Reviews

As a further contribution to the literature on those individuals and their kinsmen who operated in the multiple kingdoms of the British Isles, the book does its job with clarity and concision, offering a sensible and unglamorous survey of its principal themes. As the first monograph devoted to Robert de Brus and his descendants, it will rightly serve as the new point of reference for the Bruses and their lands.
*EHR*

Does an admirable job of uncovering the origins and development of the Brus clan. [...] A well-written, detailed and valuable book, and deserves to be read by anyone either with an interest in Border life and politics, or the larger Anglo-Scottish situation in the later Middle Ages.
*YORKSHIRE ARCHAEOLOGICAL JOURNAL*

A rewarding illumination of a specific medieval baronial family.
*THE AMERICAN GENEALOGIST*

A highly impressive monograph on the neglected history of the Brus family. [...] Dr Blakely's remarkable success in creating an intelligible narrative from some highly complex charter evidence makes this perhaps the most persuasive and enjoyable of all dynastic histories of the North.
*NORTHERN HISTORY*

Magisterial. [...] All those interested in King Robert I of Scotland will regard this book as the definitive study of the family which produced him.
*TRANSACTIONS of the DUMFRIESSHIRE AND GALLOWAY NATURAL HISTORY AND ANTIQUARIAN SOCIETY*

This impressive book is a welcome exception to the well-rehearsed claim of historians (and their publishers) that their research 'fills an important gap' in current scholarship.
*HISTORY*