Home > Uniquely Unspoilt Magazine > Issue 26 > Michael Scott
~~ Michael Scott: the Borders wizard ~~
Believed by many to be the Harry Potter of his day, with supernatural powers as a sorcerer, it is hard to tell where reality ends and myth begins when it comes to the exceptional life story of Michael Scott.
Legend has it that he flew through the air on an invisible horse, sailed on a demon ship and even locked the plague in a secret vault of Glenluce castle.
Even details of his birth are unclear, with question marks hanging over whether this really took place in 1175, and both Balwearie (a castle to the south of Kirkaldy in Fife) and the Borders claim to be his birthplace. It's also been suggested that he was born in Durham in England, of Borders parentage.
What is more certain is that he was a celebrated alchemist, astrologer and astronomer, educated at Oxford, and he travelled to Europe, studying at Toledo and Paris, and translated the works of the Greek philosopher Aristotle from Arabic into Latin.
He became court astrologer to the Holy Roman Emperor, Frederick the Great, who invited him to his court in Palermo and where Scott apparently cured his illnesses, impressed him with astrological theories and successfully predicted the outcome of the Lombard War. He also continued translating the works of Aristotle at the emperor's request.
When he found an Arabic work called "The Secret of Secrets", legend has it that it became the foundation for his magical powers, and he travelled to Sicily and became an adviser to popes Honorius III and Gregory IX.
His powers of prophesy saw him predict his own death by a blow to the head from a small stone, and as a result he constantly wore a solid metal helmet - even in bed. The only time he removed it, they say, at the insistence of a priest, Scott was struck by a pebble which fell off a church roof and killed him.
Another theory is that he died in Melrose, and was buried in the town's abbey, a story favoured by Sir Walter Scott who believed the legendary figure was buried there near a cross (to drive away his demonic followers) alongside his books of magic, "on a night of woe and dread".
The novelist and poet also believed himself to be a descendent of the man often described as "the most renowned and feared sorcerer and alchemist of the 13th century". He immortalised him in the ballad "The Lay of the Last Minstrel", in which he says the Borders wizard "cleft the Eildon hills in three and bridled the river Tweed with a curb of stone", splitting them into the three peaks that today overlook Melrose.
He was also immortalised in Dante's Inferno, and the Ettrick Shepherd, James Hogg Scott, contributed to his mythical status too, with both writers exaggerating what little was known about him.
And many years later Scott reached a whole new contemporary audience when he was the basis of a BBC Scotland children series, Shoebox Zoo. In it, he plays a "good wizard" guiding young Marnie McBride.
On her eleventh birthday she finds a wooden box which reveals a fantasy world of ancient forces battling to find Scott's mysterious book of knowledge - and making the legendary man a real life counterpart to J.K. Rowling's most famous fictional creation.
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