FRENCH NATURALIZATION OF THE SCOTS IN THE FIFTEENTH AND SIXTEENTH CENTURIES

Abstract

French naturalization of the Scots appears to have evolved from lands granted to individual Scots by Charles VII during the Hundred Years War, and it would seem that the libertas testandi associated with these grants in the fifteenth century was an early form of what were later called lettres de naturalité in the sixteenth century. French naturalization was granted not only to individual Scots but to all Scottish subjects by certain French monarchs from Charles VII to Louis XIV and had its origins in the ‘Auld Alliance’, as the Scots referred to their relationship with France, and the establishment of the garde écossaise by Charles VII in 1445. The sixteenth century saw a continuation of Scottish military service to the kings of France as well as a continuation of grants of lands, pensions, titles and privileges accorded by grateful French monarchs to Scottish soldiers in the main, but other Scots as well, many of whom were, and others who became by letters patent of naturalization, loyal subjects of the king of France.