Wallace must stay a standalone hero

In AN uncertain world we cling to certainties; the things that have always been and will ever be. That the sun will rise in the east and set in the west, that it always rains in the Highlands in summer; that in the 21st century, Scotland will always fail to qualify for a big tournament. These givens give us comfort.

So how then are we to react to the suggestion from a Glasgow University academic that far from being the Braveheart rebel of legend – and even in the historically hysterical Mel Gibson film – William Wallace was only one of a number of chiefs who led resistance to the English in 13th century Scotia?

If Professor Dauvit Broun is to be believed, the story of Wallace the rebel chieftain, passed down the generations, is so much myth-making. He has been relegated to the rank of mere “co-leader” in the murder of William Hesilrig, the English Sheriff of Lanark in 1297, the killing which sparked the Scottish rebellion.

Braveheart the co-leader? It just cannot be. Next thing you know we will be told John Knox died a Catholic, Walter Scott wrote short novels, and Robert Burns was celibate. There are some things that just are, just have to be. We depend on them to get through the chaos of modern life. Wallace the great leader must remain a historical hit, not a myth.