Scottish New Year: FLOWER OF THE FOREST💥SCOTS GUARDS💥BAGPIPES💥

[appalachiablue]

- A view of the Scottish countryside taken from across Scotland. Accompanied by the music of The Scots Guards (Flowers of the Forest). Dedicated to all the men and women who have fallen in conflicts past and present. God bless and may they Rest In Peace.

- The Flowers of the Forest: A lament for the army of James IV, the flower of Scottish manhood, slain with their king on the field of Flodden, September 1513. The composition of this song began with a fragment of a very old ballad. Mrs Patrick Cockburn of Ormiston drew on this fragment to write a full song. Then in the mid 18th century Miss Jane Elliot, daughter of Sir Gilbert Elliot of Minto, Lord Chief Justice Clerk of Scotland, drew on Mrs Cockburn's work to make this lyric a much finer piece of work.

'The pipe tune is well known to anyone who has attended a Remembrance Day service in Scotland, but the song is all too seldom heard nowadays.'

The Scots had in 1513 invaded England to support their allies, the French. On 9 September 1513 the Scots army, under King James IV, faced the English forces of King Henry VIII under the command of Thomas Howard, Earl of Surrey. The battle was ferocious and bloody - men were felled by artillery, arrows, pikes, bills and swords. Around 14,000 men died, including James IV, the last British king to die in battle.