| early Aug | Richard and Mariotta’s wedding — “after three weeks of marriage” (Vp86) they are separated by the news of war, c late Aug / 3 Sep.
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| | THE BOOK'S NARRATIVE BEGINS:
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| Aug | Lymond enters Edinburgh “on a warm August night” (Vp11). “At ten-thirty,” he returns to Mungo?s (Vp13).
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| Aug | (One day after Vpp. 11-16??) Sack of Midculter — “in the late summer of 1547” (Vp18), “midafternoon” (Vp25) under “[t]he August sun” (Vp25); at least “a fortnight” (Vp36) before Johnnie Bullo reunites with Lymond’s men on 13 Sep; “It’s the gypsies who were in Culter last August” (Vp142). |
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| late Aug / 3 Sep? | Richard leaves Midculter “to join the army in the east” (Vp78) — “two sleepless, congested days” (Vp78) after the Sack of Midculter; and see ref. to “upheaval of the last three weeks” (Vp78), that is, up to 24 Sep. |
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| c 9 Sep | “[T]he baby [Queen Mary is sent into] hiding with her mother” (Vp75) — “[f]or a week” (Vp75) before Tom Erskine returns to Stirling 16 Sep. Same time or soon after (?), “Mariotta and Lady Culter [go] to be at their side” (Vp75). |
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| 10 Sep (Sat) | Battle of Pinkie field (Vp35). |
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| 11 Sep (Sun) | George Douglas (Vp84) captures Jonathan Crouch — “two days ago” (Vp46). |
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| 12 Sep (Mon) | Bannister leaves from Leith — “yesterday” (Vp46). |
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| | Richard Crawford and Tom Erskine move south “to the River Annan” (Vp54) with their troops — “on Monday” (Vp67). |
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| 13 Sep (Tue) | Will Scott arrives at Lymond?s headquarters — not “just to pass a dull Tuesday” (Vp38). |
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| | “On the same day,” an English army occupies Annan (Vp35). |
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| | ”Much later,” (Vp44) Lymond and Will leave for Annan, arriving after “sunset” (Vp44), after “[d]arkness fell” (Vp44). |
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| | “So while the spirits of my lords Wharton and Lennox were being mortified in Annan,” (Vp55) Richard Crawford captures Bannister. |
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| 14 Sep (Wed) | Lymond’s men free Bannister — “dawn was still a long way off” (Vp55). |
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| | Lymond’s men move to Peel Tower — Turkey Mat: “We’re moving on tomorrow anyway; and I hope to God it’s to the Tower.” (Vp36) Lymond: “I shall be back before dawn. Then we move to the Peel Tower.” (Vp44) (Presumably they stick to this schedule.) |
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| | Sym finds the amnesiac (Vp60) — next day “was Thursday, the 15th of September” (Vp67). |
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| 14/15 Sep | Culter and Erskine surprise Wharton and Lennox’s army, drive it “back to England” (Vp72). |
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| 14-17 (?) Sep | Will Scott: “I was on my back for four days” “after the skirmish with Culter and Erskine” (Vp174) |
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| c 14-21 Sep | “[T]he Culter men spent an enlivening week” (Vp86) chasing and harrying Wharton’s army. |
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| 15 Sep (Thu) | Tom Erskine arrives at Boghall (Vp71); the amnesiac leaves (Vpp71, 73). |
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| 16 Sep (Fri) | Tom Erskine escorts Christian Stewart from Boghall to Stirling — “[i]t had taken all Friday” (Vp74). |
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| 19-23 Sep | Reports of English army’s withdrawal — “On Monday, … On Tuesday and Wednesday, … Thursday and today, …” (Vp75). |
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| 19 Sep (Mon) | Christian sends “a message to Sym” (Vp83) via Dean Adam Peebles — “[h]e went last Monday” (Vp81). |
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| 20 Sep (Tue) | Sym “go[es] to the cave” (Vp83), meets the recovered amnesiac for the appointment made the previous Thursday — “[c]ome to this cave on Tuesday” (Vp73). |
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| 23 Sep (Fri) | Tom Erskine speaks to Buccleuch and travels from Stirling to Lake Menteith — “today,” that is, Friday (Vp75). |
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| | Richard, his mission along the western Border completed, “turned back north for Midculter on Friday, September 23rd,” (Vp87). |
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| 24 Sep (Sat) | On Inchtalla, Mariotta, Sybilla, Erskine, and Andrew Hunter converse about Richard, Lymond, and George Douglas — “next day” (Vp77) after Erskine arrives. |
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| | Young Queen Mary meets a stranger, is later questioned about him by her mother, Sybilla, et al. — “[t]he next day” (Vp79) — AMBIGUOUS, but seems to mean after Erskine met Christian “last night” (Vp79), NOT next day after the conversation on Inchtalla. |
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| | Christian meets the recovered amnesiac — apparently about the same time (?) as Queen Mary’s debriefing on Vpp. 79-82, since she is not present there. |
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| 25 Sep (Sun) | Richard escorts Agnes Herries from Morton, headed toward Stirling — “[o]n Sunday afternoon” (Vp87). Fording the Nith, they are unhorsed — “[o]n Sunday” (Vp86). |
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| bef/on 11 Oct | Will Scott stringing his bow, singing and reflecting, “a month” (Vp96) after joining Lymond on 13 Sep. |
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| 11 Oct (Tue) | “[O]n the high road to Scotland,” (Vp100) — “the Carlisle road” (Vp178) — Lymond stages an ambush and rescue of John Maxwell, spends the rest of the night at the Ostrich Inn — two nights before the raid on Hume. |
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| 12 Oct (Wed) | Plans and preparation for the raid on Hume (Vpp99-102) — “[a]t dusk tomorrow night, a supply train of wagons …” (Vp102). |
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| 13 Oct (night) | Raid on Hume Castle (Vpp102-19), incl. arrival of the Spanish captain, Don Luis de Cordoba — chronology fixed by p. 120 (see under 15 Oct). |
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| 14-15 Oct | “Drinking went on for two days after the barrels [from Hume] were broached.” (Vp119) |
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| 15 Oct (Sat) | Lymond visits George Douglas — “breakfast time on the second day” (Vp120) after the raid at Hume. |
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| | George Douglas “send[s] one of [his] secretaries to Ballaggan” (Vp123); “Sym Penango, Sir George Douglas’s secretary” (Vp128), delivers the message — on “the middle Saturday of the month” (Vp125) of October. |
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| | Lymond captures Jonathan Crouch |
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| late Oct | “the October Papingo Shoot” (Vp143), same day as the Wapenshaw and Sterling fair. |
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| late Oct? | Lymond: “There’s a gentleman I have to meet on the Carlisle road on Friday [after Wapenshaw].” (Vp160) |
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| late Oct? | Christian: “On Tuesday [after Wapenshaw]. If Lord Culter can travel. All the Crawfords and Agnes are going back to Midculter: I shall go with them, and then on to Boghall until Christmas.” (Vp158) |
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| early Nov | Mariotta speaks with Janet Beaton of her dissatisfaction with Richard’s constant absence — “That was at the start of November.” (Vp190) |
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| Nov | “?Very soon [after the start of November], the first parcel of jewellery arrived” (Vp190), anonymously, for Mariotta. Then, “a week later, a second packet.” (Vp190) And a third arrives “several days” (Vp190) before Sybilla returns from Branxholm (which would seem to have been 12 Nov, but conceivably could have been anytime before 19 Nov). |
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| 11 Nov (Fri) | “Today, a morose and pallid Friday in November” (Vp164) (almost four weeks after Lymond captures Crouch; see 14 Nov) |
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| | Sybilla: “Janet, you’re bid to Midculter tomorrow week. We are to have a dissertation on the Philosopher’s Stone.” (Vp166) Sybilla stays the night at Branxholm (Vp167). |
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| 14 Nov (Mon) | “Three days later [after Richard leaves Branxholm, Vpp. 163-167]” (Vp168); “Four weeks have passed since I [Crouch] left Ballaggan in your [Lymond’s] company” (Vp170). |
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| | Scene at the Ostrich — pp. 175-86 — is the same night. “It’s now mid-November.” (Vp180) |
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| 19 Nov (Sat) | Johnnie Bullo's first “dissertation on the Philosopher’s Stone” at Midculter. Sybilla, on 11 Nov, says: “Janet, you’re bid to Midculter tomorrow week.” (Vp166) And Johnnie Bullo, on 14 Nov, says: “I’m going to Edinburgh this Saturday” (Vp174), but in fact he has stayed at the Ostrich and “go[es] to Midculter the following Saturday” (Vp191), while his gypsies go to Edinburgh. |
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| 29 Nov (Tue) | Gideon Somerville meets Lord Grey at Norham — “on the last Tuesday in November” (Vp186). |
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