Clad in heavy mail, draped in his royal banner, standing tall in the stirrups of his palfrey, Robert the Bruce wields his battle axe above his head. Sunlight catches the blade as it is suspended, inert for an eternal moment, before gravity and the kinetic energy of a kingly arm will inevitably make it split open the miserable head of Henry de Bohun like an overripe watermelon. Once there can be no more doubt as to the twain halves of Bohun’s head never meeting again, a colourful backdrop choir, consisting of fifteen hundred Scottish soldiers in full highland garb, which will only be invented several hundred years later under English rule, bursts into song with Dolby surrounding clarity: “Wha, for Scotland's king and law, Freedom's sword will strongly draw, Freeman stand, or Freeman fa', Let him on wi' me!” Beneath the firm rock of the immovable Stirling Castle the boohooing English army is irresistibly forced back over the Bannock Burn. The Bruce and his choir start co...
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