Margaret of Scotland

Saint Margaret of Scotland

Saint Margaret of Scotland, also known as Margaret of Wessex, was Queen of Alba from 1070 to 1093 as the wife of King Malcolm III. Born in Hungary around 1045, she was the daughter of the expatriate English prince Edward the Exile and a granddaughter of King Edmund Ironside. Her family returned to England in 1057, but following the Norman Conquest of 1066, they fled north. A storm drove their ship to Scotland in 1068, where they were granted refuge by King Malcolm III. Margaret and Malcolm married by the end of 1070.

Margaret was a devout Christian who significantly influenced the religious landscape of Scotland. She is credited with initiating reforms to bring the practices of the Scottish church closer to those of the continental church, under the guidance of figures like Lanfranc of Canterbury. Among her notable charitable works, she established a ferry across the Firth of Forth for pilgrims traveling to St Andrews, which gave the towns of South Queensferry and North Queensferry their names.

She was the mother of eight children, including six sons and two daughters. Among them were Edmund, Edgar, Alexander I, David I, who all became kings of Scotland, and Edith, who was renamed Matilda and became queen consort of England. According to the Vita S. Margaritae, attributed to Turgot of Durham, Margaret died at Edinburgh Castle in 1093, shortly after learning of the deaths of her husband and eldest son in battle.

Pope Innocent IV canonized Margaret in 1250. Her remains were reinterred in Dunfermline Abbey. Her relics were later dispersed during the Scottish Reformation. Her feast day was originally observed on November 16, the date of her death, and is now the primary date of commemoration in the Roman Catholic and Anglican traditions.