House of Stuart: Scottish Stewards Who Took Three Crowns, Then Lost Them

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The House of Stuart began with Alan fitz Flaad, a Breton who had been hereditary steward to a bishop and won lands in Shropshire under Henry I. His son Walter fitz Alan backed Empress Matilda in the Anarchy, followed King David I to Scotland, and received lands in Renfrewshire and the office of Lord High Steward, which became hereditary and turned into the family name. The sixth High Steward, another Walter, married Marjorie, daughter of Robert the Bruce, and when David II died childless in 1371 their son became Robert II. The French spelling Stuart, adopted by Mary, Queen of Scots, advertised the Auld Alliance.

James IV's 1503 marriage to Margaret Tudor let James VI become James I of England and Ireland in 1603. Charles I's English-style prayer book provoked the Bishops' Wars in 1639, Parliament set terms for funds, and the Wars of the Three Kingdoms ended with his trial and execution in 1649. George Monck restored Charles II in 1660, and the reign was dated back to 1649. James II's Catholicism and the birth of his son in 1688 brought William of Orange, the Act of Settlement passed over some 50 Catholic relatives for Hanover, and under Queen Anne the 1707 Acts of Union created Great Britain.

• Parliament argued that Charles I had committed treason against the office of king that he held.
• Oliver Cromwell sent General George Monck to subdue Scotland, the same general who later restored the monarchy.
• Charles II's illegitimate children founded dukedoms such as Buccleuch, Grafton and Richmond.
• James II reportedly dropped the Great Seal into the Thames as he fled, which Parliament treated as abdication.
• Queen Anne had 17 pregnancies and no surviving children, and the direct line ended with Cardinal Henry Benedict Stuart in 1807.