Treaty of Edinburgh

Overview

The Treaty of Edinburgh is the 1560 settlement that ended the French military position in Scotland, required French recognition of Elizabeth I, and consolidated the political victory of the Scottish Protestant movement and its English ally.

Current Profile

The treaty followed the Lords of the Congregation’s revolt, the Anglo-Scottish Treaty of Berwick, English intervention, and Mary of Guise’s death. Negotiated with Mary’s Guise relatives, it required French troops to leave Scotland and treated Elizabeth, rather than Mary, Queen of Scots, as England’s lawful queen.

For Elizabeth and William Cecil / Lord Burleigh, the settlement weakened the Franco-Scottish alliance and secured a Protestant northern neighbor. For Mary it was a dynastic defeat: she refused to ratify the abandonment of her English claim, while French withdrawal left her return dependent on accommodation with Protestant Scottish power.

Key Characteristics

• Settlement ending the immediate French military presence in Scotland.
• Diplomatic recognition of Elizabeth against Mary’s asserted English title.
• Product of Scottish Protestant revolt joined to English strategic intervention.
• Break in the old Franco-Scottish alignment without elimination of Mary’s dynastic claim.
• Precondition for Mary’s compromised return to a Protestant Scotland.

Evidence

• English strategic outcome: 619. Elizabeth I: The Virgin Queen (Part 4) connects intervention, French withdrawal, Protestant settlement, and continuing Marian rivalry.
• Negotiation and terms: 585. Mary, Queen of Scots: The Royal Rivals (Part 2) links the treaty to Mary of Guise’s death, Guise negotiation, recognition of Elizabeth, and French departure.
• Marian qualification: 585. Mary, Queen of Scots: The Royal Rivals (Part 2) records Mary’s refusal to ratify the surrender of her English claim and her later accommodation with James Stewart.

Qualifications

The treaty did not erase Mary’s hereditary importance, settle every constitutional question, or make Scottish religious change an exclusively English achievement. The sources emphasize English and Protestant success but also show an indigenous noble movement and continuing disagreement over Mary’s claim and ratification.

What Changed

• Established the treaty as the hinge between Mary’s French queenship and her constrained return to Scotland.
• Preserved the distinction between French recognition of Elizabeth and Mary’s own refusal to abandon her claim.

Relationships

• Scotland - kingdom from which French troops withdrew under the settlement.
• England - intervening power whose queen and strategic position the treaty recognized.
• France - departing military and dynastic power.
• Mary, Queen of Scots - queen who refused to ratify the abandonment of her English claim.
• Elizabeth I - monarch recognized against Mary’s asserted title.
• Scottish Reformation Royal Resistance - revolutionary political setting consolidated by the settlement.