Why The Battle Of Bannock Burn

The Battle of Bannockburn ended in utter disaster for Edward II. Thousands of Englishmen lay dead along the banks of the Bannock Burn, including an earl and over one hundred knights. For the Scottish the battle was a resounding and decisive victory. Robert the Bruce won total militarial control and de facto political independence of Scotland. Robert the Bruce’s victory at Bannockburn ended any realistic Plantagenet claim to the Scottish throne.
In the year 1314, Bannockburn was a small village immediately south of the city of Stirling in central Scotland. Bannockburn took it’s name after the Bannock Burn, a stream that ran west and through the village. The two armies are suggested to have met south of Stirling, and west of Bannockburn. According to the Scottish narrative poem, The Brus, written by John Barbour in the year 1375, when the English were given the option of camping to either the west or east, they “quartered that night in the Carse”. The possible site of the Carse of Balquhidderock, the area between the Pelstream and the Bannock Burn, has been used throughout the years as a ploughed field and a waste dumping site. Today the area is composed of largely undisturbed grassy fields wedged between 20th
The old Roman road was a key feature during the follow-up to the battle. Built approximately 80 A.D., it was the principal road leading to Stirling Castle, and was the route that Edward II and Robert the Bruce took to approach the battlefield. Research was conducted on Monument Hill, a location where it was thought that the Roman road led to. Researchers found that the road did not lead to this exact location. It was surmised that the Roman Road was buried beneath the current road network that travels past the site on lower ground. A portion of the Roman Road was found in subsequent excavations south of Randolph’s