Letters / Autonomy? What autonomy?
Stuart Hill appears to believe that Shetlanders had complete ‘autonomy’ or even ‘sovereignty’ before the marriage treaties of 1468 and 1469. It seems very unlikely that the kings of Norway would have concurred with that view.
They had, over the years, confirmed their position on the matter. Several of them arrived here in person to rally the troops, the last being Haakon IV in 1263.
Sverre Sigurdsson in 1190s put Shetland under his direct rule, removing it from Harald Maddadsson’s Earldom of Orkney.
Magnus VI when he agreed the Treaty of Perth in 1266, ceding the Western Isles and Man to Scotland, specifically reserved Orkney and Shetland to his own ‘dominium’, usually translated as ‘sovereignty’.
The land was valued for the calculation of scat, the King’s land tax, and representatives were sent from Norway to collect it and uphold the royal authority.
It has been argued that the law administered in accordance with the lawbook until the end of the sixteenth century was essentially that operation in Western Norway.
None of this is to say that Shetlanders did not have some say in their own affairs but there seems to be no evidence to suggest that they enjoyed ‘autonomy’.
Linda Riddell
Lerwick
