The History of Scotland Without the Boring Bits: A Chronicle of the Curious, the Eccentric, the Atrocious and the Unlikely

As an antidote to more sober accounts of Scotland's history, Ian Crofon offers a colorful chronology of the eccentric, the infamous, the bawdy, the horrific, and the hilarious people and events that have spattered across the pages of our nation's story. From the Royal High School riot to Marocco the Wonder Horse, from the War of the One-Eyed Woman to the MP cleared of stealing his ex-mistress's knickers, Scottish History Without the Boring Bits includes a host of little-known tales that you won't find in more conventional works of history. Ian Crofton's alternative history of Scotland looks at the country's past with a quizzical eye. #X91;Under Crofton's collector's eye, the rollicking spirit of Scotland, old and modern, comes proudly alive' #x96; Sunday Herald Scottish History without the Boring Bits offers a colourful melange of the bawdy, the bloody, the horrific and the hilarious episodes and characters that have spattered the pages of our nation's story. From the War of the One-Eyed Woman to the MP cleared of stealing his ex-mistress's knickers, Ian Crofton presents a host of little-known tales that you won't find in more conventional works of history. The story starts in the 4th millennium BC with the expulsion from Eden of the first Scot. It then makes its way via the medieval bishop roasted in butter and the appearance of the Devil in Ayrshire disguised as a lady's lapdog, right up to the twenty-first century, when US intelligence identified a distillery on Islay as a possible threat to world peace. So forget the usual parade of what James Bridie called #x91;Wallace-the-Bruceism' and #x91;Charlie-over-the-waterism'. That's all history. Here, for the first time, is the story of Scotland as it's never been told before. Praise for Ian Crofton's A Dictionary of Scottish Phrase and Fable: #x91;The kind of book you find yourself immersed in long after you should have put it down' Times Literary Supplement "As an antidote to more sober accounts of Scotland's history, Ian Crofon offers a colourful chronology of the eccentric, the infamous, the bawdy, the horrific and the hilarious people and events that have spattered across the pages of our nation's story. From the Royal High School riot to Marocco the Wonder Horse, from the War of the One-Eyed Woman to the MP cleared of stealing his exmistress's knickers, Scottish History without the Boring Bits includes a host of little-known tales that you won't find in more conventional works of history, including: the chatelaine who struck a general over the head with a leg of mutton ; the cow that gave birth to fourteen puppies ; the clan chief who ripped out the throat of his enemy with his teeth ; the surgeon who was so fast with the saw that he inadvertently took off his patient's testicles as well as his leg ; the mathematician who calculated that the Christian religion would finally disappear in the year 3153"-- provided by publisher As an antidote to more sober accounts of Scotlands history, Ian Crofon offers a colourful chronology of the eccentric, the infamous, the bawdy, the horrific and the hilarious people and events that have spattered across the pages of our nations story. Abstract: An imaginative, amusing and informative take on Scottish history by the bestselling author of The History of Britain without the Boring Bits. Read more... Cover; Title Page; Copyright Page; Contents; Introduction; The Dark and Middle Ages; The Sixteenth Century; The Seventeenth Century; The Eighteenth Century; The Nineteenth Century; The Twentieth Century and Beyond; Index