Their father, Bothwell, has fled to Europe.
He will never return to Scotland again.
But guess who's back?
Brother Moray is on his way to Loch Leven.
This time his bendable little sister is in no position to argue.
MILES: Moray forces Mary to sign abdication papers,
essentially saying that she would resign the throne
in favour of her infant son James,
and then Moray would rule Scotland on his behalf.
Mary did briefly escape her captors...
..smuggled across the loch in a rowing boat.
She then rode west to Hamilton,
where her supporters set up a temporary court and urge her to fight.
Mary clashes with her brother at the Battle of Langside,
just outside Glasgow, in May 1568.
After 45 minutes, the outcome is a crushing defeat.
Now Mary is a queen on the run.
AMY: Mary's nerves are frazzled.
Mary then makes perhaps one of the worst decisions of her life,
one of the rashest decisions of her life.
She foolishly flees to England.
AMY: Elizabeth I, her cousin, a fellow monarch,
somebody who understands the sanctity of queenship,
will surely protect her.
In the eyes of her English captors,
Mary's name is blackened.
Implicated in the murder of Darnley,
married his killer.
GATE CLANGS
Elizabeth's hands are tied.
Mary will stay locked up for the rest of her life.
Job done.
Back in Scotland, civil war between the Protestant clan chiefs
and Mary's beleaguered supporters rages on.
Moray's rule as Regent is brief.
After just two years, an assassin's bullet takes him.
Morton, the chief who plotted the murder of Darnley, lives on.
He's won, come out on top.
Regent over the boy king.
MARY: I am of no use to anyone.
But Mary's son, Prince James, is 14 now.
Growing up, he's seen the kingdom descend into chaos, civil war,
clan against clan,
in which violence and retribution spiralled out of control.
James is determined to be rid of these unruly clan chiefs.
James understands the kind of plots that imprisoned his mother
and killed his father.
They will not get in his way.
The teenage James proclaims himself old enough to rule without a regent
and pushes Morton out of power.
He will deal with Morton the clan way.
Morton spent his last night on Earth writing to James,
justifying why he and the chiefs had plotted against his father.
Even to his end, Morton is lying, deceiving, spinning.
But James refuses to read the letter.
Click...
..click...
Counting down to the moment the guillotine will fall.
While her teenage son rules in her place,
the Queen remains imprisoned, abandoned, isolated,
reduced to making mad Catholic plots to assassinate Elizabeth
so she can be a real queen.
It could only be a matter of time before Protestant Elizabeth
chose to rid herself of the Catholic thorn in her side.
THUD AND SQUELCH
James will learn from history.
One of his first actions as King
will be to try to eradicate clan identity and culture.
The sons of the chiefs will be sent to the Lowlands to be re-educated.
The Gaelic language will be outlawed -
the principal cause, as James sees it,
of their barbarity.
But the age of the clans is far from over.
They will continue to shape Scotland's destiny for good and ill.
But that's another story.